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Disney to Make Movies Available Online
musiholic writes "Disney has cut a deal with Movielink to make various Disney (and Disney subsidary) films available for 30-day paid downloads. Users can watch the film an unlimited amount of times before the movie expires. The movies requre Real Player or WMP."
"Thank you for your interest in Movielink. We want you to take part in the powerful Internet movie rental experience that Movielink delivers; however, you currently do not meet our minimum system requirements. You will need to adjust the following: You Need Windows 98, ME, 2000, XP"
This is closer to renting a movie than anything else, aside from the 30-day storage option. From the story: Customers will be able to store movies for up to 30 days. Over that span, they can watch a movie as many times as they wish in a 24-hour period.
Another article is more detailed: The movie files can be viewed on a PC or on a television connected to a computer, but customers have a maximum of 30 days to begin watching their downloaded movie. Once they begin to do so, the movie can be viewed only over the next 24 hours.Movielink Minimum Requirements
You need Windows 98, ME, 2000, XP
You need Internet Explorer 5.0 or higher - Upgrade Now
You need RealPlayer 8.0 or higher - Upgrade Now OR
Windows Media Player 7.1 or higher - Upgrade Now
You need a Connection Speed of 128 kbps or higher - Retake Connection Speed
Scripting must be enabled
To enable jscript, follow these steps:
Internet Explorer 5
1. Select "Internet Options" from the "Tools" menu on your browser
2. Click on the "Security" tab
3. Set the security to Medium on "Trusted Sites" and click "Apply"
If jscript still doesn't function:
1. Highlight the "Internet" icon and click "Custom Level..."
2. Select "Enable" on all 3 radio buttons under "Scripting"
3. Click "OK"
Internet Explorer 6
1. Select "Internet Options" from the "Tools" menu on your browser
2. Click on the "Security" tab
3. Highlight the "Internet" icon and click "Custom Level..."
4. Select "Enable" on all 3 radio buttons under "Scripting"
Cookies must be enabled
To enable cookies, follow these steps:
Internet Explorer 5
1. Select "Internet Options" from the "Tools" menu on your browser
2. Click on the "Security" tab
3. Highlight the "Internet" icon and click "Custom Level..."
4. Select "Enable" on all radio buttons under "Cookies"
5. Click "OK"
Internet Explorer 6
1. Select "Internet Options" from the "Tools" menu on your browser
2. Click on the "Privacy" tab and press "Advanced..."
3. Check "Override automatic cookie handling"
4. Accept both cookie options and check "Always allow session cookies"
5. Click "OK"
Nope. I'm using OS X and it requires IE 5.0+ and Windows just to enter their site!
DRM. You did notice that the files are available in RM and WMV formats only, right? I'm not positive abiout Real files, but I know that WMV files (especially Media Player 9, which I'm sure you will need) can phone home to get permission to actually play.
Boobies never hurt anyone. - Sherry Glaser.
Macrovision on the tv-out and overlay mode for VGA that makes it near impossible to get a screen capture of the actual movie (you just get a grey box that is underneath the overlay). So other than defeating Macrovision (easy), or hacking the video driver to record the overlay (almost as easy), there isn't currently a lot to stop you if you REALLY want to, in the future they will have Palladium and encrypted HDTV firewire tunnels.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
Put it on DVD-R, then...they're getting cheap enough now.
Having never run across a DRM'd file, it's hard to say...maybe it'd be possible to cobble something together between GraphEdit and the Windows Media Format SDK that would at least strip out the DRM. As for converting to other formats, mplayer seems to do a better job than anything else. (WMV allows for either variable framerate or frame skipping...not sure which, but I know you don't get frames from the decoder at a constant rate. mplayer converts WMV to AVI by writing a 1000-fps AVI with the source frames put in wherever they need to go. You can then use an Avisynth script to convert the framerate to something more normal (like 29.97 fps) before reencoding with whatever you want.)
I don't know about Real, but then I don't have any of their stuff on any of my computers.
<rolleyes>
Score: -1, Unimaginative, Repetitive Microsoft-Bashing.
</rolleyes>
20 January 2017: the End of an Error.
For $3-5, you get to spend all evening downloading a file. When you get it, you have 30 days to play it before it self-destructs. And it self-destructs 24 hours after you start playing it. And you have to watch it on your computer, and the computer must be a PC running Windows.
On the other hand, video rental stores charge you the same $3-5, and you usually have at least three days to watch it.
Or pay-per-view cable which costs the same $3-5 for 24 hours, but doesn't involve any download time.
Or NetFlix where a $20/mo fee lets you watch your rentals for as long as you want.
Can someone tell me again what advantage there is to using Movielink?
Like I said before, though: I could be wrong... I just don't think you have yet demonstrated me to be so.
Because the copyright they hold on Steam Boat Willie should have ended when the law originally said it should have expired, not 80 or 100 Years Later
For the good of man copyrighted material was Supposed to end up in the Public Domain at some point
See the Pictures of the Flood of '08
wmv9 is up there along with divx4/mpeg4. Take a look here
But I doubt that is the reason why they are using wmv, more probably it is due to its DRM capabilities more than anything and its ability to self destroy past its expiration date.
Still, it would be interesting to see if you can still convert it using TMPGEnc to any of your preferred DRM free formats.
My other OS is the MCP!
For anyone curious the video specs for the WMV versions they use are:
Resolution: 512 x 276
Audio Codec: Windows Media Audio 9; 64 kbps, 48 kHz, stereo 2-pass VBR
Video Codec: Windows Media Video 9
Total Bitrate: ~700Kbps
And if you are so inclined you could certainly use something like Fraps 2.0.0 to capture the video and audio.
Actually it's WMV Windows Media Video and it is actiually the best codec in existance for quality. and it IS MPEG-4. (Weather they will USE any of the quality settings is another thing).
But as has been pointed out many times, WMV and RM have DRM which allows for things like this to even happen.
DivX is for pirating, WMV is for legal watching.
Got it?
it wasnt sarcastic, but given the original post, i can see why you though so. WM9 is really good format and in fact they are using it show movies in theatres since it can be shown on a 60ft screen and still be clear enough.
Now if only the RIAA could follow this lead. I don't seen anyone hating disney - oh wait, they're not suing the youth of America.
Disney has a music branch, Walt Disney Records that is a member of the RIAA, so yes, they are suing the youth of America.
-- If god wanted me to have a sig, he'd have given me a sense of humor.
even if it did, a wonderfull little program known as tvtool (http://www.tvtool.de) takes care of that, and offers *alot* of other very handy features for the small price of 15 dollars US.
The record company your looking for is Hollywood Records, who had ICP and Danzig on their lable for a whole week.