YouTube today announced that it is going to start offering movie rentals. The site is going to start small, offering some films that will be featured at the upcoming Sundance Film Festival, but hopes to branch out from there by working with other film distributors to gain access to their catalogs.

According to the announcement:

Independent filmmakers have been critical contributors to our platform ever since we launched our site, almost five years ago. In that time, we’ve increasingly come to understand some of the challenges facing these filmmakers: technology has made it easier and cheaper than ever to produce films; more films have led to more competition for audiences; more competition for audiences has led to more films needing massive marketing budgets to cut through the clutter. And these high costs have made it difficult for independent films to compete, leaving too many films going unseen.

The first films will rent for $3.99 and be viewable for 48 hours. YouTube plans to let movie companies set their own terms, something that the companies will undoubtedly like more than consumers!

The plan is to launch the service this Friday January 22nd:

On Friday, we’ll post another blog to walk you through how to find and start watching some of these independent films.

What do you think? Good idea? Bound to flop? Add your thoughts in the comments!

Source: Yahoo! Finance