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Movielink to Enable DVD Burning

By Nate Mook, BetaNews

July 17, 2006, 1:21 PM

Movie download service Movielink has taken the first step in enabling its customers to copy their flicks onto DVDs by licensing burning technology from Sonic Solutions. However, it's not clear if the feature has the backing of any Hollywood studios, or when it would launch.

The software provided by Sonic will include copyright protections to prevent a customer from making further copies of the DVD. Currently, users can only watch the movies they download on their computers using Windows Media Video technology, and the movie industry has been hesitant to rock a lucrative boat.

Studios worry that faster broadband connections will lead more consumers to download movies and take away from physical disc sales, in turn angering major retailers. At the same time, the industry is fearful that by not facilitating the process, users will turn to illegal downloading as they did for music.

Digital rights management issues could also hold back the feature. Copyright protections on DVDs have proven easy to circumvent, and Hollywood is concerned about giving consumers more opportunity to pirate movies.

Still, Movielink was founded by a consortium of movie studios, and it may have the best chance of breaking new ground when it comes to movie downloads.

"We are anticipating an industry resolution to establish rules for converting secure Internet-delivered Movielink downloads into a secure format compatible with DVD players," Movielink CEO Jim Ramo said in a statement.

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By geebee2656

edited Jul 17, 2006 - 9:43 PM

When you said:

"Studios worry that faster broadband connections will lead more consumers to download movies and take away from physical disc sales, in turn angering major retailers. At the same time, the industry is fearful that by not facilitating the process, users will turn to illegal downloading as they did for music."

This does accurately access the problem. But it is of Hollywood's own making.

But concerning the physical disk sales at retail outlets; this is already dropping and will continue to drop.

Downloading, one way or another is here to stay.

The other side of it is that there are kiosks already in a number of smaller outlets across the U.S., and could easily be adopted by big stores to make up for disk losses.

For Hollywood to only have their main strategy be to sue people is a losing cause.

They are allowing the downloads, but as you say, it's only able to be watched on the PC platform, unless and until the studio investors release this technology to be used.

It's Hollywoods' fault because they've just sat around for the most part and done nothing, hoping the problem would go away.

Score: 0

By mathue

posted Jul 17, 2006 - 2:45 PM

Geeze, what is the deal with using Windows Media Player?. It can't be that hard to protect mpeg2 which is what DVD players use natively.

Score: 0

By speedmeister

posted Jul 18, 2006 - 8:21 PM

2 reasons. First WMP has the largest installed base of users. Second, the file sizes tend to be substantially larger for MPEG-2 than they are for WMV, Divx, Xvid, H.264, etc.

CSS which is used by virtually all commercial DVD discs has become too easy to break for the motion picture. If it were effective that wouldn't be so many bootleg copies of films on P2P networks. The only reason it is still used is because it would be impractical for the motion pictures studios to sell their films using a scheme that none of the current DVD players support.

Score: 0

By pjlasl

posted Jul 17, 2006 - 2:18 PM

another lawsuit on its way?

Score: 0

By xyzcb1

posted Jul 17, 2006 - 4:59 PM

if movielink is making money. or they can use movielink as scapegoat for decline on movie sales and box office. if they make good movie, people will pay to go see it. of course, that's not the case for the last few years.

Score: 0

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