NewsDude
09-15-2008, 07:00 PM
You buy and download a movie over the Web, from any device, and then watch it on a wide range of playback systems. That's the vision announced Friday by a consortium of major movie-industry companies -- a vision that could change the developing model for online movie distribution.
The consortium, called the Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem (DECE), will announce details of its plans at the big Consumer Electronics Show in January in Las Vegas. The main idea is to create what is being called a "uniform digital media experience," where Web sites and devices use an interoperable standard for digital rights management, consumers can copy protected content onto a variety of playback devices, and content can be backed up on writable DVDs and other physical media.
Lessons from CDs, DVDs, Blu-ray
The companies that comprise the consortium include Alcatel-Lucent, Best Buy, Cisco, Comcast, Fox Entertainment Group, HP, Intel, Lionsgate, Microsoft, NBC Universal, Paramount Pictures, Philips, Sony, Toshiba, VeriSign, and Warner Bros. Entertainment.
Mitch Singer, president of DECE, said the consortium is "taking the lessons learned from the successful 'buy once, play anywhere' experience that we enjoy with CDs, DVDs and Blu-ray today."
The plan for reaching this level of digital movie nirvana calls for DECE to issue a licensable specification, and a brand and logo for products and services that comply. The spec will describe the hardware and software requirements that compatible devices and services will follow.
James McQuivey, an analyst for industry research firm Forrester, said the DECE initiative is a "first step" toward something that consumers assume is their right -- buying something once and being able to play it anywhere.
Media Landscape 'Nonsense'
"Imagine if you bought a DVD from Wal-Mart and it played only on DVD players you bought at Wal-Mart," McQuivey said. Or, he added, imagine you couldn't give that DVD...
More... (http://www.toptechnews.com/story.xhtml?story_id=61855)
The consortium, called the Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem (DECE), will announce details of its plans at the big Consumer Electronics Show in January in Las Vegas. The main idea is to create what is being called a "uniform digital media experience," where Web sites and devices use an interoperable standard for digital rights management, consumers can copy protected content onto a variety of playback devices, and content can be backed up on writable DVDs and other physical media.
Lessons from CDs, DVDs, Blu-ray
The companies that comprise the consortium include Alcatel-Lucent, Best Buy, Cisco, Comcast, Fox Entertainment Group, HP, Intel, Lionsgate, Microsoft, NBC Universal, Paramount Pictures, Philips, Sony, Toshiba, VeriSign, and Warner Bros. Entertainment.
Mitch Singer, president of DECE, said the consortium is "taking the lessons learned from the successful 'buy once, play anywhere' experience that we enjoy with CDs, DVDs and Blu-ray today."
The plan for reaching this level of digital movie nirvana calls for DECE to issue a licensable specification, and a brand and logo for products and services that comply. The spec will describe the hardware and software requirements that compatible devices and services will follow.
James McQuivey, an analyst for industry research firm Forrester, said the DECE initiative is a "first step" toward something that consumers assume is their right -- buying something once and being able to play it anywhere.
Media Landscape 'Nonsense'
"Imagine if you bought a DVD from Wal-Mart and it played only on DVD players you bought at Wal-Mart," McQuivey said. Or, he added, imagine you couldn't give that DVD...
More... (http://www.toptechnews.com/story.xhtml?story_id=61855)