It should have been hard to figure this out.  The music industry can’t even choose its own right strategy, but when others drive the industry (through developments like MP3s in the last decade) they win.  Perhaps record executives should start listening.

Oh, wait.  Too late.

Get ready.  Here’s a selection from a survey Netflix is sending around to customers:

• “Imagine that Netflix offers its subscribers the ability to instantly watch movies & TV episodes on their iPhone. The selection availability to instantly watch includes some new releases, lots of classics and TV episodes. There are no advertisements or trailers, and movies start in as little as 30 seconds. You can fast-forward, rewind, and pause or watch again. The movies & TV episodes you instantly watch are included in your Netflix membership for no additional fee.  Whenever you want to instantly watch content on your iPhone, your iPhone must be connected to a Wi-Fi network (such as one you might have at home or at work, or in public places like coffee shops, book stores, hotels, airports, etc.).  If this functionality were available, how likely would you or someone in your household be to instantly watch movies & TV episodes on your iPhone via a Wi-Fi network?”

TechCrunch chimes in here.

Twenty bucks says Steve Jobs is a big part of this one.  We’ll know when Apple shares their plans for the future of media either later this month or later this year.

via Disney renegotiating Starz deal, might pull movies from Netflix streaming — Engadget.

Patently Apple picked up a very recent patent application for DVR technology likely to be employed by Apple any day now.  This promises to (if we’re lucky) finally blur the lines of distinction between local content sources.  In other words, perhaps when combined with the Home Sharing feature recently added to iTunes, we’ll no longer have to figure out whether the latest episode of Big Bang Theory is on the Mac, the AppleTV, the iPod, the iPhone, or still somewhere out in the cloud (perhaps at the giant MobileMe datacenter being built in the Carolinas?).

Expect to either see the role or layout of iTunes to completely change.  This is probably why Apple’s invested so little in Front Row of late, instead choosing to allow it to continue looking like AppleTV 1.0.

More here: Apple’s Media Players will One Day be Both Portable TV & DVR – Patently Apple.