From Mark Cuban's blog comes a long post about why the tradition model of the movie theater no longer works. Finally someone is taking another look at things and trying to make them better:
The experience that a 16 year old expects is going to be completely different than what a 35 or 55 year old expects.
When a 16 year old goes to a movie, there is absolutely nothing at all wrong with answering your cellphone, talking back to the screen and texting your heart away during a movie. The movie is just there because its better than doing the same thing sitting or walking at the mall, or hanging in your buddys smelly bedroom again, listening to his mom yell at him.
It's like he's talking to me man. The whole movie experience sucks and we are going to less and less of them. For $25 I can by the DVD brand new and eat whatever I want at home, pause the movie, rewind, have subtitles, whatever.
It costs us at least $20 just to get in to the movie at a theater and on top of that the whole experience sucks. No thanks. If it wasn't for the whole “getting out of the house“ thing I'd probably never see a movie in a theater again. If things change the way that Mark is trying though, well, that's a whole other ballgame...
Thanks to Darren for the link.