HDTV Almanac - More on DVD Killers

[alfredpoor]

On Monday, I wrote about the evidence that the DVD market is fading (and taking Blu-ray’s hopes with it). So of course, I immediately found one more bit of evidence that adds more weight to the conclusion.

NCR and MOD Systems announced on Monday that they were launching a new line of digital movie kiosks that [...]

[url=http://www.hdtvmagazine.com/columns/2009/11/hdtv_almanac_more_on_dvd_killers.php]Read Column[/url]

[DavidEC]

I have always hated movie rentals!!
{IF I am going to pay to watch a movie once I will go see it in the theater!}
So as long as I can ''Purchase a licence to watch" (kind of like you can currently do with Amazon streaming video's) then I really don't care if the media is 'disc' or 'memory card' or 'streaming video'...
As long as:
(A) I don't have to pay to watch it each time!
(B) I can ''fast forward to my favorite parts"!
(C) It is the highest video quality "HD"
(D) Licence to watch can not be revoked! {AKA: Amazon Kindle & 1984}
I can say so long to the DISC format.
:David

[alfredpoor]

I don't think that there's anything in the SD card rental system that would not let the company meet your requirements for rentals. I think your "license to watch" will have a time limit on it of some sort, or else there's no difference from purchasing the movie. It is possible that they can do a system similar to what Netflix and Blockbuster do; you can only have so many movies at a time, and you'll lose one when you rent the next. I would not have a problem with that, and it sounds as though it would meet your requirements.

I encourage you (and everyone else) to let Netflix and Blockbuster know what you want from a digital-delivery movie rental system. We're in the spaghetti stage right now, and if you want to make sure that your choice is the one that sticks to the wall, speak up. It takes a surprisingly small number of consumer inputs to change the direction of a company's plans, especially if you're already a customer (or a customer of their major competitor and are willing to switch).

Alfred

[DavidEC]

I don't think that there's anything in the SD card rental system that would not let the company meet your requirements for rentals. I think your "license to watch" will have a time limit on it of some sort, or else there's no difference from purchasing the movie. .... .... Alfred

As long as it does not end up being.. (hold for it....) DIVX DISC ..where the media was tied to machine 'XYZ' so you could not take the movie to a firends house and watch it..

[akirby]

I have always hated movie rentals!!
{IF I am going to pay to watch a movie once I will go see it in the theater!}

Movies - $64 - $80 for 4 people including drinks and popcorn

Home rental - $16 including drinks and popcorn
unlimited pause/rewind
better sound
extra features (for disc rental)
more comfy chairs
no driving

There is a difference between watching it once in the theater and watching it once at home.

[DavidEC]

Phone calls, yelling kids (or in my case pet birds mocking parts of the movie), not a special event, and it almost always takes me more than the rental time to be able to watch the 'special features'.

So I will take watching it once in the theater any time over at home.. and remember what is also happening to many rentals is you only get the MOVIE and not the extras.. there was an article about how the studios were going to start pressing MOVIE ONLY RENTAL DISC's and have a second RENTAL disc of the 'special features'/ extras if the customer wants it for a second rental fee...
:David
.

[akirby]

With Netflix disc rentals you can get 1 or 2 discs and keep them as long as you want (months even). Or wait until it's available on cable and DVR it.

[regman]

Of course! Now the studios will control all of the content unless you want to risk storing your movies on unreliable, hard disk technology. I predicted the death of removable media several years ago and with memory coming down I am not surprised. I am also wary, having had numerous HD failures since my first computer in 1977. So the convenience of having your entire film library instantly accessible is offset by the reliability of the storage device. Take note that Apple has moved to solid state memory on their newer iPods and cellphones. Unless you can have RAID or some other sort of backup, unlikely with copywrite protection, it's just one more thing to have to rebuy over and over. I have lost movie collections on my DVR as well (when they crashed), and they can pull the plug on that, remotely, if you lag on your bill - you might THINK you have the content in your possesion but you really don't.

You might be lulled into thinking this is some technological leap - maybe not. I won't broach where all of this internet (or satellite) bandwidth is going to come from. The current infrastructure won't handle it - not if we're all doing it.

If they are going to sell content, only, then they should sell a license for the content so it can be replaced if damaged or your system crashes, like any other software. Even upgraded as newer technology, compression algorithms, etc. emerge. I have also advocated for this in the past. Dream on...

Any ideas about how to "own" your purchased content in the 21st century?

[alfredpoor]

Regman, I can understand your frustration, but there's another possible future that could be good. For example, if you try to access a Web site from your computer, you don't have to maintain a database of all the possible Web sites in the world on your hard drive in order to get to the one you want. Instead, the "cloud" of Internet routers maintains that information for you. So long as you have access to the Internet, you can get this information for free and get to the site you seek.

People with digital cable service who use the DVR functions often don't have the content stored in their set top box; it resides back on the cable company's servers. Yes, you relinquish some control this way, but on the other hand, your information is automatically kept on a redundant storage service and gets backed up regularly, and you don't have to do anything.

So I envision a possible future where your entertainment content will reside largely -- if not entirely -- in the cloud. The difference between "rent" and "buy" (which typically is only a usage license, even when you buy a disc) will be the length of time that you can access the date or some other restriction. Will this give you the same control as you'd have if you had bought a physical disc? No. But conceivably, you would be able to access the content wherever you are, without having to drag your DVD player with you. So I think that while it may not be the same, the disadvantages could be offset by the advantages. And since eliminating the physical media will reduce costs at every step in the delivery channel, I expect that costs will go down rapidly. (How much less does it cost to download a single track from a CD compared with what it costs to buy the entire physical CD?)

I'm not promising that this will turn out well; Hollywood and the networks have demonstrated that they are capable of totally irrational behavior. I do think that there's a good chance that the change from physical disc to electronic delivery of movies and other video content will ultimately be to the consumer's benefit.

Alfred

[ccclvib]

Not to change the subject, but I've been hearing about the "death of CD's" for how long? Admittedly, they no longer sell at the same rate, but as long as there are folks like me who want to make sure there is a fool-proof way of storing their music, I think there will always be a market. Same goes for DVD's. SD cards may be almost as fool-proof, but it's still something of an issue - and, as long as the storage on the card has a time limit on it, I'm not interested. Sure, I may want to see a movie once and only once, that will take care of whatever means I want to use to get access to the data, but if I decide I want to keep the movie, I'll still want a copy I can use indefinitely. DVD, at least at present, seems to be the means to do that.

As far as "cloud computing", unless I absolutely know I can expect the company who provides the service to stay in business indefinitely - and in this economy, who's that? - I don't think I want to trust that either. I use the "cloud" for some things already, but I still download those items I want to be certain I can access. Same for digital entertainment data as far as I'm concerned.