Warner Bros’ iPad Special Editions: A #FailWin

Last night Mashable posted an article about the new iPad “special edition” apps for Inception and The Dark Knight.

The very first thing that came into my head: “Finally! Why on earth has it taken so long?” The second: “This is gonna be awesome!” And 30 seconds later: “Crap, this isn’t gonna be so awesome.”

Warner Bros is making the typical monster corporation move and severely limiting the free version of the app. If you want the full experience (which does look pretty cool) you need to shell out $10-12. That gets you a digital download of the flick and full access to bonus features.

$12 ain’t bad, but here’s the #fail: these iPad “App Editions” will not sync to the movie being played on any other medium. So if I already own Inception on Blu-Ray but still want to use the nifty tweet-my-favorite-quotes feature of this app while watching Ellen Page be hot, I’m out of luck. We know the sync technology is available…so WTF?

Why would people want to migrate from their HDTVs to watching movies as epic as these on SMALLER screens? (aside from the portability argument) But still: the second screen needs to enhance the viewing experience, not limit it. I’d be willing to pay $12 for an app that works in harmony with my Blu-Ray disc.