Home Media Magazine - September 30 - October 6, 2007 - (Page 28)

NEWS to protect their property. “Digital rights technology and consumer choice — you can’t have one without the other,” he said. “Rent, Panelists discuss the quandary of designing workable copyright protection sellthrough, download-to-own — all By Anne Sherber what kind of DRM is developed and sumers about exactly what it is they are consumer choices made possible EW YORK — Protecting deployed, some consumers will find are buying, he said. Are they limited by digital rights technology.” content is a necessary evil in ways to circumvent the security to personal copying? What about time But Attaway noted that the MPAA the copyright world, despite measures. shifting? Are they locked inis opposed to governmental differing views on how that should “The trick is to minimize the re- to a single platform? interference. “DRM be done, panelists said at the Digital wards to the attacker,” Shamoon Transparency and should be a funcRights Strategies ’07 Conference, said. disclosure are key tion of the marproduced by JupiterMedia. DRM is often discussed in black and if content proketplace,” he “A digital world without digital white terms, said David Sohn, senior viders want to consaid. rights management (DRM) would policy counsel at the Center for vince consumers that Michael Einhorn, an be like a physical world without any Democracy and Technology. It may managed rights facilitate independent policy consultdoors or windows or even walls,” be more useful, he noted, to think choices, he said. ant, took the free marketplace idea said keynote speaker Talal about tradeoffs for the consumer. Fritz Attaway, EVP and senior pol- one step further, suggesting that conShamoon, the CEO of Intertrust. Rights management on DVDs treat- icy advisor at the Motion Picture As- tent providers allow consumers to Most conference panelists and ed consumers as passive. Content sociation of America (MPAA), said freely share content on peer-to-peer speakers conceded that no matter providers need to be clear with con- consumers expect content providers networks. He noted that this kind of www.homemediamagazine.com “superdistribution,” in which consumers recommend content to other users and receive payment for each “sale” that they make, might be the most effective way of fighting the “darknet.” Managing digital rights includes overcoming the challenge of interoperability. If consumers purchase the right to view a pay-per-view movie from their cable provider, should they have to pay an additional fee for the right to watch that same movie on their iPod? “Many people are trying to equate DRM and interoperability,” said Jack Fuchs, VP of business development for Inka Entworks. “Some say that you can have one or the other. But enabling interoperability while preserving DRM is possible and desirable.” What Should DRM Look Like? N Sonic Ready to Burn Baby Burn Continued from page 1 Blu-ray Specs Reach for Uniformity Continued from page 1 picture-in-picture features, and requires support for 256MB of memory, either built in or from a memory card or USB flash drive. In short, most of the special features the HD DVD camp has been touting would be supported by Blu-ray as well. And when most Blu-ray players start supporting profile 2.0, or BD Live, the two formats would be on complete equal footing in the extras department (BD Live allows for a network connection and calls for a full gigabyte of storage). But after all the new Blu-ray set-top boxes were announced at the Custom Electronic Design & Installation Association (CEDIA) Expo in Denver in early September, Adam Gregorich of the Home Theater Forum noticed a problem. “I found it telling that of all the new players announced at CEDIA, only one company announced players that support profile 1.1,” he said, pointing to two Denon players, the DVD-3800BDCI and DVD2500BTCI, which are slated for release in 2008. “Also, there is no ‘sunset clause’ on existing players, so any player shipping before [Oct. 31[ can continue shipping as a [version] 1.0 player indefinitely.” Disney has announced two titles that have special features that require BD Live for 2008: National Treasure and Sleeping Beauty. Several 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment Blu-ray titles in the pipeline call for picture-in-picture features. But what if few set-top players available to consumers can play the special features? “I think that BD has a chicken-and-egg problem,” Gregorich said, adding most existing Blu-ray players won’t be upgradeable, with the exception of the PlayStation 3, because of its high-powered central processing unit. “The studios don’t want to include features that people with current players can’t use, and the hardware manufactures don’t want to make players when there is no software to support the features. “This is one of the things that HD DVD got right. They required Ethernet, persistent storage and secondary video decoders from day one.” Andy Parsons, chairman of the Blu-ray Disc Association’s U.S. Promotions Group, downplayed the impact non-profile 1.1 or 2.0 Blu-ray set-tops will have, noting the advanced interactive features supported by basic Blu-ray Java should work on every player. “If studios put BD Live on their discs, the only thing when a customer orders them via a touchscreen display at a kiosk or retail counter. A selection from thousands of movies and TV shows could be made available on DVD. The SRP for the set-up ranges from $1,495 to $6,995. “Primera is thrilled to be providing a reliable, yet affordable on-demand, in-store DVD disc-publishing system,” said Mark Strobel, VP of sales and marketing for Primera. Primera is just the latest of many companies joining with Sonic. Sonic reported its software already is being used by several companies. Beginning next month, consumers will start seeing the end results at retail. Pioneer, Plextor, DataPlay, Philips & LiteOn Digital Solutions Corp., and Toshiba Samsung Storage Technology Corp., will be among those releasing new drives that allow CSS-encrypted DVDs to be burned with downloaded content, according to Sonic. The company added it is working with home media hardware manufacturers as well. “We are extremely pleased that a universal standard has been defined by the industry, and the stage is set for the launch of new downloadto-burn solutions that will provide consumers on-demand access to a wider selection of highquality video entertainment,” said Dave Habiger, Sonic’s president and CEO. Other Sonic partners include Microtech Systems, Rimage, Allied Vaughn and Elesys Inc. “The DVD CCA’s announcement is good news for the industry as a whole and helps create a new distribution opportunity for major Hollywood studios,” said Curt Marvis, CEO of CinemaNow. “I would expect a greater willingness on their part to deliver top tier content for burning to DVD. “As more content for burning becomes available, we expect to see a rapid increase of CSS-encryption-supported discs and burners in the months and years to come.” Until the recent decision, CinemaNow had been offering its own technology for copyprotected burning, but only on a handful of older movies. CLASSIFIED SHOWCASE PA C K A G I N G CLASSIFIED ADVERTISING MAKES DOLLARS AND SENSE! U S E D TA P E S & D V D S FOR ADDITIONAL INFORMATION CONTACT: Kurt Wohlman (714) 338-6749 kwohlman@questex.com www.homemediamagazine.com that would be missing would be online functionality [for earlier Blu-ray models],” he said. “The impact on the consumer should be minimal. “All players after Oct. 31 must comply with that (1.1 profile). That’s not going to change.” And for picture-in-picture features, a workaround is possible without a second video recorder, due to the larger capacity of Blu-ray, Gregorich noted: two copies of the same film can be included on one BD-50, one where the secondary picture is burned into the film, the second including only the standard film. Still, HD DVD supporters are quick to point out the potential problems facing Blu-ray special features. “On the Blu-ray version of 300, [many] special features you see on the HD DVD [don’t] exist,” said Kevin Collins, director of HD DVD evangelism for Microsoft’s Consumer Media Technology Group. “Warner’s not going to include extras that 0% of the population can use. “Confusion with consumers is going to be a mess.” Warner Home Video, the lone major studio still releasing titles on both high-def formats, has either excluded features for Blu-ray seen on the HD DVD, or held off on releasing a Blu-ray for a movie until the 1.1 and 2.0 profiles are introduced. “We’re about 21 titles light between Blu-ray and HD DVD, and that’s largely due to functionality,” said Daniel Silverberg, Warner Home Video VP of HD Media Development. “The nice thing about 1.1 BD and HD DVD is they have dual audio decoders. In the long term, the Blu-ray hardware [will catch up].” Paul Hemstreet, Warner Home Video VP of DVD special features, pointed out that many of the special features on both high-def formats today may not be needed in the future. “How much interactivity do people want?” he said. “When does it become too gimmicky?” Still, Gregorich sees potential problems for some studios releasing on Blu-ray should consumers not be aware that some bonuses won’t be compatible with their player. “Most of the early adopters know it and understand they will need a new player to support the full potential of Blu-ray, but I doubt most of the average consumers buying the Sony S300 at Target, Costco, WalMart and Best Buy do,” Gregorich said. “I wonder what will happen when they buy National Treasure or Sleeping Beauty this summer and find out that they can’t view or use all of the special features that I’m sure will be heavily advertised.” Home Media Magazine September 30–October 6, 2007 http://www.homemediamagazine.com http://www.homemediamagazine.com

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Contents News Commentary TV DVD Reviews Pipeline Research Top 20 DVD Sellers Top 20 Rentals and Top 10 Charts Just Announced

Home Media Magazine - September 30 - October 6, 2007

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