Apple And Fox Renting Movies On iTunes?

With Blockbuster Entertainment raising prices on its DVD-by-mail service, it seems like the death bell has rung for Netflix’s primary competition. Now it looks like Apple may be giving the company a run for its money as it enters into a rental deal with Fox pictures that will allow people to download movies for a limited time via iTunes.

I can only guess that the limited time window of the rental will be enforced through some sort of stronger Digital Rights Management than Apple currently utilizes, since their current market is movie and music sales, not rental. Speculation is all we have right now since, despite the news being picked up by Variety, The Wall Street Journal, and other major channels, neither Fox nor Apple is talking about the deal at this time.

The home rental market is suffering greatly, and even Netflix, which is considered to be a more successful approach, reported a drop in market shares last quarter according to Reuters. Another distribution channel could add further injury to an already damaged industry.

The big question is how will consumers take to the idea of renting instead of buying over iTunes, and how long will any DRM go before being hacked? This is the sort of thing that a lot of online users view more as a challenge to be broken than a service being provided. Something tells me clocks will start counting down the hacking of the rental DRM as soon as Apple makes a formal announcement and the movies pop online.