I was shocked to see one producer selling a video on a popular download site, shot in 640 x 480 resolution with very blurry screen caps for $14.99. Details on the video say it was shot in 2009. I would have expected to either see a re-mastered higher-res version, or a highly discounted price. But to charge the going rate on an older, low quality video doesn't seem right to me, when other producers are providing such higher quality material at a similar, or even lower price.

Sample photo is at the same size as these videos, and looks just as blurry.

What do you think? (see poll)

As the old saying goes, a thing is worth what someone is willing to pay for it. And there is a demand for older content even if lower res than current material. So definitely not removed unless the model(s) or producer wants to do so. But clear labelling so people know what they're getting is definitely a must.

MM recently added a bunch of automatic flags that will indicate if a video is very short, or low resolution, along with the existing one for whether there is sound or not. So UMD purchasers at least should be aware what they are getting.

This sounds more like an issue for whoever owns the download site to make sure resolution and publish date are clear, which is the case on every WAM-centric download site I've ever seen. Then if the producer wants to repeat it in the product description, that would be cool too. But I'm not one to tell people what to sell their content for. The seller will learn what it's worth when it gets no sales.

That said, one of the reasons I hate using screengrabs for promotional photos is the low frame rate/shutter speed of video inevitably makes it not as sharp as a real photo taken at photo-centric settings. I can only imagine that being even more exacerbated on a 480p video. And to think we used to eat that stuff up and thought it was the best thing ever.

How about an option so that readers can add answers to polls that don't have enough answers supplied?

Hmmmmmmmm

That would be cool, but I only use the existing poll feature, I didn't create it and can't modify it. That's MM's baby. In the meantime, don't do the poll and type your answer as a comment.

There are some older videos that are no longer available that, I am sure, are in poorer video quality than one would expect in 2022. Videos that I missed out on when they were offered, let's say ten or more years ago but that fit nicely with what I like in a video (hot woman, nice pies, good script, etc.). If those videos suddenly became available I would pay $14.99 for them.
The store owner in your case may have the sales that he/she wants without lowering the price. If this vid is not selling well due to poor quality, he/she may lower the price. I am sure producers here can tell you stories of videos they thought would sell great and tanked and vice versa. In short, the market determines. No way should it be removed nor should the owner be forced to lower the price.

I have some of the original MessyFun videos in 320 x 240 pixels. That's ridiculously tiny, and to top it off, they are blurry as hell too.

To illustrate this, I've uploaded a 1080 pixel screen cap with the 320 pixel, blurrier version superimposed for comparison.

But Messyfun began in 1991 and their website started in 1995. (basically, when the www began) In those days, everyone had dialup, and the lucky ones had 56k "high speed" dialup. Only tiny videos could be downloaded, and even then, it would take an eternity to finish.

What's more, video cameras were not digital and generally used film which had to then be 'digitized' with some further loss of clarity, color and quality.

Would I pay $14.99 for each of that size of video today? Absolutely not, but I would pay $24.99 for a bundle of such videos, if there were enough in the bundle. Producers who are still in business, and in possession of older, low-quality clips, could sell them and price them as such, and make some extra money. But marketing them and pricing them as though they are up to today's standards is not cool in my books. Usually we can see the video details if we look for them, but often we get excited by content and buy in a hurry without checking.

Gotta go with caveat emptor here. I can't tell you how many times I've accidentally bought the wrong version of a product at the store because the packaging looked almost identical to what I intended to buy--damn you, "reduced fat" cheese. But nobody's going to issue me a refund because "I didn't read the packaging carefully." Maybe some stores will if I raise a big enough of a fuss but it is what it is. Not the seller's fault that I was lazy.

The difference with wam videos is that we seldom see cheese on a package and get all excited and turned on and buy it on impulse. That usually gives us more time to think clearly and read the label. But I suppose it depends on the type of cheese.

I agree with TheSpecialist here, regardless of excitement, it's really down to the buyer to check what they are getting. Customers can always decide a product isn't worth the money and not buy, or buy something else instead, and producers can adjust their prices to suit changing market conditions. But there certainly shouldn't be any coercion to force lower prices, as I said previously, a thing is worth what someone is willing to pay for it, and it's up to the seller, not the buyer, to decide what price they think any given piece of content is worth.

I do agree that information about size and quality should be clearly and prominently displayed, and here on UMD at least it is, detail of the video size and frame rate is shown in a standardised way for all stores, there are prominent automatic warnings triggered where videos are small, low-res, or very short. I've attached what shows up in the store for a couple of my oldest scenes.

The first image is for scene gm-2m05 featuring Nurse Wendy in a uniform skirt in the mudbanks. Technically that's actually a photoset, it was done long before I was shooting outdoor scenes on video, but the still camera it was shot on had an option to record very short video clips as well as take photos. So I included two such clips in the set. But between them they only come to 27 seconds, and MM's system has correctly flagged this up as "very short video", prominently displayed above the "Add to Cart" button, and I'm happy that it is shown, as I don't want people buying scenes and being disappointed, so if lack of video is an issue, I'd sooner they were warned about it.

The next two images are for an even older set, though being a dungeon one this was shot on video, gm-2f03 featuring Nurse Wendy and Lady Full-Wellington custardising each other. But it was filmed using a DV tape camera, and is only at 720 x 400 resolution, plus it's a silent video as back then I didn't realise the importance of sound to some customers - nowadays our scenes have full sound. Again, MM's system has correctly and automatically flagged up that there's no sound and that it's relatively low-res by modern standards, above the Add to Cart button. But it's 22 minutes of fully clothed messy video in which the action starts almost immediately, plus a large and detailed photoset, there's a free "trailer" which is a full wash-off to show the video quality and resolution, and a detailed description telling a buyer what happens in the scene, including that only one of the two girls gets her hair messy. I think that's enough detail and samples for any potential buyer to make an informed decision on whether that particular scene is worth $7.50 - which is only $5.25 to us once the UMD commission is taken off.

Note I voted for the "clear info" option in the poll but do not think anyone should be forced to lower their price. That would defeat the whole point of a "free market".

Edit: Also, bear in mind lots of people watch WAM videos on their phones nowadays. They might prefer smaller files that don't eat acres of phone storage memory, and not need extreme resolution.

I honestly wish more modern producers would offer a low-res option. Very few people, models or otherwise, can withstand the harsh scrutinizing eye of a 4K camera. Lower resolutions got the job done and left a little more to the imagination. Plus if I'm downloading stuff I don't really need to dedicate terabytes to my collection when I know I'm only going to ever watch a very small portion of it again.

I've been releasing "lo-res" versions of 1080p scenes since... 2014? And finally, the entire collection of HD scenes is now available in the Original DL Store with smaller file sizes at 480p. (But otherwise identical.)
SlapstickStuff.vidown.com

Occasionally someone screws up and orders the wrong resolution, in which case I always let them switch it for the one they wanted. Seems churlish to penalize them for an honest mistake.

Scenes shot in full 1080p but downgraded still look better than the original 4:3 scenes from my first decade, although I will admit those early videos had a certain charm, and sometimes the lower resolution worked in their favor. (Certain shaving cream crust pies look less "fake" in lower quality.)

I personally don't shoot in 4K because the file sizes would be enormous and too many customers would have issues. As it stands, I still occasionally have to re-render a 1080p scene at a lower bitrate (like I'm doing at the moment) to get it under the 1.5GB UMD limit.

Charging more than $1 a minute is a flex and your content better be good enough to charge that much. Something shot on a cell phone in the model's bathroom.... ain't it.

I always try to put out clips in the highest quality available to me. And, if I'm uploading to sites with any form of limits it often feels like vandalism if I have to reduce the file size to fit (even if it doesn't necessarily reduce the quality)

I say this. On one site every single clip I put out gets two releases, one as high as possible and another much reduced in quality and file size... the latter makes up around 20-25% of my sales.
Both clips are the same price.

Obviously of course, there's some really old low res stuff kicking about (actually, I have some 20+ year old splosh content I filmed which if the people in question ever said "you know what, let's re-release them" I would feel the quality is rather lower than I'd like to put out. Even if they do look good on phones.

But, like anything, it's a sellers market. If a clip is $14.99 then it's $14.99 if you don't wish to pay that price you don't pay it but you don't get the clip, regardless of its age or quality.

I guess somewhat I get the idea that perhaps it could be sold with a new lease of life at a lower price or as part of a classic package - buuut - one sure fire way to get people to not buy your content is to tell them it will be cheaper in the future.

I sell my videos at Xcream, which is online video store in Japan.

A short while ago I had a questionnaire to my customers about what they place emphasis on when purchasing videos.
It was Check-all-that-apply question, but the percentage of respondents who checked "video quality" was only 18.5 percent.

By the way, Xcream system is just like YouTube.
Producers upload high quality videos to Xcream server, and Xcream encodes the videos.
If producer uploads 4K video, the server encodes it to 4K, 1080P, 720P and 480P at moderate bitrate.
Customers can stream or download (only if producer permits it) the video at each favorite quality.

Amen to that! I've seen too many newer vids shot on phones, sometimes with bad lighting, shaky shooting, and other issues, yet they charge the same as a producer who is using actual video equipment, lights, tripods, etc.

I think perhaps we, as buyers, just need to slow down and make sure of what we are buying. Yes, videos come in different resolutions, but some are just plain blurry and old. The system here is good at flagging short or low-bit-rate videos, but not so on some other download sites.

One final suggestion for any store would be to flag older content. There are a couple of websites advertised on here who have not updated any content in many years. Joining their site gives you small photos and small videos, and if you had joined in the past, you'll probably already have all of the content you want saved to your hard drive. I know it's not up to MM to go through what his advertisers are selling, but it might help to know if it's older and low-res content.