Re: NYTimes.com Article: Hollywood Moves to Rent Movies Online

[Cleber da Costa Oliveira <cleber@linux.ime.usp.br>]

   Acho que isso é mais uma forma de fazer dinheiro. E pode ser até que no
futuro funcione ( mas, por enquanto, pouca gente tem, por exemplo, speedy
ou ajato para conseguir puxar videos de tamanho grande como
500Mb). Enquanto fazia download, daria e sobraria tempo para ir até uma
locadora ao lado, alugar e até ficar assistindo enquanto você puxaria o
vídeo! E acho que vai ser difícil evitar que as pessoas copiem ou que
esse mercado vire algo como um napster da vida.
   Mas como os americanos são ótimos em propaganda, muita gente ainda vai
querer alugá-los!   


Cleber.




--------------------------------------------------
Cleber da Costa Oliveira <cleber@linux.ime.usp.br>
Computer Science
University of Sao Paulo  
Sao Paulo,SP - Brazil
--------------------------------------------------

On Fri, 17 Aug 2001 is@ime.usp.br wrote:

> This article from NYTimes.com 
> has been sent to you by is@ime.usp.br.
> 
> Bom dia, classe.
> 
> La vai uma outra noticia interessante.
> 
> Alguem para comentar esta noticia?
> 
> Boa leitura,
> 
> Imre Simon
> 
> 
> 
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> 
> Hollywood Moves to Rent Movies Online
> 
> By RICK LYMAN
> 
> 
> 
> LOS ANGELES, Aug. 16 — Five major movie studios, including some of
> Hollywood's top players, unveiled plans today for a joint venture
> that would allow computer users to download rental copies of
> feature films over the Internet.
> 
>  The service, which will be available only to those with high-speed
> Internet connections, is an attempt to get ahead of piracy problems
> that have plagued the music industry through services like Napster
> and which were beginning to be felt in the film industry with newer
> file-swapping services.
> 
>  "I think the majority of consumers believe that copyright has
> value and that if they have a pay vehicle to watch movies on the
> Internet, they will pay for it," said Yair Landau, president of
> Sony (news/quote) Pictures Digital Entertainment. "We want to give
> honest people an honest alternative."
> 
>  The venture is also seen by many studio executives as a first step
> toward true video-on-demand, when consumers will be able to watch
> any movie they want, whenever they want. Initially, the films will
> be available for download only onto personal computers, or
> television monitors linked to an Internet connection, but
> eventually video-on-demand service is expected to include cable
> television and other delivery systems.
> 
>  "I think anybody who is in the movie business wants to reach the
> day when you can watch any movie you want, any time you want," Mr.
> Landau said. "I personally believe that launching an Internet
> service like this is a necessary first step in that regard."
> 
>  The studios that will be partners in the service are MGM,
> Paramount Pictures, Sony Pictures, Warner Brothers and Universal
> Pictures. Noticeably absent were Disney and 20th Century Fox,
> although sources close to Disney said that it intended to announce
> its own video-on-demand service within 10 days. Fox issued a
> statement late this afternoon saying that it, too, would announce
> plans soon for such a service.
> 
>  Executives at Sony's Moviefly, an Internet movies-on-demand effort
> that will provide the technical backbone for the venture, had been
> saying since early this year that they intended to go online as
> soon as they could.
> 
>  They delayed the move, the executives said, in hopes of persuading
> as many Hollywood studios as possible to join the effort, a process
> that took longer than expected as each studio brought its concerns
> about pricing, security and competition with other outlets like
> cable television.
> 
>  "It's very expensive to create something like this, so economics
> plays a role in bringing so many studios together," said Jack
> Waterman, president of worldwide pay television for the Paramount
> Television Group. "And this allows a lot of companies to come
> together to create a common viewpoint on the technology and
> security behind the system."
> 
>  In the coming months, a chief executive will be hired for the new
> venture, which will have an equal number of representatives from
> each studio on its board; a name will be chosen; and the site will
> be tested extensively to make sure its security system works as
> promised. Then, the first 100 or so films, a mix of recent releases
> and films from studio libraries, will become available, either late
> this year or early next.
> 
>  The selection of films, and how much it will cost to download
> them, will be left to the individual studios. Studios that are not
> part of the venture will also be allowed to post films on the site.
> 
>  The average feature film is about 500 megabytes in digitized form
> and will take 20 minutes to 40 minutes to download, Mr. Landau
> said, depending on the type of broadband connection. Download times
> would be untenable for those with slower Internet connections.
> Studio officials estimate that there are 10 million households with
> broadband connections, a number they expect to increase
> significantly, as well as 35 million screens in offices and
> colleges.
> 
>  A film will remain on a computer's hard drive for 30 days but will
> erase itself 24 hours after it is first run. In that 24 hours,
> consumers will be able to watch the film as many times as they wish
> — pause, fast forward and perform other functions typical of a
> videocassette or DVD.
> 
>  Studios traditionally release movies in a series of so-called
> windows, starting with theatrical release, followed by
> videocassette, DVD, pay- per-view, pay-cable networks and,
> eventually, broadcast networks. Executives at several studios said
> films would be released on this new system, initially at least,
> only when they entered their pay-per-view window, usually months
> after the theatrical release. The rental cost will be about the
> same as a pay-per-view film, the executives said.
> 
>  "We are not looking to undermine DVD, which is a great business,"
> Mr. Landau said.
> 
>  The new venture will be neither the first video-on-demand service
> (cable operators in a few markets have offered such a service to
> some customers, though the movie selection has been limited) nor
> the first time that feature films have been available for download
> on the Internet (companies like CinemaNow and SightSound
> Technologies have offered a limited roster of films for download).
> But it is the first effort involving Hollywood studios and offers
> the promise of thousands of potential films.
> 
>  "This announcement confirms that film producers are eager for the
> Internet to enlarge and flourish," said Jack Valenti, president of
> the Motion Picture Association of America. "For the first time, in
> the very near future, a broad selection of motion pictures will be
> available online, protected by encryption, and delivered directly
> to consumers at a reasonable price."
> 
>  In general, the studios have been hesitant to allow the
> distribution of digital copies of their films on the Internet,
> fearing they would be too easy to copy and share through
> unauthorized sites. What has made studio executives agree to this
> venture has been a growing confidence that the necessary security
> is in place to prevent copying of the downloaded files.
> 
>  However, since almost all film pirating has involved the latest
> releases and this service will make movies available only months
> later, it is unclear what effect it would have on illegal copying.
> 
>  "That remains to be seen," said Ric Dube, an analyst for Webnoize,
> a research company that focuses on digital entertainment
> industries.
> 
>  "What this does is to compete with piracy more effectively than
> the movie industry has in the past," Mr. Dube said. "And the real
> issue isn't whether it will affect piracy, but whether the movie
> industry is willing to tolerate the amount of piracy that's going
> on in order to grow their market."
> 
>  The music industry, which shares parentage with many of the
> studios involved in today's announcement, has also fought against
> file-sharing sites like Napster, and had a harder time because of
> the relative ease of downloading a piece of music.
> 
>  But movie studios have also been faced with file-sharing sites
> like Aimster, which allows swapping of both audio and video files.
> 
>  "The film industry does have a better history of coming through on
> plans like this than does the music industry," Mr. Dube said. "So
> when five major film companies say they will use an online channel
> to distribute their films, that means a lot more than a similar
> statement coming from five music companies."
> 
>  The real question, though, is how many people really want to
> download movies onto their personal computers.
> 
>  "To be really honest, we have no idea," Mr. Waterman said.
> 
> 
> http://www.nytimes.com/2001/08/17/technology/17STUD.html?ex=999055436&ei=1&en=c9ee710697a10157
> 
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