From Reuters
Disney to use Microsoft for Web movies

Mon 9 February, 2004 02:34

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Walt Disney has agreed to license copy-protection technology from Microsoft for distributing movies over the Internet.

Disney, which was last year's top Hollywood studio by revenue, will license Microsoft's digital rights management technology that prevents illegal distribution and copying of audio and visual content stored digitally.

Disney said on Sunday it wanted to start selling its movies on the Web by late this year or early 2005.

Hollywood has been fearful that releasing films over the Internet will lead to unauthorised copying and distribution of content, a problem that has plagued the music industry and hurt CD sales.

"They (Disney) don't want the film industry to go the way of the music industry," said Will Poole, Microsoft senior vice president in charge of the Windows desktop business.

Disney said it needed technology to keep it from losing control over content.

"We are looking at both retailing the content through our own Web site as well as making the content available through third-party Web sites," Disney Chief Strategic Officer Peter Murphy said.

Disney already sells movies through third-party sites and is trying other technologies from its own set-top boxes to disposable DVDs.

Microsoft and Disney plan to put movies in digital format, distribute them via the Internet and on portable media. The movies could be legally transferred between computers and a new generation of portable video devices with hard drives.

The nonexclusive agreement between Microsoft and Disney was similar to some aspects of a deal made in May 2003 between Microsoft and Time Warner Inc.

Under that arrangement, part of a $750 million settlement between Microsoft and Time Warner's AOL business, Time Warner agreed to work together to promote the creation and distribution of digital content.

Goodbye, movie industry. Nobody will buy movies that they can't do anything with that constitutes fair use...

If it's purely software DRM, it will be cracked readily.

I suppose the crackers should wait until many movies are distributed this way before releasing their decryption tools.

Disney said it needed technology to keep it from losing control over content.

On the internet you never have total control

I'm disgusted with Michael Eisner, but I thought your picture of Gates with mouse ears sucked.

So they made a deal. I can't believe people's reaction. This should have already happened. Disney is a major movie studio. Microsoft is a software company which is heavily invested in DRM and anti-piracy.

It makes sense they'd want to work together. Disney was one of the companies pushing for the adoption of the DMCA.

Microsoft software sells, but, it can be cracked. There's always an answer to DRM. This isn't much of a development. I don't find it interesting or exciting. In fact, I'm surprised it hasn't happened yet.

Open source will trump Microsoft. It will. It's just able to spread more readily. I'm not sure why people are so worried about Microsoft. We have Linux. Why do we need to be afraid? We will win. Just watch and see.

A lot is hanging on the Democrats this year. If they get elected, you'll see the influence of big corporations lessened. Note: for all you republicans out there, I said "lessened", not "go away".

:-:~ Phantom

Lessened? Not if any one of the top few get the presidency.

And by the way, I'm not scared of Microsoft. They can kiss my ass, and I blame their shit for making me stupid when it comes to programming.

Linux will prevail. Open source is where it's at. Freedom from Microsloth and thier "control over content"

So, you're telling me that John Kerry (whom I expect to win the nomination) is just as cozy with big corporations as George W. Bush? Sorry, that statement is wrong.

George W. Bush's entire administration is corporations, corporations, corporations. If John Kerry (or any other democrat) is elected, he won't give millions to Halliburton in lucrative contracts. He won't open up more national forests and public lands to hunting, drilling, snowmobiling, mining, and pollution every Friday. He won't go invade more countries in search of oil so our economy can keep at the status quo.

By the way, insulting Microsoft doesn't take you very far. As I've mentioned in previous posts, the company has done a lot of good things (I live in the same town as them, and I know). You take the good with the bad.

It's every company's dream to be a monopoly. Pure capitalism has no way of preventing this from happening. Government interference is then necessary, hence our mixed market economy. Microsoft is just trying to become the DeBeers of software. Ever wondered why diamonds cost so much??? Look up DeBeers.

Since we have Linux, we're guaranteed to have a weapon that will keep Microsoft in check. They're not a sloth. They're just a company trying to make money. They're much different from real sloths, like Exxon, Halliburton, or Wal Mart.

:-:~ Phantom

Phantom,

I'm sorry but I have to say this...

Lessoned the same way it was when the DMCA and CTEA of 1998 were passed???

Who benefited most from those laws???

I agree the payouts won't be as well publicized, but they will happen in the same severity as they always have, no matter which side of the aisle is in the white house.

I'd personally like to see how the Medal of Honor winner conducts himself since he's shown he can handle things when the bullets start flying, but I've pretty much made up my mind I'm not voting for any of the publicized candidates.

I'm going to try to find somebody with a little more intestinal fortitude to do what they believe is right instead of what the party line is.

Disney said it needed technology to keep it from losing control over content.

So they turned to Microsoft.

Another victory for file sharing!

Disney has overlooked a small problem. Even the movie pirates have to download a movie as 700MB. Anything less than 600 and the quality goes down noticeably. Thats with the divx codec, WMV performs considerably worse at moderate and high bitrates, as its optimised for streaming. So, Disneys market is now limited to people with broadband, credit cards and a lot of free time.

Then theres the CDN for delivering those 300M files (Disney will sacrifice some quality for profit). Its going to be big. Disney could afford it of course, but they will struggle to make a profit of it, espicially when the p2p networks are already providing all those films in higher quality, open formats and at earlier dates.

Ghost: Microsoft is just trying to make money, same as any other company. They just try to do so by taking over markets completly. They have produced some good technology, and its unlikely the PC would have reached its current popularity without the Windows OS, which brought the PC from the geeks-only technical useage down to a level ordinary people could understand We can still make fun of of them through. Their software is bloated, feature-suffed, buggy and insecure. Their media technology is released under licenses so restrictive you cant even use an open-source text editor to write the code for an application using it. Their NGSCB shows all the signs of being the Lock-In From Hell.

As far as presidental canidates, this guy has my support.
Vote Aaron Russo.


http://www.russoforpresident.com/issues.php?id=18

"I suppose the crackers should wait until many movies are distributed this way before releasing their decryption tools. "

haha. Hopefully they do.

This article would be relevant except I don't like any disney made after the early 90's, because it's garbage. And I don't use any microsoft product except.. um.. windows98. But it's sharing space with linux.

lol...I just love that picture of Gates as a Mickey Mouse club member....

I needed a laugh and that was great.

Another great post Tom....
--------------------------------------------
death123 - I also am throwing my support to Russo...I wrote Aaron and received an email back from him...

~Code

Woohoo! Disney movies online? Software-based DRM? EXCELLENT! Let me fire up my old Pentium III and grab the cracked versions. My daughter will be wanting to watch these in a year or two.

What's with the conspiracy / monopoly angle? Disney is looking to move into the online market (THANK GOD SOMEONE IS) They will need to at least ATTEMPT to secure their products (logical business move) MS has been desparately trying to innovate such, much like most other software firms. (great product IF you can do it)

Look, streaming/downloadable on demand delivery is the wave of the future. What's more it will be the ONLY way very soon. Goodbye teevee, goodbye broadcast radio, bring on more what-you-want-when-you-want services. They say the ppv on-demand stuff is absolutely KILLING the rental video business ('they' being an article I read in the NY Times, no link it was hardcopy)

Anyway, good to see a film house trying to establish an online set of goods. Bad move for trying it in the middle of a protest movement, with a firm trying to instill DRM on every poor soul out there, but hey, evolve or die, right? No one will go to the movies to see Cinderella II or Lion King III so you have to offer on-demand to get people interested.

I better stop now before CodeSpellingNazi impales me for misspelling something in his forum.

Phantom, it is because of people like you that we have to worry about all of this. You just sit around and let others make the decisions for you and then take the side of the lesser evil. You know why diamonds cost so much? Because DeBeers has killed thousands of people to keep it that way and no one has had the balls to do anything about it. That whole "their the biggest and I have to play into it because I don't have any choice" attitude is the reason that corporations can get away with taking adavantage of people to make a buck. I refuse to let it continue and I am doing something about it instead of just complaining.

If the Democrats win, the coporate influence will be roughly at the saem level, but it will be different influences. Both parties have their coporate buddies. Just read that John Kerry used to have oil buddies, which of course Bush has quite a few of.

If I remember correctly, Eisner was one of the top supporters of the "Fritz Chip" which was a suppose to be aome type of hardware based copy control tool that would be required on ALL computer, as written in a bill from Sen. Fritz Hollings (Democrat - SC). The first result in google for 'Fritz Hollings Eisner' brings up this. http://www.boycott-riaa.com/rogues/hollings

BTW, his seat is up for election this year and he is not running.

Most of espn is tied into msn somehow (which is strange since msn and nbc co-own msnbc).

Brandon we must be on the same wave length I was getting ready to say the same thing. Your right both parties have there special interests. They all have their corporate interests as well. For the Republicans its big bussiness and a lot of major corporations. well not all Repbulicans. The Democrats have the a lot of people in the music and movie industry which if you ask me are pretty big corporate intrests. Bush as got some oil buddies so does Kerry. Heck Kerry is married to a big corporate interest. We all know his wife is the heiress to the Heinz fortune. Not that who her family is will have any bearing on what type of President he will be if he gets elected or how is decisions are influenced well at least I hope not.

WMDRMv2 has been cracked, but because of that almost everyone uses the older WMDRMv1, still unbroken.

" So, you're telling me that John Kerry (whom I expect to win the nomination) is just as cozy with big corporations as George W. Bush"

He is every bit as close, if not closer, to the record companies.

Of course Kerry is close to the record companies. He had a band once upon a time, so he's going to take the bullheaded position when it comes to these issues.

Microsoft? What Do You Want to Crack Today?

A little off topic but might want to check out this link. If you like Mancow takes a little shot at the record companies.
http://www.foxnews.com/video2/player.html?6645&Mancow&Mancow%20Cam&acc&wvx-300

From a buisiness and economic standpoint this is a pretty good move for both companies.

ok, so now disney movies now will be buggy, and need security d/l's for them to work, and will crash when viewed.

PhantomGhost, wake up...it does not matter. its all big company and government.

Bnpayne78 That was a damn good shot at the record companies and quite Funny!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The very idea of DRM is laughable. It is so fundamentaly flawed. If something can be read/viewed/played it can be copied in some way.