RSSNBC Universal Licenses Content to P2P
By Ed Oswald | Published November 18, 2005, 4:57 PM
Marking the first time a major studio has agreed to work with a peer-to-peer service, NBC Universal on Friday announced a deal with Wurld Media, creator of the legal Peer Impact P2P service. The agreement would allow users to download Universal movies and NBC TV events for a fee.
Customers would be able to "rent" movies from the service and view them within a 24-hour window. NBC said that it wanted to give its viewers another way to access the studio's content in a way that protects it from illegal distribution.
Unlike other P2P networks, Peer Impact itself is the only authorized user that can upload content to the network. The company says this prevents illegal content from being transferred through its servers.
The service already offers downloadable video games, and music that is either in MP3 format or protected using Windows Media's DRM technology.
Some of the movies slated to become available through the service include "Ray," "Meet the Fockers" and "The Bourne Supremacy." TV shows will include "Jerry Springer: Uncensored" and the company's "Blind Date" franchise, among others.
Family-friendly and Hispanic programming are also slated to be offered as well.
"It has been a great honor to work with the executives at NBC Universal with whom we share a common vision for the future of this consumer marketplace," said Gregory Kerber, chairman and CEO of Wurld Media, in a statement.
Last November, Wurld Media inked deals with Sony BMG Music Entertainment, Universal Music Group and Warner Music Group to sell songs and albums from the major labels through Peer Impact.
Unlike current online music stores that distribute songs directly from centralized servers, Peer Impact relies on the bandwidth of its users. Some pundits have wondered if Wurld Media is simply latching onto the P2P hype to save distribution costs, and whether paying customers want to receive their music downloads from other users.
"I see the 'legal' peer-to-peer sharing concept as fundamentally misunderstanding why people trade songs to begin with. If file traders are looking for free stuff, what incentive would they have to pay for it?" questioned Jupiter Research senior analyst Joe Wilcox.
Ooh, how generous and pioneering of a huge company to take on the P2P model.
Get real - every megacorporation loves the idea of offloading bandwidth issues to it's consumer base whilst still imposing all DRM restrictions.
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Let's see, pay money to download and watch a tiny compressed version on a PC, or watch it on a big screen TV without compression for free. Tough choice...
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Gee, I wonder if this company is related to WurldMedia spyware?
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Whats the point of P2P if you have to pay a fee to access content that only works for 24 hours?
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I THINK this is the same as another story I read.. BUT it explains the P2P part.. in that only NEW content may be put on by the CREATOR of the site.. it works like this.
You pay to download a tv show and you can watch it over a 24 hour PERIOD.. BUT then you HAVE to keep it available for download, from you, for an ADDITIONAL 30 days!!! so you have to PAY and you have to use YOUR bandwidth to send it to people as well!! Now, if this were a FREE service, and was paid for by sponsored ads, maybe.. but making you pay THEN sucking up your bandwidth for 30 days after as well is kind of ridiculous.. I THINK, not positive, I read a better worded story over at the IMDB (Internet Movie Database). This story was not as clear on why this is a p2p service.. but, its just crazy talk to me.
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It's not P2P if only they can upload.
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my interpretation of that is that only they can add new content, but once you have downloaded the content, you bet your a** you'll be uploading it too.
I'd prefere "unauthorized" P2P programs with legal content.
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Peer Impact gives you a system credit for uploading that goes into your account so you can use the credit to buy more content and with the recent adition of games on the Perr Impact network you can earn a credit off the trial games without purchase.
So lets dispel the Upload Myth Right away
As for the 24 hour viewing window this is the same for Pay Per View on the cable and satelite TV networks .
This is new territory for the media companies and they are experimenting with several bussiness models to see what works.They also use the same usage rules for the MPAA owned Cinemanow service that has had lackluster sales so thier attiude may change when they see that the sales are low.
Remeber even doing a deal with a peer to peer company must of been a big hurdle for NBC .
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