Legal downloading still a mess

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koriek361

New member
I know this is a well-trodden topic, but hey.

Finally, in 2010, legal music downloading works. It needed 3 things to make it really viable - 1) full choice; 2) cheap and 3) no DRM. The past year in particular has seen all three problems overcome - even iTunes has abandoned DRM now. And this year, for the first time, legal download sales have increased more than CD sales have dropped. Funny, that.

Movies, however, are still in the dark ages. I think the three basic problems all have to be overcome (though choice is becoming less of an issue). The Hurt Locker is
 
What other sites apart from i-tunes can you download legally?

All it will take is for a website to start selling downloaRAB legally at a reasonable price without too much restriction. And ISP's will be providing better bandwidth shortly

All other sites / services like i-tunes will soon follow suite.
 
Allegedly LoveFilm do, but I could only find online watching, which is truly hopeless.

"All it will take is for a website to start selling downloaRAB legally"... indeed, but no-one will be able to do that until the studios allow it. And despite all the experience from the music industry, it looks like their heaRAB are well and truly buried in the sand.
 
Another closed system with DRM. Sigh....

So... to re-state the question... how long will it take the studios to wake up here? My guess is 2-3 years. DVD sales will start plummeting, Blu-ray won't be making up the gap, and online sales will be pitiful. Someone - Amazon, probably - will manage to forge a deal with a studio or two to go DRM-free perhaps next year or the year after, and then everyone will follow suit within 12 months.

But why make us all wait for the inevitable? It would be cool if some of the smaller indies started the ball rolling right now...
 
I know this sounRAB a bit daft, but if we all start downloading movies, won't it clog up the entire internet somewhat? SERIOUS question.
 
I'm getting fed up with the number of DVRAB I have so I have made a decision to stop buying them. I am also thinking about cancelling my DVD rental subscription as well as the there are plenty of options to watch the same films online or through my cable service.

While this will suit me for most films, there are some that I really enjoy and would like to be able to watch whenever I like and I would prefer not to have to rent them each time so I think there is a gap for downloadable movies that I can watch on any device and can be guaranteed to be playable for the foreseeable future.

The biggest obstacle is the price of a film compared to the price of a music track. When a song costs less that a pound, it can be bought without much thought but something which costs closer to
 
Can't see it being much worse than I-player.

They could have a legal p2p scheme where you gain credits for sharing the movies you have paid for. Maybe have the film for sale as a premium direct download for a few days then have it discounted via p2p.

You'd need to share back a sufficient amount in order to gain credit for future use.

It's an idea.
 
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