Warner Bros: New Program To Digitize Your DVDs

shoutingloudly writes "Warner Brothers has just announced a new 'Disc-to-Digital' program to convert your DVDs into digital files that you can play on your internet-connected computers. As the helpful Public Knowledge graphics demonstrate, all you have to do is find a participating store, drive there, pay again for your movie, wait while it's ripped for you, drive home, and hope it works. This will surely have tech-savvy movie fans saying, 'Brilliant! I've been looking for an excuse to uninstall this free, 1-step DVD ripper that I can use in the comfort of my own home. This is much better than DMCA reform.'" In exchange for paying a bit more you might get a higher resolution copy (DRM encumbered and stored in "the cloud"). The launch process is absurdly cumbersome, but: "Later on, Internet retailers like Amazon.com will email customers to offer digital copies of DVDs they previously bought. Eventually, consumers will be able to put DVDs into PCs or certain Blu-ray players that will upload a copy, similar to the way people turn music CDs into MP3 files." Will the video distributors ever offer DRM-free files that you own? The music industry doesn't seem to be any worse off than they were when they insisted upon DRM.

Comments

For only a small fee I can watch my own movie?

[elrous0]

Wow, what a deal.

Seriously, who the hell is in charge at Warner Home Video these days? When DVD first came out in 1997, Warner was one of the leaders in DVD's. They offered the best extras, were the first to make anamorphic DVD's their standard (meaning my first Warner DVD's still look pretty good even on a HDTV), and were real cheerleaders for the format back when a lot of people were saying things like "Why would Joe Sixpack want to give up his VHS tapes?" and "Laserdisc looks so much better" (I kid you not, those were prominent arguments against DVD in those days).

But in the last few years, their home video department has went to shit. Their support for early HD-DVD and blu-ray was weak. Their blu-ray discs these days are almost as annoying with the upfront/unskippable trailers as Sony. Even their extras seem weak these days.

You used to be cool, Warner.

Re:For only a small fee I can watch my own movie?

[Dogtanian]

"Laserdisc looks so much better" (I kid you not, those were prominent arguments against DVD in those days).

I didn't have one at the time, but weren't some of the early laserdiscs apparently quite poor? I might be wrong, but I vaguely remember hearing some of them were single layer (*), the transfers weren't apparently too great (the first Blade Runner DVD issue was apparently rubbish) and/or the compression wasn't that well done. It's not beyond the realm of possibility that a well-done Laserdisc would beat a poor DVD, or at least its limitations wouldn't be as obnoxious as visibly blocky compression.

(*) Actually, I have a DVD with a *2005* issue date on it that is a single layer (I'd checked when I noticed some distracting compression artifacts and suspected the reason). Granted, it was only a 109 minute film with no extras, but the compression was still clearly visible. (Probably didn't help that it apparently hadn't been remastered that much, as perversely lower-quality and noisier material tends to require more compression to compensate for that wasted reproducing the noise(!))

Re:For only a small fee I can watch my own movie?

[Dogtanian]

Old people don't get it, and they never will. The digital revolution is about what's possible that wasn't possible before, not about doing everything the way you did it before only with digital files instead of physical media.

Yes, this is my theory on (partly) why DVD recorders rose then fell in popularity.

DVD recorders are obviously based on different technologies to VCRs, but from a consumer point of view, the usage model is similar- removable media that stores a similar quantity of video. You basically use it like you use a VCR, but with discs instead of tapes. Also, prerecorded DVDs and players replaced prerecorded videocassettes, so shouldn't video cassette recording be replaced by DVD recording? You can see how people used to VCRs would mentally have perceived the DVD recorder as their logical successor.

Except that this is flawed because it forgets that most recording on VCRs was done for timeshifting purposes rather than archiving, and now that PVRs/DVRs exist, they're way more useful because they remove the need to faff about with (and store) tapes altogether, hold more than enough for most people's timeshifting use and tend to include useful facilities like "series record" (i.e. no messing about with timers).

The video recorder was the best way of doing that in its day, but the DVD Recorder isn't the best way of doing it nowadays.

IMHO, people's thinking has now been weaned off the "VCR model" of doing things and they have now realised the benefits of the DVR. I also think that people realised that DVD recorders were a PITA, with media type compatibility issues and general temperamentality that made them less straightforward than a VCR replacement ought to have been. They might be useful for archiving, but the "old way of thinking" would blind one to the fact they're not, and were never, the VCR's true successor.

Content Providers are consumer hostile

[AnalogDiehard]

Judging from Sony's Rootkit fiasco and the content industry's push toward pay-per-view, tethered content, and self-destructing media I no longer trust any application or service from content providers.