Hollywood classics ignored online

FROM VARIETY: Digital downloads only catering to newer films

By Scott Kirsner of Variety -- Video Business, 8/26/2008

AUG. 26 | FROM VARIETY: Citizen Kane and The Godfather top the American Film Institute's list of the greatest movies ever made. James Cameron's Titanic still holds the record for biggest box office take, and Annie Hall, Star Wars and Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs are part of Roger Ebert's personal pantheon.

But almost a decade after consumers began legally downloading movies on the Internet, none of those titles is yet available for digital purchase or rental.

While download sites like iTunes and Movielink offer recent releases and scads of library titles, there's a void when it comes to some of Hollywood's greatest -- The Wizard of Oz and Schindler's List among them -- and some of its top-earners.

Read the full story on Variety.com.

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