NBC To Offer On-Demand Movies Via P2P

RX8 writes "NBC Universal has signed a deal with Wurld Media to make some of their movies available for download via a secure P2P network in 2006. There hasn't been a price released yet, but the movies include what you would get on their existing video-on-demand and pay services plus around 100 older movie titles. Once the material is downloaded, users can only view it for up to 24 hours before it expires."

Comments

fair is fair

[Scrameustache]

Once the material is downloaded, users can only view it for up to 24 hours before it expires.

And they can only spend my money for 24h before the payment expires, ok?

Re:Surprise - Too Little, Too Late

[MoralHazard]

You think that the only killer feature of P2P networks is free content? My friend, you miss something, I think.

True P2P networks offer tremendous bandwidth efficiency for the distributors of content, which is especially important when you're delivering large content (like, say movies and other media). Think of how quickly Bittorrent downloads of Linux distros took off--it made it so much easier for gazillions of people to get a brand-new release at the same time. No more waiting a week for the Debian FTP servers to be pingable again.

Plus, the distributor saves money on bandwidth charges, since many of the users will get the content from each other instead of the central servers. Whether this in turn increases the costs of the users remains to be seen, but it probably won't affect their connectivity bills much more than using open P2P networks to get stuff on their own.

Dear NBC,

[ewhac]

I am willing to pay exactly $0.00 for this "service" you're planning on offering. Copy protection is a form of product defect, and I do not purchase products I know to be defective. You may wish to confer with Sony on this issue.

On the other hand, if you are willing to offer movies and programs in an unencumbered format (DiVX, MPEG, QuickTime, Ogg Theora, whatever) with no usage restrictions, and no special download clients required, then I'd be very willing to consider as much as $3.00 per show/program downloaded. I'd especially be interested in the old NBC Mystery Movies from the 1970's, including McCloud, Columbo, and McMillan and Wife.

Please correct your offerings accordingly.

Schwab