Fox joins the PSP party
One more name on the list of studios promising to support the new UMD video format for Sony's Playstation Portable (PSP). 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment came on board yesterday, with a slate of releases including "I, Robot," "Dodgeball," "Predator," and the independent comedy surprise success, "Napoleon Dynamite." This make Fox the latest to follow in the footsteps of Sony Pictures (of course), Universal, Buena Vista, and Lion's Gate.
As for me, I don't expect the UMD movie format to survive the next 12 months. With prices at or above DVD's, visual quality about the same - only smaller, and no other player besides the PSP, I don't think consumers will be interested for the long term. There are too many alternatives and too few incentives to use the new format. I'm guessing most households that own a PSP also own a laptop computer capable of playing DVD's on the go. The other main competition is from the PSP itself, which is capable of playing movie files from a memory stick. Tech savvy users can use freeware from the Net to convert their DVD's to a video file that can be stored on reusable memory stick that costs about the same as 3 or 4 UMD movie disks. Who wants to buy their DVD collection all over again? My friends are already cutting back their DVD purchases in anticipation of High Definition formats expected to come late this year.
Here's the fundamental problem: the copyright lawyers for the entertainment industries want it to be abundantly clear that we don't purchase content- we license it. That's why we aren't supposed to make copies of our digital media to give to our friends. They need to obtain the license to view that media by purchasing a disc also. If that's the case, then once the consumer has purchased that license, they should never have to purchase it again. Once I've purchased the right to watch "Van Helsing," it shouldn't matter if I want to watch it on my TV or my PSP or my Pocket PC or my Divx player. And it shouldn't matter if my digital media was originally stored on a DVD or a Kryptonian Meteor Rock. I should be able to move it around, as long as I keep it to myself and don't release it to the public. You can't have it both ways, guys.
As for me, I don't expect the UMD movie format to survive the next 12 months. With prices at or above DVD's, visual quality about the same - only smaller, and no other player besides the PSP, I don't think consumers will be interested for the long term. There are too many alternatives and too few incentives to use the new format. I'm guessing most households that own a PSP also own a laptop computer capable of playing DVD's on the go. The other main competition is from the PSP itself, which is capable of playing movie files from a memory stick. Tech savvy users can use freeware from the Net to convert their DVD's to a video file that can be stored on reusable memory stick that costs about the same as 3 or 4 UMD movie disks. Who wants to buy their DVD collection all over again? My friends are already cutting back their DVD purchases in anticipation of High Definition formats expected to come late this year.
Here's the fundamental problem: the copyright lawyers for the entertainment industries want it to be abundantly clear that we don't purchase content- we license it. That's why we aren't supposed to make copies of our digital media to give to our friends. They need to obtain the license to view that media by purchasing a disc also. If that's the case, then once the consumer has purchased that license, they should never have to purchase it again. Once I've purchased the right to watch "Van Helsing," it shouldn't matter if I want to watch it on my TV or my PSP or my Pocket PC or my Divx player. And it shouldn't matter if my digital media was originally stored on a DVD or a Kryptonian Meteor Rock. I should be able to move it around, as long as I keep it to myself and don't release it to the public. You can't have it both ways, guys.
posted by Matt at 10:49 AM
1 Comments:
From the Hollywood Reporter, December 19, 2006:
"The PSP was launched in March 2005 amid a flurry of studio announcements promising movies on the proprietary Universal Media Disc format. But poor sales prompted most studios, including Sony, to either cut back or stop producing UMD movies."
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