In Stores Soon: Perishable DVDs

Makarand writes "Technology that renders optical media useless after a short lifespan will soon find its way into stores in the form of perishable DVDs. Retailers in the Southern United States will soon start giving a sample DVD to buyers of a CD (by Nappy Roots, a hip-hop group). This promotional DVD from Atlantic Records will work for only 8 hours. This promotion is aimed at finding if music fans would be interested in buying a package with both audio and video instead of just plain audio. A special dye sandwiched between the layers of the DVD will interact with air making it opaque and unreadable later. If this media catches on you may not have to return your DVD rentals in the future." We noted this 2.5 years ago.

Comments

So copy it the first time you watch.

[BoomerSooner]

Pathetic attempt at locking out consumers once again.

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[rmohr02]

It doesn't seem that bad--as of now they only use these as samples. If they want me to buy one, screw them (o wait--I haven't bought a CD since 1998).

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[AKnightCowboy]

The cost barrier to breaking the copy-protection would be much higher than with other methods because after 8 hours the hacker would need another disc. The hacker would need to track down a _lot_ of free samples to be able to analyze the disc properly.

Since this says it interacts with the air, wouldn't the resourceful hacker just setup his environment in a vacuum chamber? If he really wanted to crack the disc without it "expiring"?

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[uncoveror]

Good for you. All consumers should join you in not buying CDs. Boycott the recording industry!

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[jez9999]

The hacker would need to track down a _lot_ of free samples to be able to analyze the disc properly.

Not necessarily. The 'hacker' could merely copy the entire DVD's raw data to a proper DVD, within 8 hours. Problem solved.

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[ninthwave]

Well the comment on rental movies using this just made me think. Doesn't this sound very wasteful. From a plastic production and disposale sense. It is bad enough we have millions of AOl cds that you have to find something to do with but now you will have dvd coasters with them. There are only so many coasters one household needs before this just becomes more filler in the tip (dump for the Americas)

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[SonicBurst]

And this could be way out there, but if the stuff reacts with air, couldn't you just spray the surface with some optically clear but non-air permeable gunk? This of course assumes said gunk exists, but I'm sure it does.

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[YrWrstNtmr]

And there are ways around this as well.

Figure most users run Windows 9x and above. Further, figure most users have AutoPlay turned on (by default).
A .inf, that pops up a warning message, and then ejects the DVD is quite easy to write.

"You may not play this in a PC-connected drive." POP.

Joe average will then say hey, I guess I can't. And proceed to watch it on his TV, and not copy (unless just to the VCR).

Doesn't work for all, obviously, but for a good percentage, it creates just another layer to get through. Most will give up eventually, and just watch it.

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[general_re]

Since this says it interacts with the air, wouldn't the resourceful hacker just setup his environment in a vacuum chamber? If he really wanted to crack the disc without it "expiring"?

Gonna need some fancy cooling in the absence of any air for your system's fans to move around. Maybe this is the first practical use for those liquid-nitrogen overclocked systems ;)

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[Oculus Habent]

Something tells me that even though he hasn't purchased a CD since 1998, he has still obtained some new music.

However, I do agree with dontbuycds.org in that the RIAA is in violation of anti-trust laws.

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[uberdave]

So send them back when they expire.

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[Herkum01]

I was thinking about this, and I was wondering, which is more wasteful, a disposable DVD, or driving X miles round trip to and from the video store to return them. If you are going back to the store anyways it is no big deal but to just drop them off, it depends.

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[flymolo]

Why the vacuum chamber? A truly resourceful hacker would do a bit for bit copy and the reverse engineer the rest from that. Resourceful in hacking means least effort.

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[Neon Spiral Injector]

I could easily tell people to hold the shift key while putting in a CD/DVD that does this.

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[ninthwave]

But you have to add in the collection % of petrol used for waste collection and this may depend on how often you rent movies. I used to rent one a night because I worked nights and daytime tele was not geared towards me. So in the 3 years I worked nights that would have been an average of 700 of these in the rubbish but the video store was between my work and home relatively.

It all does depend so the question is will they give you a choice?

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[Cpt_Kirks]

Why use DVD+/-R when CDR works fine? Convert it to Divx or VCD.

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[Cpt_Kirks]

Give a coupon for some amount off the next disposable DVD to people who return the "used" DVD. Recycle the plastic. Make the return/recycle a *BIG* part of the advertising.

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[ninthwave]

Or put them in your tea :)

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[Anonvmous Coward]

"Good for you. All consumers should join you in not buying CDs. [dontbuycds.org] Boycott the recording industry!"

The problem there is that a resulting sales decline will be attributed to P2P. What's that mean? Think SSSCA round 2.

An alternative approach would be a surge of spending with indie bands, or a surge of spending on used music that the RIAA gets no royalties on. You gotta send the message: "We're happy to pay for stuff, but we're unhappy with doing business with the RIAA."

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[ivan256]

Joe average will then say hey, I guess I can't. And proceed to watch it on his TV, and not copy (unless just to the VCR).

I'm realated to a Mr Joe Average. He bought a consumer DVD recorder for his television, and returned it to the store angrily when he realized he couldn't copy the DVDs he rented onto blank media.

Joe average may not know about how the technology works, but he's also not willing to pay for something that removes functionality that he's previously had with video tapes.

Similarly, my mother only listens to CDs on her headphones that are pluged into the CD-ROM drive of her computer at work. Guess who isn't going to be buying any copy protected CDs.

The copy protection battle will be won by Joe Average.

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[Squareball]

I don't CDs because there isn't much to want to buy. I mean what do you get, the latest RAGE AGAINST THE KORN BIZKIT album? The latest from Creed or NSync or the latest barbie doll 16 year old singing half naked? nah.. no thanks. I have seen a drop in CD prices though. I have seen a lot of CDs at Best Buy for 11 bucks. I purchased my first CD in over 3 years the other day.. it is the latest from Tanay Donnelly (Throwing Muses, Belly, The Breeders) Any way, give me something worth buying and maybe i'll buy it.

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[_ph1ux_]

exactly. thats one issue that has the possibility of being a deterent to thinks like this - the pollution and environmental resposibility. we do not need 400 million CDs flooding the landfills.

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[YrWrstNtmr]

Oh I agree completely. And my hypothetical only prevented/slowed down copying via the PC, not a DVD player/recorder.

Removing previously held functionality, in the name of "preventing piracy", seems to be what they are about, and I think it STINKS.

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[uberdave]

Not so fast there! The carbon used in CD production is bound in a form that is unusable by the boisphere. With vehicle emissions, plants can use the CO2 immediately.

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[DarkZero]

Is a little DVD really that much more wasteful than the cans, cardboard boxes, plastic containers, and plastic bags that our food from the grocery store comes in?

Deprive yourself of some Cheetos or cookies every time you rent a DVD and I think you're more than even.

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[ncc74656]

Since this says it interacts with the air, wouldn't the resourceful hacker just setup his environment in a vacuum chamber?

I doubt you'd need to go to that trouble. It's more likely that the disc reacts only with some particular component of the atmosphere (it's most likely that it would react with oxygen, since oxygen likes to react with stuff). Put your computer and the disc in a big box, flush it with nitrogen or carbon dioxide (dry ice would be easiest to handle...drop in a chunk and wait for it to sublimate), open the disc in the oxygen-free environment, and go to town. Since carbon dioxide is heavier than air, you wouldn't even need to close the box...just seal the cracks with tape so it doesn't leak out. You might want to put a cover on it once the disc is loaded up, though, so that air currents in the room don't find their way into the box and contaminate it.

(Hmm...does this mean dry ice will be outlawed by the DMCA as a "circumvention device?")

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[NewWazoo]

While this would be nice, the fact is that only the RIAA has a voice in the media. If their actual revenues decrease (not % revenue increases, as has been happening - think about that), they'll scream bloody murder and buy some more draconian legislation that you'll be powerless to stop. And you'll hear all about it on CNN, MSNBC, Reuters, etc, etc, etc.

And you know what? All the indie labels that are now rolling in cash will get one editorial article in the Washington Post and NYT.

Fact is, the RIAA has borked the market bad and the only way to deal with them is to artificially reintroduce some sanity. Good luck.

Brandon

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[kasperd]

after 8 hours the hacker would need another disc.

Who says the hacker would need more than 8 hours? Why would he even need more than 2 hours? All he has to do is read the disk. If he can read what the reader reads, and he knows what else the reader does, it takes no longer to copy the disk than it takes to read the disk. This is really not a question about cracking a disk, this is all about knowing what your drive and or software does. And you can find out about that beforehand. Once he has the disk in his hands he will already know what to do with it. This will take less than 8 hours.

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[matrix29]

You dont need to copy it. Just use something non permiable to coat the edge of the disk. Something like finger nail polish might work. That way air can't get to it.

Or you could just strip off the metallic layer and recoat it with a shiny metallic coat.

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[uberdave]

Perhaps we can kill two birds with one stone so to speak. Just paint the time sensitive dye on old AOL CDs. :-)

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[slittle]

you'd prolly have to polish the fuck out of it so the laser can still focus..

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[Jace of Fuse!]

Spray on clear-coat, perhaps?

That's a very interesting idea.

I personally was thinking I'll just copy the damned thing the moment I take it out of the wrapper. If they're going to try and fark me, I don't mind breaking one off in them.

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[Alsee]

couldn't you just spray the surface with some optically clear but non-air permeable gunk?

I'm sorry, but gunk has been found to be illegal under the DMCA, we no longer sell it. I'd give you a recipie for gunk, but that's illegal too.

-

Re:So copy it the first time you watch.

[ninthwave]

No because then someone would just come up with a way that it would play itself into a buffer and write back to the rewritable bits as they became available. But the idea is that the media is not stable but physical degrades in a time frame a rewritable would not fit that security method.

This is great!

[FyRE666]

If this media catches on you may not have to return your DVD rentals in the future.

Yet another way to contribute to the environment. Let's just dump more trash rather than get off our lazy asses to take the DVD back to the shop... Jesus...

Re:This is great!

[Anonymous Coward]

Walk a mile. Human beings walk for short distances. That's what the things dangling down from your chair to the floor are. Try it some time!

Re:This is great!

[Spudley]

Silly git. You're ignoring the cost of taking the DVD back to the shop. If you have to drive even a mile, it's better for the environment to landfill the DVD.

Some of us walk to the shop.

Re:This is great!

[sql*kitten]

Yet another way to contribute to the environment. Let's just dump more trash rather than get off our lazy asses to take the DVD back to the shop... Jesus...

What would be great for the rental market is a disc on which the data fades after a period of time, but the disc itself is fine, and reusable. You could then take your disc back to the store and get a new time-limited movie imprinted onto it. This would massively reduce the physical resources consumed by the industry.

Re:This is great!

[FyRE666]

This is a pathetic excuse - rarely do people jump in their car and JUST take a DVD back to the shop without doing anything else (shopping etc). Much of the time a person returning a DVD will hire another anyway, in which case they would have made the trip for that reason. This is all assuming they have to use a car in the first place.

Of course, you can try to argue that the sheer weight of the DVD will cause teh vehicle to use extra fuel I guess...

Re:This is great!

[kramer]

Actually, I wrote an e-mail to the company developing this when the story ran 2.5 years ago -- I'll quote the response in full (Yes, I'm a packrat):


Thank you for your comments. We have been sharing your frustration as the new reports have failed to report this product will be a recyclable. Just a drop the disc in the bucket next to the butter container and milk bottle. It also eliminates the car pollution of returning the movie to the store. avg. 10 miles and 1/3 gallon of gas.

We appreciate your concern.

SpectraDisc


I still think it's a stupid idea, but it's moved from monumentally stupid to moderately stupid.

Re:This is great!

[TheGreenLantern]

Not in America, Commie swine!

Re:This is great!

[YeeHaW_Jelte]

This is a stupid argument for a whole other reason too, because the DVD is going to be moved anyway, regardless if it's deposible or not, unless you're planning to have a nice landfill in your backyard. Enviromental issue are too often mucked up by this kind of tentative reasoning.

Re:This is great!

[Damek]

Which begs the question, "How many people will actually recycle it?"

Here in NYC we can't recycle glass any more. Stupid mayor. Now they want to institute a "pay as you throw" garbage tax, which I think is actually a good idea, but only if they reinstate full recycling.

So anyway, how will these things be recyclable? They're part plastic and part metal, right? They really need to educate people & city recycling programs about how and where to put these if they're truly going to be responsible about their products. ...as we all should be responsible for what we produce and consume...

Regardless, surely having no physical matter at all is the best solution! Ah, but then we have to worry about how dirty the computer chip manufacturing process is. Trying to be responsible is so damn frustrating sometimes! Maybe I should just give in and pollute to my heart's content!

Re:This is great!

[Hadlock]

you're obviously unaware of the fact that near half of their rentals on the weekends (where most of their buisness is done) are by teenagers, or college students (with cars) that have little else on their agenda, and spring at the chance to use their car. all throughout high school for me involved 1, and sometimes two trips to blockbuster on the weekends for "movie night"s. we would routinely start up the car for no better reason then to drive down to block buster, and then back to the house once the selection was made. and then another trip, usually around 5pm on sunday, when the new releases were due back. that's 3 cold starts of an engine with less than 2 miles, round trip in 3 days for videos. this happened at least 3 times a month where i lived.

don't get me started on those "30 dvds in 30 days for $20 deals durring christmas...

Re:This is great!

[Eccles]

Not in America, Commie swine!

Don't be such a cold war relic. It's socialist swine now.

Re:This is great!

[cheesebot]

and this is also a great reason why i can't imagine video rental stores actually promoting this (or divx) because much of their business model is based on bringing the customer back into the store for returns - they're likely to rent or buy something else while they're there. it's like a guarantee that your customer will come back. not so with this disposable crap.

Re:This is great!

[wings]

Just a drop the disc in the bucket next to the butter container and milk bottle.

I imagine they are recyclable... in theory.

I remember when juice boxes/pouches were introduced in the U.S (25? 30? years ago). In order to get consumers to accept the new packaging, part of the push in the advertising was how environmentally friendly they were because they were recyclable. When finished, you'd just toss them in the special "juice container recycle bin" at your school or wherever. Since those containers were introduced, I've NEVER seen a "juice container recycle bin" or any other recycle facility that will accept them. I also expect that if disposable DVDs are introduced, there will be few, if any places that accept them either.

Re:This is great!

[Will_Malverson]

Let's see...

A DVD is 120mm in diameter and 1.2mm thick. That puts its volume at 1.2 * 60^2 * pi, or 13572 mm^3. That means that a DVD's volume is about 1/74000 of a cubic meter.

Assume that every American buys 10 disposable DVDs per year. That's 3 billion of these things that wind up in the landfill, for a total of around 41000 cubic meters.

Switching to American measurements, these would fit into a one-acre, 30 foot deep hole. There are plenty of places in the Nevada Desert where you could dig such a thing.

Or, think of it another way: If you threw away disks like this every time you rented a movie, by what percentage would it increase *your* personal trash output? For me it would be well under 1%.

On the other hand, assume that each DVD rental results in one extra mile of driving to return it. (Yes, I know you could walk, but the places I usually rent from are 4 and 9 miles away.) That results in an extra 3 billion miles of driving, or at least 100 million gallons of gasoline burned. Given that 1 gallon of gasoline results in 20 pounds of pollution (mostly CO2 and H2O), that's 1 million tons of pollution.

So: One acre hole in Nevada, or 1 million tons of pollution. Your choice.

Re:This is great!

[IXI]

that have little else on their agenda, and spring at the chance to use their car

so if they don't have to return DVD's they'll find another stupid reason to waste oil. Thus junk DVD's don't save any fuel.

Re:This is great!

[kubrick]

So: One acre hole in Nevada, or 1 million tons of pollution. Your choice.

How are you going to move all of these discs to that hole? Magic? I'd say some fuel might be expended in the effort... how much does pollution is produced by all the garbage trucks in the US for a year? What's, say, 0.5% of that?

Re:This is great!

[mr_gerbik]

Assume that every American buys 10 disposable DVDs per year. That's 3 billion of these things that wind up in the landfill, for a total of around 41000 cubic meters.

Not every American owns a DVD player. HOWEVER.. most Americans do have a mailbox, and where there is a mailbox there is an AOL CD every freaking month (but hey.. maybe some people just don't realize how great AOL 8.0 is yet).

My real point is.. don't worry about the prospect of the added trash these DVDs MIGHT create.. why not worry about all the trash we are already creating with all of our other disposable goods.

-gerbik

Re:This is great!

[IWX222]

Surely a biodegradable plastic that would be suitable for making DVD substrates out of wouldn't be that difficult, surely? I think starch - based biodegradable plastics are in use for carrier bags at the moment, and if the dye breaks down on contact with air, that only leaves the label to break down

Re:This is great!

[jred]

I will give them credit for the argument that it eliminates the pollution and consumption involved in returning a video rental, and while it's hard to compare different environmental costs like increased landfill vs. increased driving, personally I think tossing a DVD would be better for the world than driving 10 miles.

Hmmm. I wonder how much petroleum (sp?) it takes to make a DVD (for the plastic & for the manufacturing process). It would be interesting to see how that figure compares w/ ~1/3 gal. gas.

Re:This is great!

[jred]

I almost never go into the store when I return a DVD, I just use the drop box on my way to work. I'd guesstimate that most of my friends use the drop box, too.

Re:This is great!

[NeuroManson]

"Hmmm. I wonder how much petroleum (sp?) it takes to make a DVD (for the plastic & for the manufacturing process). It would be interesting to see how that figure compares w/ ~1/3 gal. gas."

Remember kids, every time you view a DVD, you're supporting terrorism...

Re:This is great!

[operagost]

I thought those were my testicles.

Re:This is great!

[hfcs]

They pick up drink boxes (and other similar containers as part of our curbside recycling program. Our guys are pretty vigilant about leaving anything that's not recyclable in the blue curbside bin (ie empty quart motor oil bottles), but they've never left juice boxes.

Maybe I'll try an AOL CD and see what happens. :-)

Re:This is great!

[irc.goatse.cx troll]

"How are you going to move all of these discs to that hole?"

I figured we'd frisbee them in.

Re:This is great!

[sacherjj]

Actually, I ride a bike to the shop.

Re:This is great!

[Dun Malg]

BTW weren't there bacteria discovered which ate PVC's ?

Not in real life. You're thinking of the movie "Andromeda Strain", and in that case it was a virus.

I think DVD's (and cda/cdrom's too) are made of the same material as common (uhhh old-fashioned) records, which is vinyl.

They're not.

Re:This is great!

[BreakWindows]

My real point is.. don't worry about the prospect of the added trash these DVDs MIGHT create.. why not worry about all the trash we are already creating with all of our other disposable goods.

It's much easier to shoot down a new idea than to reverse the habits people already have. It's also easier to put pressure on a company trying a new and risky idea, than to pressure a corp like AOL into not marketing.

I say do both....reduce your current usage of stupid, disposable nonsense AND stop things like this before they start.

Re:This is great!

[telstar]

"Now they want to institute a "pay as you throw" garbage tax, which I think is actually a good idea, but only if they reinstate full recycling."

• "Pay as you go" for garbage is the single biggest mistake New York City could ever make. If you want to see trash thrown out everywhere EXCEPT where it should be thrown out ... adopt the "pay as you go" scheme. The parks will be littered. The streets will be littered. Every alley will be littered. People will use public trash cans for their personal garbage. People will burn the stuff. Pay as you go is a tremendous mistake. While it may make economic sense ... the reality of the situation is that the majority of New York City residents will not accept such a scheme, and it will lower the overall standard of living in a city that will be overcome by litter.

Re:This is great!

[Damek]

I dunno, a few other places that I would regard as more reliable and trustworthy on this issue than Slashdot posters seem to suggest that Pay As You Throw should at least be piloted in NYC. Even the EPA is for such programs...

Re:This is great!

[Russ Nelson]

And what were you doing for the environment while walking to the shop? Nothing. There's still an opportunity cost involved in returning the DVD back to the shop.
-russ
p.s. it's obvious when non-economists get involved in economic thinking: you get an oxymoron.

Seal it - and use it forever

[terminal.dk]

Just seal it with some translucent airtight coating, and you can use it forevert.

Low tech solution to a high tech problem.

In the future...

[Dim_Slashdot]

we will buy expensive hard drives that are designed to fail after a short time...

Oh wait... we already do.

Re:In the future...

[FyRE666]

we will buy expensive hard drives that are designed to fail after a short time...

Don't Fujitsu already sell these?

hm..

[nick-less]

This promotional DVD from Atlantic Records will work for only 8 hours.

seems like plenty of time to rip the content ...

Oh they think they're so clever then..

[Scooter]

Notice on the disk will read "You have 8 hours to listen to this music"

Geek reads "You have 8 hours to rip this data to your RAID 5 dedicated music storage facility".

hehe.

Recycling?

[dr_dank]

Can plastic discs like these be recycled? It seems wasteful to line landfills with these things.

Re:Recycling?

[Matey-O]

Can plastic discs like these be recycled? It seems wasteful to line landfills with these things.

Actually, if they line the landfill, it'd be a bonus if they DIDN'T degrade...then the landfills wouldn't leak.

8 hours?

[RedWolves2]

8 hours is plenty of time to rip and make an MP3 out of it.

Re:8 hours?

[bsharitt]

Why do you want to turn you video into an MP3.This will only make it harder to watch.

Re:8 hours?

[RedWolves2]

Good point! I meant MPG (or Divx), it was a slip of the finger, honest. ;-)

Re:8 hours?

[Omnifarious]

I hope you meant an ogg. :-) Of course, the video bits of ogg aren't there yet. Give it a year or so.

Re:8 hours?

[RedWolves2]

Interesting...I never heard of ogg. I had to look it up. I'll have to give it a try and see how it compares. Thanks. ;-)

Re:8 hours?

[RedWolves2]

sarcasm my friend, sarcasm. ;-)

Re:8 hours?

[Omnifarious]

*laugh*

I'm rather tireless about this. History has shown over and over how people who use patent encumbered data formats are at the greedy whims of the patent owners.

Buy and immediately rip!

[EllisDees]

Seriously. The first thing I'd do with any DVD that is going to self-destruct is make a copy of it. This is just a dumb idea all around.

Re:Buy and immediately rip!

[mekkab]

Not if you sell blank media! Given your 8 hour time limit you won't be able to wait for the rebate deals at Best Buy the one time you run out.

So just make sure...

[countach]

folks that you make a backup copy as soon as you buy it.

Summary...

[MosesJones]

You buy something that breaks after a few hours, its then just plain trash.

So apart from being bad from an environmental, consumer and most other perspectives this is a good thing because it helps push up the pollution rates even further.

Re:Summary...

[btellier]

Oh good scrod.. you probably burn that much gas (plastic is made from the same core materials) getting back to the video store. The environmental argument should have no place in this discussion.

Re:Summary...

[btellier]

You remind me of one of a self-righteous animal-rights oriented vegetarian. She won't eat beef, but you better believe that Prada handbag is real leather. You can't possibly complain about disposable DVD's unless you never (drawing on recent personal memory) buy water in a plastic bottle, use plastic utensils, have a non-electric car or clothe a child in a disposable diaper. Any of these is as bad or worse than DVD's, so don't complain about a negligible plastic loss, complain about the real issues. Unless of course you're a caveman (that's not really a career).

I'm curious

[iceT]

Why is the entertainment industry so hell-bent on NOT giving us entertainment?

You'd think that will the failure of DivX (the Circuit City one), they they would realize that when someone buys something, they expect to keep it...

Even for Video rentals, I wonder if we're SUCH a disposable society that creating this much waste is worth it.

Re:I'm curious

[fferreres]

They are giving the DVD for free. The bad thing would be the bad uses of this technology (like with every technology, nuclear, etc).

Remember when CD where promoted as a "lifetime" buy, never downgrading it's quality. Hehe.

Re:I'm curious

[iceT]

They are giving the DVD for free.

This time, sure. But WHY don't they want us to keep what's on it, especially if it is free?

It has to be a market test to see if it works. And if it does, what will they use it for?

More Trash

[Seldon_21]

DIVX! Think about the waste. "If this media catches on you may not have to return your DVD rentals in the future." The rental chains business model is based upon you not returning them on time. So why would they go for this idea? and Where do you think that get there money from?

Re:More Trash

[jeremyacole]

You have a good point. Their model is based on you not returning the videos on time so they collect late fees. But, if you think about it, it's also based on you actually *returning* the movies, as well. You're probably something like 50% more likely to rent *more* movies if you already have to go back to the store to return the old ones. I know I am.

In any case, I really don't think Blockbuster and Hollywood Video are going to warm up to the idea...

Re:More Trash

[entrigant]

"Where do you think that get [their] money from?"

Assuming only 10 people EVER rent a movie and the movie rental cost is $3.50 then they make $35. That is well above the price of most DVD's. Now imagine if they get a total of 100? Late fees are a source of revenue however it is by far not their only source.

Re:More Trash

[jred]

There's a really cool independent video store here in Memphis that doesn't charge late fees. They'll start calling you after a week or so, and eventually charge the DVD to your CC, but no late fees.

Granted, they specialize in non-mainstream flicks, but they're doing good business.

Just what we need

[Rossalina W Sanchez]

When will we wake up and smell the mocha lattee and start to realize that we have landfills filling up with trash and that the space available for trash on planet earth is finite.

The whole disposable philosophy that consumers embrace shows how short-sighted and self-centered most people are.

I for one am concerned about my children and their children and will never use one of these if at all possible. Then again I don't own a car (I jog or bike ot take the bus when I have to) and use recycled materials whenever possible.

Easy

[JediTrainer]

Stick the DVD in your computer, and you have a few hours to make yourself a good copy (either to your hard disk or to recordable DVD) and you're good to go.

Am I missing something? If I know that a disc will go blank, I'm going to just copy it to something that won't destroy itself (at least in the next few years).

Or throw it in the recycle bin.

[laetus]

Are these things recyclable? If so, toss them in the bin.

Re:Or throw it in the recycle bin.

[will_die]

I live in Germany were they have fairly high recycling laws.

When I asked about CD when I was turning in some batteries I was told to toss them in the bin where non-recyclable items are put.

Re:Or throw it in the recycle bin.

[zapfie]

As I understand it, CDs are not recyclable, because of the layer of metal sandwitched between two pieces of plastic, that isn't very easily separatable.

Yes, let's start adding DVD's to the landfills...

[rdean400]

I'm not an "environmentalist", but this is just plain ridiculous. Sheesh, it's bad enough that AOL sends out gazillions of CD coasters every year.

The ironic thing is that a lot of the people who are producing these are in Hollywoold.

Decomposing dollar bills

[cdf12345]

Too bad I couldn't put the same coating on my dollar bills that would cause them to decompose as soon as the MPAA or RIAA touches them.

seal it

[rkoot]

would it be a big problem to, say, seal the edges of the cd with maybe a glue on silicon base or something ?
if the air can't reach the dye in between, I guess the cd stays readable, no ?

a just a thought.

rkoot
I'm not as think as you drunk I am

Re:seal it

[Hadlock]

clear nail polish sounds like a good starter. that way, it has less mass and is less likely to destabilize the disk while it's spinning

Re:seal it

[Skip666Kent]

I think the dye is light-sensitive, not air-sensitive.

Re:seal it

[Skip666Kent]

I was wrong. Sorry!

They could easily make it light-sensitive, though.

Eight hour life? How about shelf life?

[jeepliberty]

Is it hermetically sealed? What is its shelf life if it isnt't opened? I recycle my AOL CDs as Christmas tree ornaments. Tis the season!

Irony alert?

[TheConfusedOne]

Ummm, gee, didn't you register to SlashDot?

What is so darn evil about having to register to read an article at the NY Times? It's not like you can't just register as Bill Gates or something there.

Better yet, register as that Spam Queen from the other article. :-D

Re:Nothing new here

[demon]

After a few years on the dash of a car, it all becomes "Best of Queen" anyway...

Perishable media - patent, and vacuum drives!

[krazyninja]

This patent #
6,161,106, was granted to Motorola, in 2000. While this depends on a magnetic method, it is interesting to know that the current referred method depends on interaction with air. How long before "mods" are made to have a drive enclosed in vacuum??? :)))

Yet Another Circumvention Technique

[limekiller4]

What do you want to bet that giving it a quick spray of clearcoat will render the disk substrate isolated from oxygen yet still useable?

What is to stop me from making a copy that is less unstable, for that matter (the article actual touches upon this at the end) once the price of blanks come down? A right, I might add (and we all know) that is codified in the Fair Use clause of Copyright law.

I'm gonna go out on a limb and say this isn't happening anytime soon.

Could make sense for the video rental biz..

[debest]

The big problem with Divx was that you needed a proprietary (and more expensive) player, along with privacy-invading dial-in features, in order to use it. The public said "nah-uh", and the format died deservedly.

This sounds like it should work in standard DVD players, and require no phone-home function. The "disposable rental" could work here.

The issue for the video rental business is that it needs to be priced *lower* than a standard DVD rental. Since most people would view the inconvenience of a time-restricted view as greater than the benefit of saving themselves the return trip to the rental store, there must be a cost-saving component for the consumer to accept this. This means that the cost of production and stocking of these one-time useage disks must be substantially less than the cost of re-stocking of returned rental DVDs.

Now that I think about it, maybe the perfect application of this would be the rental-by-mail business: only one-way shipping charges! This doesn't seem to be a market with very large room for growth, however.

Re:Could make sense for the video rental biz..

[JPelorat]

It doesn't have to be less.. in fact, it could be a little more - the offset being that you don't have to take it back.

Blockbuster already charges more for their new releases *and* you have to bring them back sooner than the older ones.

Of course, we're already talking about sub-$1 differences here, so it's not really a big deal either way.

Fortunately...

[Rayonic]

Fortunately I live in a Neon/Argon atmosphere, so this shouldn't be much of a problem for me.

Re:Fortunately...

[eyeball]

Fortunately I live in a Neon/Argon atmosphere, so this shouldn't be much of a problem for me.

Unfortunately for you, living in a Neon/Argon atmosphere is now illegal under the DMCA, as it circumvents copyright protection.

Your mission...

[GnomeKing]

This DVD will self destruct in 10 seconds

Your mission, should you choose to accept it is to assasinate general kERROR READING DRIVE E. (A)bort (R)etry (I)gnore

Re:Your mission...

[nounderscores]

That is the funniest thing I've read in a long time! thanks for a good laugh

Again I post my same little thought...

[Eric_Cartman_South_P]

...that when they do things like this, it proved that THEY HAVE LOST.

Stand back for a minute and look at the big picture. Take a breath, take a minute, and think about it. They encrypt their content and then store it on self destructing disks. HA! It's so pathetic it's funny. If there was ever an example of the dead horse (Rosen?) getting another whack (DMCA?) this is IT. They lost.

Imagine the munks, years ago, using disapearing ink in their scrolls so you didn't have time to read it long enough to place letters on a plate at a printing press! Same shit. Different day. "DISTRIBUTION" is dead. If any 5 year old can publish themselves WORLD WIDE 24/7, then the business of distrobution (of "information") is dead. Ever see a little kid make a homepage on AOL? They do... it ain't XHTML but it's there for the world to see 24/7. Tell me again why I need YOU to publish my info for ungodly sums of money? Tell me again why I should listen to one artist for one hour at a time on obsolete media?

Re:Again I post my same little thought...

[pavera]

Or do they not have for Linux yet? Ever heard of a grammar check? Or does MS Word not do that properly still?

Re: Again I post my same little thought...

[pjrc]

To say that "they" have "lost" implies that there's some sort of contest, competition, war, etc, with clearly definable winners and losers. MPAA vs hackers, RIAA vs consumers, or something like that, or maybe some other contest? Just because someone invented a self-destructing disc and some media company is giving it a trial run for distributing a free promotion is somehow an indication that "they" have "lost" this (undefined) contest?

Yeah, that's +4 insightful. So is...

If any 5 year old can publish themselves WORLD WIDE 24/7, then the business of distrobution (of "information") is dead. Ever see a little kid make a homepage on AOL? They do... it ain't XHTML but it's there for the world to see 24/7. Tell me again why I need YOU to publish my info for ungodly sums of money?

Well, assuming you're an indie band or film maker, if you take the "throw up a webpage" approach, you'll be in fine company with many other no-names. The reality of today's market is that most people (at least in the US) gain exposure to music by listening to the radio, and movies by viewing big-budget advertising (television, newspaper, billboards, etc).

I would suggest to you that "they" are "winning" as long as the mainstream population learns of new entertainment and makes their entertainment spending decisions based on advertising which "they" control.

When/if someday a good portion of the population discovers new entertainment and makes purchasing decisions for entertainment based on indie-accessible channels (internet), then I'll be convinced that "they" have "lost". In the meantime, a trial run of a new media type (that sucks) means nothing.

Re:Again I post my same little thought...

[pavera]

ROFLMAO!!!
right so Word's spell check isn't that great either we can see.

Great

[fizban]

More "disposable" technology to fill our landfills with...

Yay for Environmetal Pollution!

[RAMMS EIN]

OK, this is great news for those who favor environmental pollution through waste of resources! Now we no longer have to depend on AOL for sending us all those free CDs to fill our thrash cans, but we can also pay for media that we can throw away because they're useless shortly after!

Re:Yay for Environmetal Pollution!

[vidarh]

The question is whether the discs will pollute more or less than the average pollution of people travelling to the rental outlet to return discs. It's not automatically a given that creating waste is a bad thing if it has positive effects that outweigh the problems it cause. I'm not saying that it is good, just that automatically assuming it's bad because it create waste isn't very constructive.

Re:Yay for Environmetal Pollution!

[mikerich]

To be fair this is better than the AOL disk...

These ones give you 8 hours of useful content, the AOL disk on the other hand...

Best wishes,
Mike.

Re:Yay for Environmetal Pollution!

[vidarh]

Of course. The point is that it is not a given that one is worse than the other, and you can't automatically assume that something is worse because it generates more trash until you've looked at what, if any, improvements it makes other places.

More trash in the landfill is only worse if the environmental impact of manufacturing, distributing and disposing of that extra item and having it on the landfill add up to be worse than the environmental impact of anything it replaces - in this case potentially extra trips to hand the discs back.

As a general rule reducing the amount of trash is good, but when you're reducing it by replacing the trash with something else (like travel with a polluting vehicle) then you need to factor that in as well.

Re:Yay for Environmetal Pollution!

[vidarh]

You are making a whole lot of assumptions, and the point of my message was exactly that instead of making assumptions like these, you need to carefully look at the environmental costs, because it's far from being as simple as you assume.

First of all, you are assuming that everyone will return the disc to the video store while you're running errands. From personal experience I know for a fact that not everyone does it as part of other errands. I don't know how many people do it as part of other errands, how many do it on foot or by other non-polluting means, how many use ridiculously polluting cars, how many use electric cars or other less polluting vehicles (electric cars pollute too, both in that there's likely to be pollution involved in power plants supplying the energy, and because driving one will wear it, shortening the lifespan and thus contributing to pollution in the creation and disposal of more electric cars) etc. And neither do you. In other words we can say nothing about how much pollution will be generated from people returning discs.

And can you tell me exactly what amount of pollution is generated from pressing a disc? What about this new type of disc? No? Didn't think so.

You are also assuming that no recycling is in place, and that these new discs can't be made in a bio degradable way - considering that these discs are designed to become unusable, everything would point to possibilities for using materials that will decay quickly for the rest of it as well if possible and cheaper than the alternative. Do you KNOW what the time for degrading this new type of disc is?

You are further assuming that the volume of non degradable material created will be large enough to more than make up for the effect of reduced pollution in returning discs. Considering that this new disc doesn't need to be well protected (it's unusable after a few hours after use, after all), they might not supply them in big bulky plastic boxes etc., do you know how much larger this volume will be in reality? Truth is, you are unlikely to even know how many more discs will need to be manufactured compared to a normal disc.

The above is exactly why I say you need to carefully look at the impact before you can know whether something has a positive or negative environmental impact.

A good example is cars. Cars have been improving steadily, and a few years ago there was intense discussion in many countries about whether to give people heavy incentives to replace their old polluting cars with less polluting more modern cars. Some people immediately assumed that that would be a better approach, but several environmental groups and other organizations bothered to do the calculation.

Depending on methods used, they came out with everything from immense gains from replacing cars quicker, to immense gains from making people keep their older cars as long as possible (thus polluting more from usage of the vehicles, but less from the manufacturing of new cars).

Regardless of who you think are right, it's a good example that it's seldom as cut and dried as it seems at first glance. There are negative ecological side effects to almost everything we do, and positive effects from some things, and if you want to get an accurate picture of how something, for instance a change in behavior, affects the environment, you need to take all changes that this change in behavior causes into account, not just make simplifying assumptions based on the most blatantly obvious ones.

hmmm

[nege]

While I think its cool not to have to return DVDs to rental outlets(I have had some really bad fines before) it just seems like such a waste of materials. Maybe we could use them as frizbees or coasters. But then what do we do with AOL discs?

"We noted this 2.5 years ago."

[tmark]

I guess things are coming full-circle when Slashdot editors are pointing out the retread stories for us !

So you're the guy they are going after!!!!

[BoomerSooner]

Lol, I don't buy CD's either but it's because I'm happy with my collection from college. Now my wife buys a ton and I get to choose between what she's bought and my old ones.

I've told her of the evils of the RIAA and she doesn't care. However, she does try to purchase them used first (thrifty and hot!).

Maybe this can be hacked

[FearUncertaintyDoubt]

The mechanism works by letting air in to react with a layer of dye. How does the air get in? I would imagine only the outer edge (maybe the inner edge too). So what happens if you seal the outer edge? No air gets in, and the dye doesn't go opaque. I'm sure there is some form of glue or other sealant widely available that can handle this task.

Re:Maybe this can be hacked

[Hellkitten]

I expect the actual media itself can be made to let air through to the dye (through the use of some kind of porous plastic). That would probably be a bad ide for regular media, but these don't have to last more than 8 hours so they can use some kind of cheap shit material that lets the air through.

Mission Impossible

[techstar25]

In Mission Impossible voice: "This recording will self destruct in 8 hours"

Air or light?

[Stavr0]

A special dye sandwiched between the layers of the DVD will interact with air making it opaque and unreadable later.

Hmm, two years ago it was a light-sensitive coating that opacified after multiple playbacks.

Re:Congratulations!

[andyt]

They definitely won't have thought of that. What an ingenious idea.

You'd be surprised. When the first phonecards came out in the UK, (back before the dawn of time/widespread use of mobiles) it was discovered that if you coated the back of them with clear nail polish, then they wouldn't decrease in value...

I think I must have made about a hundred hours of phone calls until BT wised up...

Who Speaks for The Trees? Er... Polycarbonates?

[Levendis47]

Someone should bury the executives and "marketing masterminds" who come up with this drivel under a multi-ton pile of their "perished" DVD's...

Let's add AOL to that pile...

DivX should have been the end of this short-sightedness. Remember that one? Same concept, even worse implementation.

This is actually a trend I've been seeing in large, bloated, over-valued, scared companies. Make the same mistakes and bad business/product decisions over and over and over. Ultimately, make the consumer pay for all your dumb mistakes. Then hunt the consumer down for not playing by your rules.

So how's this for a Fight Club-esque social-hack: find a means of cracking the airtight seal on in-store copies undetected. Of course, then boxcutters and knives will be outlawed in public places... oh wait... already are...

viva le revolucion!,
or something,
Levendis47

Disposable Rentals - NOT!

[RealityProphet]

This technology will never catch on for DVD rental companies. They make WAY too much money off of late fees!

A disc too far...

[TheLocustNMI]

Can you imagine the number of discs this would create? I mean, I've made a lot of coasters in my time -- nothing I'm too proud of, mind you, but this would great a HUGE glut of coasters that will end up in the land-fill!

The ecological matters are huge, not to mention the implementation here. What if I only handle it in the dark, like one of those "darkboxes" they have at the camera store?

Anyway, I may just have to get one of the Nappy Roots DVD's -- gotta support the home teams :)

not exactly 2.5 years ago, re-read slashdot !

[mirko]

Michael wrote: "We noted this 2.5 years ago."

It was actually less than a year ago (Feb 8th 2002)...

Great...

[tmark]

Some company comes up with a way to distribute content in such a way that users can actually listen/view/try it in their home BEFORE buying, and /. readers are busy rubbing their hands in glee at the likely truth that will still be able to rip it off.

Where are the kudos for addressing a supposed itch that so many of the P2Pers out there use to justify the existence of unfettered file "sharing" ?

How long...

[Nomad7674]

...until someone gets sued for allowing the packaging of such discs to be punctured, thus prematurely invalidating the promotional DVD value. I can see the advertiser being FURIOUS if they paid a few million dollars to imprint, say, the newest BMW ad on the James Bond soundtrack, only to find that no consumers can view it because the plastic shrinkwrap failed to keep out enough air.

Seems like a disaster waiting to happen. No to mention that it will drive MORE people to rip this video in order to be able to rewatch it - exactly what the RIAA and MPAA do NOT want.

Re:How long...

[Cid Highwind]

I can see the advertiser being FURIOUS if they paid a few million dollars to imprint, say, the newest BMW ad on the James Bond soundtrack, only to find that no consumers can view it because the plastic shrinkwrap failed to keep out enough air.

Why wait for nature to take it's course here? When these start shipping in the US, I'm going to the record shop with a needle!

quick thoughts

[mirko]

I guess DVD rental prices will however increase...

I'd however appreciate to have such a burner at home, in case I want to send music to some recording label...

Thier entertainment, not ours

[CharlieO]

Hey its thier entertainment, not ours...

[A shady scene in a seedy downtown bar]
Rosen : "And last week we introduced CD's that will hardly play in anything and yet still the sheep buy them"
Valenti : "Heck we released DVD's that self destruct in 8 hours, and they're 'renting' those"
All : guffaw, guffaw
[exunt omnes]

Sad

[CFBMoo1]

It's really sad to see this kind of perishable DVD or anything being put out. It amazes me that an industry who's artists are so pro-environment will allow something so trashy to get out.

Some real uses for perishable DVD's:

1> Replace that aging AOL drink coaster.

2> Great for inner office CD fights. Become a disc ninja to your favorit artists and movie themes!

3> Wow your friends with a new and delghtful style of wall paper. Hopefully the change in the CD will keep it at a pleasing color for wallpaper.

4> Stair case banister decorations!

5> Please the wife by decking out the kitchen with a fancy new tile. Renovating has never been easier and cheaper!

6> Been looking for a neat crash guard for the garage? Look no further! Stack a bunch of these babies sideways in the back and next time your teenager pulls the dodge in you'll have a neat show and the kid can clean up afterwards.

7> And finally.. snow shoes getting worn? A little rubber cement and some handy dandy disposable DVD's and your slip-sliding your way in to fame and fortune.

Do they consumers are morons?

[BigJimSlade]

This promotion is aimed at finding if music fans would be interested in buying a package with both audio and video instead of just plain audio.

Sure we are... why just the other day I bought the new Jurassic 5, Foo Fighters, and Queens of the Stone Age CDs. All came with a bonus DVD, and the album didn't cost any extra... even with the extra disc. In fact, the QotSA album was only $8 the first week it was on sale.

Funny thing is, none of these DVDs will deteriorate. So why would I want this again, oh beloved Record Industry?

I don't? Oh, ok. That's what I thought.

Gee, 8 hours...

[Mysticalfruit]

How long does it take a program like SmartRipper to decode and extract the vobs from a disk? Definity less than 8 hours!

An irresistible challenge

[CatherineCornelius]

They might as well just put a big label on the disk saying 'You have only eight hours. Rip me!' Even if the music is crap, the crackers will not be able to pass on this one.

And how long before someone finds a way to read the 'opaqued' surface?

Not a win for your local Blockbuster

[artemis67]

I say that this technology is as dead as the old Divx format. Blockbuster is counting on two things for increased revenue: 1) the many late fees that they collect, and 2) your coming back to their store and picking up a new movie when you return the old one.

I don't know what the numbers are, but I know that those two points were significant enough financially for Blockbuster to move against Divx. So, what does this format offer that Divx does not?

If the MPAA is insistent on video stores using this technology, I forsee a lot of video stores closing down.

Re:Congratulations!

[Hadlock]

you could probably use clear nail polish on the edge of the media to keep the air from leaking in! unless, of course, all the plastic is permeable.... we'll find out soon enough, hopefully.

and I'm betting it takes...

[Lumpy]

3.5 minutes for this to be defeated easily with a pimple faced 16 year old sales clerk taking a disc and right after opening it, shrink wrapping it or coating it in a clear shellac sealing the air out. yet allowing it to be played.

it will be defeated easily and without much effort minutes after the first discs reach the public.

Blockbuster

[SlamMan]

No rental chain will ever use this. They'd have to either a) store hundreds eachs video of these in thier store to rent out. Think how many differnt videos they have. Now, multiply that by every customer they have. Now, I know they could get away with less, but just think how many copies of lotr or Harry Pottery alone they'd need? Their other option would be b) let the clerks in the store burn them them each time for each customer. This means they're still going to need thousands of these blanks sitting around, and they've jsut giving thier $5.65/h employees the ability to make DVDs. There's no way these wouldn't be hacked to make real dvds.

Luckily...

[Lethyos]

Ripping only takes about 15 minutes per disc. 8 hours is plenty of time to make a backup before the disc goes bad.

Is it just me, or do these kooks do everything they can to encourage movie piracy?

I for one would like to see

[waspleg]

this for video rental places if it can be done in an non-environmentally harmful way

right now my g/f has a $300 fine for having 2 videos that are like 6 mos overdue which is completely insane..

if the tapes had just melted after 3 days or wahtever no one would have any problems

(of course here you see the catch 22, because why would Blockbuster pay extra to NOT get their late fee money which I'm sure is a substantial portion of their income)

Re:I for one would like to see

[quintessent]

why would Blockbuster pay extra to NOT get their late fee money

Exactly.

Blockbuster seems especially treacherous about charging high fees. A friend of a friend thought he had returned a video, but they sent him a notice later that he owed about $150. When he told them the story, they said, OK, we'll only charge you (something like $70). Seems rather exorbitant for a $20 movie.

Re:I for one would like to see

[Carmody]

right now my g/f has a $300 fine for having 2 videos that are like 6 mos overdue which is completely insane..

It is. She should have returned the videos. What a whiner.

Re:I for one would like to see

[invenustus]

right now my g/f has a $300 fine for having 2 videos that are like 6 mos overdue which is completely insane..

$300 / 2 videos = $150 per video
$150 / 180 days = ~83 cents per video per day

Seems perfectly reasonable to me.

Re:I for one would like to see

[FreeUser]

It is. She should have returned the videos. What a whiner.

Amen.

God is real unless declared integer


#define FALSE 0

int God=0;

What color is the sky on your planet?

[adb]

On mine, DVDs contain MPEG-2 data. My official cost-too-much-money copy of LoTR definitely has its share of artifacts. DivX ;-)-encoded MPEG-4 might have more, but DVDs are far from pristine. If disposable disks become common, expect to see luser-friendly DivX rippers with much nicer codecs than the current generation plenty quick.

Fortunately...

[alexjohns]

... I just finished my new PC-in-a-vacuum-chamber case mod. If the dye reacts with air to break down the disc, well, any self-respecting geek would just use the obvious solution of 'remove contact with air'.

I wonder if shellacking would work? Or some kind of Rustoleum all-weather coat? Maybe someone will invent an oil-bath immersible DVD drive.

Those seem like the most obvious solutions to me. Perhaps someone else can come up with something better. Hmm... maybe you could just copy it. No, that encryption system, what's it called, CSS? No, that would prevent copying. Well, vacuum chamber it is, then.

Laywers and Marketers, keep out of our business!!!

[jonr]

This (and many others) happen when laywers and marketers get their mutts in business they don't understand. I don't see engineers looking over the shoulders of the company laywers telling them what to do!
The whole concept of business is more and more ass-backwards, instead of making a product and service at a price that people want, well... I don't really know what to call stunts like this. Stupidity is not the correct word. Maybe we need a noun/verb for "people who have no touch with REALITY, and are living in their own little fantasy world!"
J.

You might be a redneck if....

[r_j_prahad]

Retailers in the Southern United States...

That figures. They's already gots perishable pickup trucks down there. So does this like mean their DVD players is a gonna end up on concrete blocks in the front yard?

Consider the opposite...

[Pooh22]

What if the entertainment industry did concentrate on making movies and distributing them in a free and copyable way and using open standards...

What fun would there be left for the geeks? Nothing to do all day but work(?), watch movies and play music freely... No more "who gets to break the latest copy-protection first". /. could just pack in and die with all those geeks happily enjoying their favorite movies all the time ;-)

Lemme think.....

[Lxy]

Going from memory here.

The earlier use of this mentioned in the article used some weird dye that was on the surface of the disc. After the laser hit it, it started a slow process of becoming opaque, and in a few days it was unreadable. Some college students discovered that a product called "soap" mixed with a catalyst "water" removed the dye and made the CD readable again.

This uses a dye in the middle of the disc, between layers. If air can get in, why can't another solvent? Wouldn't the same technique be true of these discs as well as the previous attempt?

While the future of non-returnable DVDs is dead in my mind, I'm glad to see that the RIAA is finally looking into "value added", giving me a reason to buy the CD instead of download it.

You're Missing the REAL Application for this tech

[Specter]

All this stuff about the rental stores is baloney; the real use for this technology is to make "renting" a movie an impulse purchase that can take place anywhere. Think about it:

What if you could pickup a brand new release while you're on your way through the checkout at the grocery store for something like $1? Maybe you're interested in watching the movie but not necessarily interested in owning it or maybe you just want to check it out to see if it's worth a buy; either way you'd pay a dollar to find out right?

I think the real goal as far as the movie studios are concerned is to get people like BlockBuster out of the way. If a really cheap disposable DVD might lead to a more expensive purchase (say a boxed set with extra goodies) then that's even better for the studios.

It's also not necessarily bad for consumers since you're potentially not risking much to check out if a movie is worth a purchase or not.

As far as piracy goes this could be a big winner for the studios also. What's the point of hassling with ripping a DVD that you might only watch one or twice if you can grab one for about the price of a candy bar when you stop for gas?

Radio

[javilon]

The only reason to do this is to promo the music, but that is what radio is for.
I guess the reason this is needed now is that nobody listens to radio anymore because it has being bought and perverted by the same people that is pushing this...

ironic

Bad Precedent -- dont accept it

[nurb432]

The goal will be to make **ALL** media time sensitive, so you cant actually retain anything and must continue to pay for listening/viewing/reading time.

Would be applicable in the software market too, forced upgrades since your original cant be used after the next release is out. ( using estimated time of next releases )

Or in the case of E-books, ' sorry that document is no longer acceptable speech, that isn't available for lease any longer'

extending the lifespan.

[nobodyman]

I wonder what tricks people will perform to keep the perishible dye from breaking down. Seems to me that a clear coat of enamel and some car wax would do the trick. Also, don't these "CD repair kits" add a clear layer of some goo anyhow? Would this in essence make the media airtight again?

Damn, have I just violated the DMCA?

One Simple Question

[cascadefx]

Do we not have enough trash in the world as it is?!?!?

If the process was reversable, I could see its usefulness. But, just rendering them useless sucks the big one.

We already can't find anything useful to do with the millions of AOL CDs floating about.

Re:Nothing new here

[anotherone]

CDs degrade after a few plays? never heard of that, got a link?

Stupid Question

[NeuroManson]

Polycarbonate plastic (used in CDs and DVDs) is not biodegradable or recyclable in any sense of the term. So how would the landfills benefit from hundreds of tons of DVDs (and presumably CDs when they figure out they can use the same scheme with audio CDs) with a premature death rate?

Time shifting?

[grahamsz]

Hang on a second... everyone here is fighting for the right to time-shift & space-shift things that they own.

Now if i'm vaguely allowed to tivo something off satelite (my satelite company even suppy tivo enabled boxes) then surely i should also be able to time-shift one of these discs.

DVDXCopy just released

[burgburgburg]

One button DVD copying and restoring/backing up to DVD R[W] in, they claim, about an hour, DVDXCopy was just released.

From the people who brought you DVD Copy Plus

R&B, E.

[Pig Hogger]

Rip and Burn early, Rip & Burn often.

Rentals without return sounds familiar...

[nedron]

Hmmm, when Circuit City introduced DivX, it's major selling point for consumers was that you never had to return the disc you rented. If you wanted to watch it later, you just paid another fee without ever having to go back to the store. If you knew you'd never watch it again, you just threw it away. No hassle, low drag.

If something as convenient as that didn't fly, I don't see how an 8 hour disc will be any more attractive.

You laugh...

[Gruneun]

but it brings up an interesting idea that I predict someone with too much time will eventually do...

Picture the case-modders and over-clockers of the world suddenly working on a DVD player and CD wallet that is sealed and pumped with some easily-obtained gas (for example, helium). You have a double-door for loading and then openings with heavy rubber gloves (like the beds for premature babies) to open the DVD and load it in the player. So long as the media is never exposed to the air, the dye never fades.

Hell, if Blockbuster would send my rentals in the mail and I could "rent" and preserve any movie for one or two bucks, while keeping the apparatus relatively small, I could almost justify it. The obvious downside is the emotional breakdown when your gigantic DVD colection is lost to a slow leak.

Re:You laugh...

[glitch!]

Picture the case-modders and over-clockers of the world suddenly working on a DVD player and CD wallet that is sealed and pumped with some easily-obtained gas (for example, helium). You have a double-door for loading and then openings with heavy rubber gloves...

Here is a plan... Get a large plastic bag with the glove and transfer openings. This bag will enclose your computer and oxygen concentrator. You will also need to run power into this bag, of course. Now run the oxygen output tube out of the bag and vent it somewhere. Make sure you have at least 25% more air in the bag than you really need, since you will be pumping the oxygen out (about 20% atmosphere). Voila! You now have a nitrogen environment for your PC. :-)

What, you've never heard of an oxygen concentrator? This is really one of the cool medical gadgets invented. Basically, it is a device that separates nitrogen from air by selective absorbtion. Normally, you are interested in the oxygen, which comes out a small hose. The nitrogen is exhausted out the side. This runs on regular AC, and typically go for a few hundred dollars on ebay.

I have thought many times how cool it would be to build a server room with a nitrogen atmosphere. No chance of fire here! Anyone working on the servers would have to carry in an air supply, which would cut down on frivolous visits and discourage theft :-)

Re:You laugh...

[glitch!]

And at the same time,, you could pump your room full of oxygen :D

At 5 liters per minute, that could take a while... Since a cubic foot is just over 28 liters, figure about 10 cubic feet per hour of oxygen.

how much do these "concentrators" cost? where can i buy one??

Check out ebay, search for "oxygen concentrator". They seem to be going around $300 to $400.

Tit for tat

[edp]

I think self-destructing DVDs are a great idea as long as I can pay for them with dollars printed with disappearing ink.

Re:Inert-gas filled Air-free DVD players

[borkus]

Actually, I was thinking of a submersible DVD player that had some relatively inert gas (Nitrogen, for instance) pumped into its case. You would open the package of the DVD under water and put it directly into the DVD player, which would also be submerged.

Infact, a submersible DVD player would go great with the TV player by the hot tub.

I'll buy it!

[salimma]

It takes, what, 15 minutes to copy the entire DVD to hard disk to then process at your own leisure?

Then again this is only meant as an experiment to see if customers appreciate a/v packages, so maybe they did not put too much thought into securing it.

A/V bundles are very common in East Asia, btw; in Singapore I could get live video performance VCDs for Japanese artists for the same price as buying their album CDs.. about US$15.

How the hell will this work?

[fudgefactor7]

Ok, I get this perishable DVD, and put it into my old as hell, second generation DVD player (not in my PC). How's the DVD player going to know not to play it? Does it flash some EEPROM in my DVD player or something? If so, I'm sueing, because as I see it "any software that does damage to, or causes a functional system to cease functioning" is a virus. Clearly, if it does this, then it's a virus. If it doesn't, then how can this possibly work as a deterrant, unless it wont work in a normal set-top DVD player, which is totally GAY.

Re:How the hell will this work?

[fudgefactor7]

So, what you're saying is that as time goes on, the laser makes the black more opaque and thus unreadable by the laser?

Marking direction

[eyeball]

This is yet another glimps into the minds of the entertainment industry's marketing people. The holy grail is pay-per-use consumer products, which unfortunately is a concept that is fairly new in capitalism, especially in the United States where property laws reflect mostly tangible goods. This helps to explain why companies and consumers are having so many problems with each other.

Anyway, the distribution methods look somethin like this, from most desirable (and most profitable) to least:

Pay-per-Use - Require consumer to pay for each experience (i.e.: theater movies, pay-per-view, arcade games)

Subscription - if pay-per-use isn't possible, require the user to pay a recurring subscription fee for access to the material (i.e.: cable)

Media Ownership - if subscription isn't possible, sell the media in a permanent form to the consumer.

Media ownership is of course the most desired for the consumer. It allows them to experience themusic/movie/etc whenever they want, trade or sell it to friends, etc. Of course it's the least profitable for the industry.

The problem media companies are facing is that, as technology matures, it's allowing consumers to use the media in any way they want. For example, using a Tivo to turn subscription-distributed media into owned permemant media.

What we're seeing now is the entertainment industry scrambling to use laws that were originally enacted to protect companies from each other, and bend them to try and keep consumers from using the media for which it wasn't originally intended.

Here's a hypothetical situation: In 15 years medical science progresses to the point where they fix eyesight with little nano machines. In the process they also give people the ability to record what they watch and play it back (kind of like a Tivo built-in to your head). Thus turning everything you experience into the potential for permenant media. What do you think the entertainment industry will do then? Legislate congress to make all medical nano devices capible of recording motion images be part of a digital rights management royalty payment system, and likely called something along the lines of the Digital Medical Device Copyright Act. That's if the entertainment industry is still alive in the same for it is today, which I doubt.

Flexplay Enviornmental Impact Report

[buckminster]

Like many of you I was stunned that this story is receiving covereage without any comment on the potential environmental impact of disposable DVD's.

A quick search of Google turned up the following:

http://enduse.lbl.gov/Info/VideoImpacts.pdf

Flexplay approached a scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Labs to perform an environmental assessment of the disposable DVD technology.

This report is truly amusing. The scientist acknowledges that he was not given enough time to perform a standard Life Cycle Assessment on disposable DVDs, so instead he calculated the amount of pollution that would be prevented if disposable DVDs were depoloyed as a video rental option. He theorizes that if 10% of all consumers renting DVDs did not have to make a return trip to the video store the envirnmental impact of increased junk being sent to a land fill would be offset by a decrease in pollution.

What a hoot. I guess Flexplay didn't bother to explain their marketing strategy. It appears that these disks are being deployed as promotional items which are handed out for free and are never intended to be returned.

Flexplay is also persuing the Hotel market. Just how much pollution would be prevented if a guest didn't have to walk down to the lobby to return their rental?

If this is the best defense that Flexplay can come up with then we must believe that the potential evironmental impact will be pretty bad.

Are we really willing to trash our planet in the battle against piracy? Hollywood's answer seems to be a resounding YES.

One dumb idea to rule them all...

[DaveOf9thKey]

DVDs that only last 8 hours? But then I might miss that bonus blooper reel where Viggo Mortensen picks his nose during a break on the set of Fellowship of the Ring! Horrors!

Seriously, this won't fly because human beings have an infinite capacity for carelessness -- which Blockbuster has exploited to great success, I might ad. There are too many opportunities for something to go wrong here, not only on the part of the consumer, but the factory workers, the shippers, and the handlers at the grocery stores and mall CD chains where these DVDs will be marketed relentlessly. (Watch once and throw away! Only $4.99!) A couple batches of ruined airtight seals will turn retailers away from this idea in a hurry.

This idea is destined to go the way of the caribou. IMHO, that can't happen too quickly.

Fairly useless.

[OverCode@work]

What good is music if you can't get random bits of it stuck in your head, or select a track from your library to lighten your mood after a lousy day? And how can you possibly do that if there is a time limit on a CD? The same argument applies to movies.

I can see how this might be useful for DVD rentals (but still rather wasteful, error-prone, and inflexible), but otherwise there's no way I'd ever spend money on a time-limited disc.

-John

In Other News, AVIS creates disposable cars..

[clickety6]

...that breakdown after the weekend, so you don't need to retrun them to where you hired them. They come with a warning that if you can suddenly see the road between your legs, GET OFF THE HIGHWAY NOW!!!

Well, obviously

[forged]

I was thinking of just the same thing. If people know it will perish within 8 hours, the first thing they'll want to do is to store the DVD content on their hard drive.

Actually, that might even prove bad for those who produce the DVD in the first place. What did they think people with files on their hard drive and a broadband connection will want to do ? (hint: the answer's in the question)

Better get bigger hard drives

[heroine]

Forget I said that.

Kind of Cool, Actually

[Skip666Kent]

This will eliminate entirely the return-mail aspect of on-line video rentals, making them more popular than ever, eliminating COCKDUSTER VIDEO once and for all!

(insert Star Wars I "Yippie!" here)

Re:"Copytheft" technology justified now

[Junior J. Junior III]

At least after you return a rental DVD someone else can still watch it. These disposable things just turn to useless junk. Someone needs to tell the movie industry that their revenue model can't be based on an airtight "every eyeball pays every time they see it" ideal.

Re:NYC recycling

[Damek]

Well, regardless of NYC's current mayor or the previous one, people have been telling the NYC administration to adopt pay-as-you-throw garbage management for a while, yet instead they decide to cut back on what we recycle. And now they come back half a year later and say they want to adopt pay-as-you-throw garbage management anyway!

You're right, it's not all the mayor's fault. "They" made a half-assed decision to start with, and now "they" will probably make another half-assed decision, unless they reinstate the recycling that they cut earlier.

IMHO :P

Wrong in some points!

[Eric_Cartman_South_P]

the reality of today's market is that most people (at least in the US) gain exposure to music by listening to the radio, and movies by viewing big-budget advertising (television, newspaper, billboards, etc).

WHICH IS EXACTLY THE PROBLEM!!!!!! Shaggy-Boom-Bastic(TM) was discovered because he put himself on Napster. Lucky him that radio stations in Hawayii and Calif not 100% pure on the inside payola system actually played what they wanted to. For many, many, many artists, they can't get ANY exposure unless some fat exec wants to make them a "star". It's Brittney or bust these days. If the RIAA et. al. wasn't so controlling, we would have a much better choice of music.

In regards to "us" vs. "them" it IS that way. "They" want to control your PC (DRM, Palladium, Bill in congress to allow DoS'ing your box), your livingroom (can't copy DVD's you own, fair use out the window, 2006 digital TV will have DRM built into all broadcasts, SuperCD's disable digital out), disolving DVD disks, CD's that crash Macs and don't burn in my PC... is the picture starting to become a little more clear? Anyone who says, after I spend $20 on music, that I MUST BE FORCED to listen to it WHERE THEY SAY (Sony walkman player, or maybe my car, but NOT my computer, NOT my MP3 player, etc) is a criminal in my eyes.

So yes, it is US vs. THEM. I think tech-savvy slashdotters who remember the old days (when a CD was a CD and it didn't crash your computer or insist on installing Media Player) would agree.

.

free?

[_ph1ux_]

if they are giving them away for free - to test the market. gladly walk up and ask for as many as they can give you - then throw them on the ground and stomp them to pieces before their very eyes.

Then be sure to thank them - and tell them that you are really happy with the new stress releiving features they are planning on putting into these new CDs. oh? They're not stress releiving features? Copy protection? well - I guess I cant copy the CDs now, huh? Thanks guys!

Re:Nothing new here

[Triv]

Just a quibble.

The actual reference from "Good Omens" is that all tapes turn into "Best of Queen" after a Fortnight. A Fortnight's two weeks. :)

Triv

Returns?

[zardor]

This won't catch on. Rental companies have a significant revenue stream from people returning stuff late. (Blockbuster - 15-20%) If the stuff is disposable, then they can't charge you for not returning it. They mightn't care about the enviornment, but they do care about their shareholders.

Re:[OT] Re:So you're the guy they are going after!

[BoomerSooner]

Lol, I'm a robert too, so I too am capable of being a complete asshole for no reason.

However, that being said, simply implying all these things by my wife choosing to buy used CD's is a stretch. So in the end piss off.

Oh and why anyone would marry someone they don't find attractive is beyond me. My wife is getting her PhD, and is extremely intelligent. She is hot too. I was very picky in selecting my life long mate and would hope you would be too. Maybe you're just pissed your significant other (assuming you can find one) is fugly. My wife doesn't smoke, isn't religious, loves animals and kids, is extremely intelligent, and for some strange reason chose to date me. So all in all I'm the winner in this situation.

Robert (different Robert btw)

Or...

[Gruneun]

the money could be encrypted with the artist's public key. Let the RIAA go after the artist for their cut, instead.

DVD recorders

[TheSHAD0W]

Dumb question -- anyone seen any consumer DVD recorders where the security could be bypassed?

Sounds like a plot for a Sci-Fi film...

[rworne]

I can imagine that 10,000,000 years from now, an archaeological dig where a scientist studying the old decayed cities of the past civilization and comes across these still-shiny plastic discs in what appears to be a large shrine composed of shiny plastic bits, fossilized organic detritus, and disposable diapers as offerings to the Gods.

The scientist places the disc into their all-purpose decoder/translator, and suddenly a nearby overlooked sarcophagus opens, and out pop the mummified corpses of media lawyers bearing copies of the DMCA. The scientist shrieks (as only super-intelligent cockroaches can) and tries to run, but its too late...

Re:Sounds like a plot for a Sci-Fi film...

[ninthwave]

Except the disc will not decode because the technology worked. The disc has degraded and the future cockroach will never be able to watch Mimic and realise the vital piece of evidence they needed in understanding early culture.

Re:Sounds like a plot for a Sci-Fi film...

[rworne]

Yes, but you must never underestimate the technological prowess of a super-intelligent cockroach.

Sealing the edges

[No Such Agency]

Hey, maybe black marker ink would be enough. I hear that it makes your CD's sound better too!

Hmm...

[No Such Agency]

You're the kind of alien geek who probably thought "Earth Girls are Easy" was a documentary, right?

Uncopyrightable?

[Animats]

What about the deposit copy for the Library of Congress?

Fixing this "problem"...

[cr0sh]

DAMN THESE FUCKERS!

I don't currently own or buy DVDs, but this still OUTRAGES me! They want to make information behave like food, but at least with food you get some energy and such out of it!

Screw 'em, this will be hacked easily - in fact, I will tell you one way how it might be hacked and still work:

The dye interacts with air, right? Well, you have the sandwich of label/dye layer/polycarb disc - thus, the air would have to get to the dye layer either by the edges or through the label, or maybe through the polycarb layer. I am not a chemist, so I don't know how porus the polycarb disc would be, but I don't think it is really that porus. That would leave the label and edge. So, seal the label with some spray shellac (as one poster already mentioned), and the edge with superglue, as soon as you receive it!

Damn, how dumb do these farks think we are? What exactly is this about? EVERYTHING THEY HAVE COME UP WITH HAS BEEN BROKEN, many times BEFORE it comes out, or not too long thereafter.

I tell you, I HATE THESE GREEDY NO-GOOD BASTARD WASTES OF FLESH...!

rant off...

8 hours are enough

[kipple]

to dd it to a hard disk.

cheers :)

This is simply not true

[MasteroftheVoxel]

First of all, these days the American movie rental industry is dominated by Blockbuster.
If you look around you'll notice that Blockbuster rental stores are often large stores in independant buildings. Yes, occasionally you'll find them in a mall, but usually they are by themselves. When you go to Blockbuster - you drive, and park, just to go to Blockbuster.

Secondly, realize that most people are not good about returning their movies on time. Most people I know leave it to the last minute. You can drop off the movie up to midnight, and the late evening is a very common time to return movies (some people do right after they watch them!). It is also not a time where you are likely to do more shopping. It's also not a time where you are going to be able to walk in most places, and public transportation is frequently closed.

Lastly, I would say that most people rent movies to watch on the weekends - maybe a Friday or Saturday night. When you go return the movie on Sunday afternoon, you aren't going to rent another one because you have work/school coming up the next day.

Frankly, the environment arguement is just silly. Too often people are arguing about tiny little things we throw away without looking at the big picture. I'm sure there are people who don't recycle every plastic bottle they use and each probably contains as much plastic as a DVD. How about candy bar wrappers - who recycles those? Did you know that everytime you get a take-out or delivery pizza those boxes are not recyclable?

Honestly, I'm shocked that nearly a dozen "think about the environment" posters have been modded up while not one has been modded as "redundant"

Disney and a screaming little kid...

[telstar]

So who gets to explain to Billy why he can only watch "Lilo and Stitch" 5 times instead of his usual 12?

No, no, and hell no!

[Da VinMan]

You are exactly right, this will be a landfill problem even worse than the AOL CD problem.

I don't know where companies get these stupid ideas. I have nothing against "Music DVDs" (whatever the hell that is, a DVD with music + videos maybe?), but this expiring medium stuff is a bunch of crap.

As an American - I ain't buying it. I don't care how cool it gets. I don't care if they give it away for free; I'll have nothing to do with it. They can grind it up and spread it on toast for their own personal consumption. It would be more useful that way.

You know, I get pretty angry about stuff like this. Don't they realize people do not like planned/intended obsolescence?

Yes apparently you don't read.

[BoomerSooner]

The only new music I get is from the CD's my wife purchases. I have 3 jobs (2 full time and 1 contract labor) and as a simple fact of time I listen to SportsRadio (notice my username) when I'm in the car. I drove a 1964 1/2 mustang from high school through college without a radio so silence isn't bothersome to me, it's relaxing (ignoring the glasspack mufflers of course).

My wife bought me the Cult CD that came out last year and my brothers in law buy me KMFDM / MDFMK cd's for Xmas (Dec) and my birthday (June). I could care less if I ever buy a CD again. I am however fully against theft from the artists (even as it's more from the RIAA, some minute percentage still goes to the artist).

My solution is simple and yet expensive. I could probably bank roll it but I have no expertise in the music industry.

My solution:
Setup a barebones studio, have the bands save and hire their own technicians (with local admins monitoring to help and watch the equipment). Produce their "album" (man i'm old) and setup a website that has the mp3/ogg files for free and cd's available for purchase at around $5.

The problem is it's an unproven model and wasting money isn't my goal. However, if my own company takes off I may do this anyway (allowing the artists to retain rights to their own music! how novel).

Although I'm a liberal/socialist at heart so this republican country wouldn't want anything like that, now would they?

Come on.

[BoomerSooner]

Can you take me higher? Sales are driven by Jesus man. Oh yeah and a healthy dose of Angst. Scott Cornell (sp?) sounds weird as Rage's singer. Kind'a reminds me of 1993 with soundgarden. I've really got to dig up some of my old CD's.

I was a RIAA junkie in college but I've reformed. I listen to sports radio (the animal AM 640/105.7 FM & the fan 1400 AM). I still have around 600 CD's (unless my wife has sold them to the used cd store which is very likely).

oh no, worse than the AOL CD problem?

[MasteroftheVoxel]

Exactly how bad is the AOL CD problem?
Have we actually filled up landfills with AOL CDs?

Two men in California are collecting 1 million CDs that they will send back to AOL.
They have done all the math and calculated that that would weigh 17 tons - enough to fit in 17 F-350 pickups or not even 1 semi truck. That really isn't that much when you compare it to the amount of garbage americans produce in a year - no, even compared to a day?

Why do you hate AOL CDs? Its not because of the oh-so-large amount of garbage produced by a little tiny piece of plastic. Its the SPAM factor. Its the fact that people like to get pissed off by the inconvience of throwing away their junk mail. We've learned to ignore the numberous credit cards offers and paper junk we receive every day, but we suddenly can't deal with a little piece of plastic???

Re:oh no, worse than the AOL CD problem?

[Da VinMan]

Who said I didn't get pissed off at the paper junk mail?

Cripes...

Making a DVD is a dirty process too.

[Dr. Spork]

The problem isn't only the landfill space. It's also the dirtyness of DVD production. Remember that the dyes are expensive, and that the plastic is made from oil in a way that generates some nasty by-products.

Anyway, this is a totally pointless and wasteful exercise in an age when we could just use the internet to transmit the data.

not blockbuster, grocery stores

[Freedom Bug]

It's not going to be blockbuster selling these things. They want you coming back, as many have pointed out. It's the grocery stores and convenience stores that are set up to sell things once, but aren't set up for the whole rental thing. They're not undercutting an existing business, just adding a new one.

It'd work great for me. I never go to blockbuster. I watch movies once every couple of months, and only when I feel like sitting on my ass for a couple of hours. If I feel that way, I'm not going to be walking a mile to Blockbuster. I used to use PPV, but I cancelled my digital service because the roommate who actually watched TV moved out. I'd pick up a few movies during a grocery or Walmart expedition and let them collect dust on my shelf until I need two hours of mindless & muscle-less entertainment.

Chemistry for fun and profit.

[pla]

Nope. Get a 10 gallon aquarium (they cost like $10-$20), and a tank of helium (the party-balloon filling small tanks, they cost as high as $40 but half that you get back when you return the tank, and one full tank lasts almost forever).

Put the wrapped DVD in the aquarium. Take two rubber gloves and some saran-wrap to effectively seal the top of the aquarium (make sure to use enough that putting on the gloves won't break the seal).

Tip the aquarium on its side, and peel away a small hole in one top and the opposite bottom corner.

Light a votive candle and place it in front of the lower hole.

Add helium, via the PVC tube that almost certainly came with the aquarium (if not, pay the $0.15/foot for a few feet), to the upper hole. Add it slowly, and when the candle goes out, keep adding for a few more seconds.

Voila! You now have a home-made, inert-gas, anhydrous glove box! Put your hands in the gloves, unwrap the DVD, and apply the clear nail polish to the edge. Oops, you *did* remember to put the nail polish in the aquarium before sealing it, right? ;-)

Re:Chemistry for fun and profit.

[pla]

Most of what I suggested counts as a one-time buy (the helium tank needs refilling on occasion, but one fill costs just a tad more than one normal DVD, so...). And, depending on what sort of reaction they use in the disks (probably simple oxidation), a person could probably use much cheaper nitrogen, rather than helium.

Personally, I agree, finding a way to keep the DVD from "expiring" seems like a waste of time. Except for non-mainstream content (ie, anime, anything imported, etc), most DVDs don't cost all that much - The HDD space needed for them costs only a bit less, and involves quite a lot of CPU time to rip and encode.

However, I think you might have overlooked one of the biggest concerns about the availability of expiring DVDs - If they manage to catch on to any significant degree, we stand a very real chance of having "permanent" DVDs (and CDs, no doubt) no longer available for *any* price. If that happens, would you still say that ripping them seems "wrong" somehow? Personally, I buy 99% of what I rip and store (and the remainder, what you could reasonably consider "stolen", only because I cannot find it anywhere, but I would buy if I could get it). But I like having the music and movies I enjoy available at a moments notice, and not subject to the MPAA/RIAA deciding they want something off the market, making it totally unavailable.

To me, this doesn't involve money. They provide goods/services, and I pay for it. Fair 'nuff. But if they stop offering the goods I want, instead giving me a far inferior product (in this case, in terms of convenience, not short-term quality) where does that leave me? I need to resort to criminal activity just to have the ability to watch a non-Disney version of Mononoke Hime (A good example, you *already* can't get something by that title in the US, only the dubbed "Princess Mononoke").

I believe the MPAA has the right to offer me what they want to offer. But I also believe I should have the right to modify it (or at least try) to make it a "better" product for my needs.

Divx Parte Deux

[sydbarrett74]

This has already been done before. Circuit City tried this lame strategy with Divx. And they failed miserably. I predict this strategy will fail equally miserably. Not to mention the environmental travesty of having billions of useless DVD's clogging landfills (unless they make provisions to recycle DVD's).

Where's the profit?

[Daetrin]

How can they possibly make money off of this? These self-destructing disks must cost _more_ to make than normal disks, right? And the RIAA has been telling us for years that they're losing money while CDs are selling for $14-$18 in stores. So clearly CDs already cost at least $15 to make, and these new-fangled ones will cost $20 or $30 to make, right? No one would be willing to rent something for that price.

Inventory

[Anonymous Custard]

If this happens, video rental stores will need to have much much much larger quantities of DVD's on hand than they presently do.

Anyone know on average how many times a DVD gets rented before it is sold or retired?

Rental stores just do not have the retail or storage capabilities for this idea.

They Should Sell Self-Destructing CDs

[serutan]

as long as they accept checks written in disappearing ink.

Netflix

[MikeFM]

I'll stick to Netflix thanks. I can watch the movie as often as I want and return it when I want. Pretty slick. Wish my local Blockbuster would let me just drop the rentals in the mailbox back to them. No little plastic discs in the landfill either and no risk of leaving the disc til tomorrow to watch and finding it dead.

This may actually backfire and *encourage* copying

[KenCrandall]

Think about it...

If the media is going to self-destruct and is essentially "disposable" then people will want to copy the content to something more durable (an action which is entirely protected under fair-use laws, until they take those away, too.)

People already copy content to different formats for ease-of-use and convenience reasons (1-2 HD's is more convenient than 1000's of CD's) and this would be the same thing, only practically *enforced* by the nature of the original media.

Just something to think about...

Ken

This is a redundant trial

[Zeddicus_Z]

Two things:

1) Time-limited DVD type media has been tried before, and has failed (the other Divx).

2) It should be perfectly clear to the music studios that people are willing to purchase special CD/DVD music bundles. Case in point; one of my favourite bands, Disturbed, recently released their second album (Believe). There was a 'special limited edition' release that also contained a DVD with music videos, a few interviews etc. I pre-ordered this thing by over a month, and still missed out. So they're a proven method of distribution.

Im also sure that most people would feel much more comfortable paying $AU40.00 for a CD/DVD bundle than they would the current $AU32.00 for just the CD. I know I sure would buy more albums if that 'value for money' factor was increased.

Of course, they could acheive the same rise in sales by just dropping to a $AU20.00 price point, but we are talking about the music industry here...

Uh.

[superdan2k]

I fail to see why this is an issue. The market will correct for this almost instantaneously. DivX didn't fail for technology reasons...it failed because no one in their right mind is going to pay repeatedly to watch a movie that they "own".

There are companies that realize this, and they will be the ones that create non-perishable discs. Perishables might have their place, but it certainly won't be in rental media or for-purchase long-term media like modern DVDs. No one in their right mind would buy them!

Think about it -- why did DVD take off? Because it offered the customer significantly better performance at costs equivelent to VHS. Why did DivX flop? They assumed, incorrectly, that people would pay less money up-front and pay a per-view cost, for something that offers similar performance.

The same thing is going to happen here. No one is going to pay less for a degradable disc. It doesn't offer any additional value, and it doesn't matter how cheaply they price it.

Stop sweating it. The market will correct for this, and it won't be occupying landfills.

I've used the self-destructing discs

[stilleon]

I had a chance to try a DVD video as part of a consumer test. /.'ers will find the last part really interesting. It was called EZ DVD, and, upon contact with air, would begin self destructing until, within 72 hours, it would be unreadable.

My wife came home from the mall with a package of materials for a consumer test EZ DVD. It was a copy of "Kate and Leopold" (they had others but that was the wife's choice-- oh boy!). The questinnaire included what we thought of the quality (poor- no chapter stops, pan and scan), how much we would pay (I put $3.95 but they had up to like $7) etc.

Here is the whack part: I put it in my DVD-ROM. It would not play back correctly nor would DVD-Decryptor rip it. I put it back in the DVD-V player and it worked fine (it was suppsed to last 72 hours before destruction and it had only been about 3 hours). I don't know if this was a test of a new anti-copy device or a side effect of the disc's construction. Mysterious. Has anyone else tested the disc's as well?

Good for the environment!

[rice_burners_suck]

This technology is convenient, cost-effective, and most of all, good for the environment.

It is convenient because it will require stores to continue buying copies of the same movie to rent out.

It is cost-effective because it is certainly cheaper to purchase new copies of the same disc than to purchase a disc once.

It means that more natural resources will be used up in generating the otherwise unnecessary copies, which will fill our landfills with yet more garbage. Both of these are clearly good for the environment.

In short, I believe this technology should be extended to every area of business. For examples, books will henceforth be printed with ink that disappears the instant it has been read, utilizing chemicals that react to eyesight particles; Cars will ship with full gas tanks, and will turn into pumpkins when out of gas; Microwaves will only heat one dish and then explode; Hammers will disintegrate after hammering one nail, etc. (After all, hammer manufacturers have the right to make a profit on each nail that is being hammered.)