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Warner Bros Announces Acquisition of Flixster and Rotten Tomatoes
by Ethan Anderton
May 4, 2011
Back in January of 2010 it was Flixster, the movie discovery application company with over 25 million worldwide users per month, that decided to acquire the popular movie review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes. Now today Warner Bros. has revealed that they have acquired both of those popular movie-loving sites. The plan is to take Flixster, with its wide membership base, and expand its services beyond movie discovery to enable digital content ownership and delivery across any connected digital device. This includes WB integrating their Digital Everywhere application and more for digital content acquisition.
Once again, in this acquisition, both Flixster and Rotten Tomatoes will have their sites remain independent so members need not worry about losing either of them. Flixster is currently the number one movie discovery application on mobile platforms with over 35 million downloads to date, including Android, Blackberry and iPad, and ranks among the most downloaded of all iPhone apps. Rotten Tomatoes is one of the most trusted and influential brands in movie reviews with over 12 million unique visitors per month. Warner Bros plans to keep it that way while still expanding their digital ownership initiative. It's an interesting strategy to be sure, but I can't help but think there's a conflict of interest with a studio owning a movie review site like Rotten Tomatoes. I guess we'll see how that pans out soon enough. Thoughts?
13 Comments
1
Slowly, "Yogi Bear"and other steaming piles of WB crap start to climb towards 100% on Rotten Tomatoes....
Voice of Reason on May 4, 2011
2
The first thought that comes to mind is "conflict of interest" just like you write. Who would trust a studio owned review site to be impartial?
Andreas Climent on May 4, 2011
4
I'm thinking that rotten tomatoes will no longer be a viable source of truthful movie reviews.
MrMcgregg on May 4, 2011
5
yeah its kinda weird, can't help but wonder if 'warner' movies will start getting higher ratings
dave on May 4, 2011
6
Miss Congeniality 3 100% book it.
Asadaa on May 4, 2011
7
RIP
Thetesterman on May 4, 2011
8
Congrats to the Flixter team! Hopefully the website will not get "corporate" under the Warner rule. If you're considering a replacement for RottenTomatoes, Metacritic.com is the way to go with its great review aggregator that in my opinion beats that of RT. And if you're looking for an alternative movie social network, you can always try our Filmaster - currently available at Filmaster.com and in Apple's app store, providing personalized movie recommendations in your area. Android app coming soon.
michuk on May 4, 2011
9
The Changing of the Guards have always been an interesting event:-) it can bring about famine or feast.
Bettybmusing on May 4, 2011
10
Looks like there's now a vacuum for reviews. Man, just when I felt I had a handle on RT's percentages. You have to read between the lines. Was it ranked high because it was good entertainment, or film festival artsy good? Some of the highest ranked movies on RT are also some of the biggest yawn fests ever. Now I'll need to keep an eye out for a trend toward bias. uggg.
Aaron04 on May 4, 2011
11
Any review aggregator site should never be owned by a sole coporate entity that is in a business that has other coporate entities in the same field of business. Ultimately it would come down to conspiracy theorists thinking that reviews could be inflated towards the sole owner, which in this case is Warner. I myself use Rotten Tomatoes to help me decide if I should watch a movie in the theaters or not because in actuallity, about 85% of the time I agree with what the reviewers say. Either the RT staff sold their souls for a grand fortune, or it was for something better we may never know. Some new neutral site out their will come rising.... or other sites such as metacritic will have a boost after the wake of this take-over. Thats my 2 cents.
Mike Cromley on May 5, 2011
12
I guess all the negative reviews for crap WB films will mysteriously vanish...
Anonymous on May 5, 2011
13
Conflict of interest idd. What's up next for grabs, imdb.com?
David Banner on May 5, 2011
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