World first: download-to-own movie service
Online movie service Reeltime has announced what it claims to be the world’s first “download to own” movie service, in partnership with Universal Pictures.
The concept is unique – purchasing a title from ReelTime gives the user access to three digital files. The first two are WMV – one for playback on a PC or laptop, and the other is suitable for playback on a Windows Plays4Sure-compatible portable device. The third file is used to burn the movie securely and legally to DVD (up to three times), which you then own.
The idea is terrific, especially given the amount of complaints media providers face regarding fair use policies and the locking of downloaded media so as to make it non-transferable.
There is an opinion floating round that digital piracy is so rife in Australia because media providers are so completely out of step with what people actually want to do with their media.
So ReelTime DTO – which comes online next Wednesday, 29th November, might just be the answer.
To get a better insight into how DTO will work for users, I had a chat to the Managing Director of ReelTime Media, John Karantzis.
APC: “Users who purchase content via ReelTime will have three files available to download. What are the average file sizes?”
John: “The WMV file for computer playback is encoded at 1.6Mb/sec, and works out to around 800MB to 1GB for a 90-minute movie. The Plays4Sure WMV file is encoded at around a third of that rate, giving a 250-300MB file. The DVD image file is compressed down to around 2.5GB.”
APC: “What file format does the downloadable DVD take?”
John: “It’s a proprietary file format developed by ReelTime and Universal. We take the original VOB files and compress them, and they are decompressed during the burn. Given that the file is proprietary, you can only use the ReelTime software to burn the file to DVD.”
APC: “What security is in place to prevent the files from being pirated?”
John: “The WMV file for computer playback is locked to the MAC address of the machine which downloaded it, and can’t be transferred to another machine. The same is true of the Plays4Sure WMV, except in that case the file is locked to the portable device it’s transferred to. We can’t prevent someone from transferring the file to a friend’s portable device, but once it’s copied across it’s not going anywhere.
The compressed DVD has to be burned within 30 days of download, and it also can’t be copied off the host machine.”
APC: “What happens if you need to download a file again?”
John: “Customers can download the WMV files any time, as long as they have proof of purchase. We are limiting downloads of the compressed DVD files to one download per year.
“We will be monitoring how often files are being downloaded, to prevent people abusing the system by downloading the same movie to lots of different machines.”
APC: “When the compressed DVD is burned, does it decompress to a single-layer or double-layer format?”
John: “Single-layer. ReelTime and Universal have a highly professional post-production team in place to compress the original double-layer DVDs down to single-layer without any noticeable loss in quality. In time though, we will be offering customers the choice to download either the single-layer or double-layer formats.”
So the system looks pretty robust so far. The file sizes are not so large as to put people off or to be unworkable given Australia’s generally limited broadband speeds (and given the recent upgrade of Telstra’s ADSL1 network to 8Mbit/s, it’s even less of a concern).
ReelTime has addressed the basic problem of giving customers the option to view downloaded content on a variety of formats without having to bypass DRM protection, and this alone makes the service highly attractive to tech enthusiasts in particular.
ReelTime users won’t have to wait for new releases either. Through the partnership with Universal, ReelTime DTO will release titles at the same day and time as those titles are generally released to DVD. Prices start at AUD$14.98, with new release titles averaging around AUD$33.99.
On the face of things, ReelTime DTO looks to be a flexible and innovative approach to digital media – a service which recognises that customers have a wide variety of playback options and don’t like being prevented from choosing which one to use, and yet has measures in place to protect their own commercial interests as well as those of the content producers. It will be extremely interesting to see what impact it has on the current digital media market.
Currently, the ReelTime service is Windows-only. Mac and Linux users will have to wait, or use virtualisation software to run up a virtual Windows system to access this service.
