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Starz, RealNetworks Offer Movie Download Service
Mz6 writes "The
New York Times and
others are reporting that RealNetworks and the Starz Encore Group will introduce an online service today that will let high-speed Internet users download and watch many of the movies shown on the Starz cable channel. This report is just on the heels of
TiVo's announcement to stream from the Web. This move is another early attempt by Hollywood to build a business out of downloadable movies and head off the sort of piracy that has hurt the music industry. The new service, called Starz Ticket on Real Movies, will cost $12.95 a month, and subscribers will be able to download and watch 100 or more movies each month, using Real's media player software, but only if you have a 600Kbps connection or higher."
The wide availability of 600k to coincide with Realplay finally not having buffer issues eh?
Neat trick.
Or is 600k just the streamspeed they've been aiming for the whole time.
G
...when it gets down to fundamentals, do what you have to do and shed no tears. Dr. Matson in Tunnel in the Sky
So it states ....
"Each film will have an expiration date that coincides with its last showing on the cable station. The movies will be encoded so that they cannot be played after the expiration date."
Any estimates of how long it will take to crack this encoding?
For the price and quality, I'm thinking Netflix is a better deal...
...and you run and you run and you can't stop what's been done...
If most DVD's are 4 gigs, what quality will there be in a 20 minute download. At 200 k/second, can you even get a full gig in 20 minutes? I wonder if these movies will be at low resolutions. And at 12 bucks a month, I would like to be able to use the computer to play it on my 36" TV. But I know how much worse a movie can look just by doubling the window size on my 17" monitor. I can't imagine it would look good on a TV.
RealPlayer 10 and Helix DRM Provide Highest Quality and Security
What kind of DRM will be included in this? Can I download the movie and watch it on my laptop while away from a network connection. And what will stop someone from recording what is on their screen. I can't help but think this product/service is going to suck. Plus, ever since RealPlayer invaded my privacy years ago I have never trusted them. I do not like a company where I have to search and search and search for a setting that will disable sending reports back to the company about how I use my PC.
How about getting back to where people can buy and own stuff? Like back when VCR's came out and if I taped something, I could watch it anytime and anywhere. I hear iTunes lets people download their product and use it as they wish. Why dosen't the movie companies do the same thing?
Rosco: "If brains were gunpowder, Enos couldn't blow his nose."
We get about one DMCA notice a week (usually from Paramount) at the university I work at. Either they suck at tracing other methods, or they only focus on BitTorrent, because every single notice is someone sharing on BT. Beware!
" Because it's "on demand", whereas on TV you have to wait for something to come on."
actually, no you don't. I don't know how widespread it is, and what the exact requirements are, but on my digital cable I have HBO on Demand. It's "free" for HBO subscribers, and gives you access to a whole load of on demand programming. Most of the big hits HBO is showing that month, usually the current + past season of HBO's original series, all their specials, etc. I haven't used it for watching anything other than a comedy special, but it's fairly slick. Nice menu driven, downloads fairly rapidly, and you can play/pause/ff/rew just like it were a vcr/dvd. granted, it'll never be as extensive to have random movie from 3 years ago you want to watch, but it's still a nice step in the right direction. I imagine all of the big premium cable channels are going to go this way...
Same here. Its not so much DRM that bothers me, but Real. I used to love them when I first was able to listen to streaming radio stations on the internet with a 28k modem. Last time I had it installed there was so much shit it did I didn't like, I've avoided it like the plauge since. Besides, does Real even look good at 600k? Give me HDTV movies for $12 and I'll sign up.
Actually the quality of Reals 10.0 encoder is arguably as good as divx (arguably is the ultimate point as would can tell the difference if you look very closly, but its still quite good)
Night of the Living Dead was recently released for free distribution. It is available for download from the Internet Archive in a few formats including a 4.1GB MPEG-2 file that can be used on a DVD.
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