Slashdot Log In
BitTorrent Video Download Store Falls Flat
Posted by
ScuttleMonkey
on Wed Feb 28, 2007 01:58 PM
from the working-as-intended dept.
from the working-as-intended dept.
seriously writes "We've all heard about BitTorrent going legit this week with legal movie and TV show downloads. Ars Technica took a look at the service to see how usable it was and ran into a few snags, including not being able to download or even open the video files on some computers. However, the ones that they did manage to open varied a lot in quality. Overall, they blame DRM: 'Without knowing whether browser compatibility and dysfunctional video files are a rare occurrence or not, it's hard to say whether BitTorrent's service is a good one overall. Our initial experiences have been disappointing and frustrating, and guess what the culprit is once again? DRM. Why the DRM failed to work on 50% of our purchases is not clear, but whatever the cause, it's simply unacceptable.'"
Related Stories
[+]
BitTorrent Legit Service Launches 158 comments
The launch of the BitTorrent Entertainment Network came out today; there's the AP write-up, which is decent enough but the interview with Bram about it is more interesting. Tangentially, the the education of lawmakers on video DRM is an interesting countweight to all this.
This discussion has been archived.
No new comments can be posted.
BitTorrent Video Download Store Falls Flat
|
Log In/Create an Account
| Top
| 195 comments
| Search Discussion
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
again... (Score:5, Insightful)
(http://www.atomjax.com/)
Once again proving the point that DRM is nothing but punishment for being a paying customer.
Re:again... (Score:5, Insightful)
(http://libtom.org/)
Is a week long enough to tell if a service will work in the long run? Imagine if we used such journalistic skills for companies like Microsoft or McDonalds...
"After a solid 7 hours of being open, it's clear, Microsoft will never make a sale."
Tom
Mmmm, okay, lets see (Score:4, Insightful)
(Last Journal: Friday August 17, @05:34AM)
If I go into a newly opened restaurant, give my order and seven hours later I would still be waiting for my food, I would NOT give that restaurant another chance.
You seem to have an amazingly silly idea of how you sell things. In the real world you get your stuff in order and THEN launch. I know I know, this the computer industry, home of the patch and beta release, but regular stores like McDonalds do NOT work that way.
Why on earth you label a regular business with Microsoft or for that matter an IT company is beyond me.
You can rest assure that when McD launches a new hamburger they will have at least done some testing to see that the majority of customers are in fact able to digest it. They also do not attempt to stop you from feeding that burger to your dog, splitting a cola with your friends or use the ice cubes to cool your overheated radiator.
If the article is accurate then it is extremely bad, but expected, news for the site. Crippling DRM, inability to just take the customers money (imagine if McD refused to sell you food because it thought you were from the wrong country) and just plain not being able to match up with the ease of downloading the same stuff for free.
I could have gotten all the stuff he payed for, for less and play it without WiMP. Oh and used the money for snacks and drinks.
You know the funny thing? It is not that I am cheap, I got money to burn, and never had a trouble renting or buying stuff before. Just that it has gotten so much easier to just fire up a torrent.
Frankly this looks the same as when napster went legit. Too little, too late.
Re:again... (Score:5, Funny)
HA HA HA HA HA
Re:again... (Score:4, Insightful)
I can make no judgment as to how many of them played Frogger.
Re:You must be a quick reader... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:You must be a quick reader... (Score:5, Insightful)
(http://www.jonnythan.com/)
I read the article before it appeared here. Obviously someone else did because they posted it to slashdot.
I'm not saying the OP read the article, but this article appeared on Ars Technica before it appeared here. This isn't some story that slashdot broke.
DRM (Score:1)
short term profit (Score:5, Insightful)
(Last Journal: Wednesday July 11, @08:27PM)
The more we can download all of our media, the less need there is for a giant distibution company. I don't think the big players want legal, easy, inexpensive media downloads.
Because "they" want to get paid "again" (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:short term profit (Score:4, Interesting)
And, of course, the insane amount of marketing is needed to counter the insane amount of marketing that other makers get. Essentially making sure a large part of the capital available from the end-consumer goes, not to fund more movies, but to maintain a pointless marketing war that neither consumers nor creators want or benefit from.
DRM failed? Say it ain't so! (Score:3, Insightful)
Um, maybe its because most DRM works only by virtually destroying a user's PC? When DRM makers finally agree on a standard (for better or for worse) THEN we'll start seeing progress (on the part of DRM breaking 'hackers').
Re:DRM failed? Say it ain't so! (Score:5, Funny)
(http://www.hyperlogos.org/ | Last Journal: Wednesday July 18, @08:19PM)
No shit man, this has got to stop. I installed Windows Media Player 11, and my laptop display exploded in a puff of orange smoke. Then I installed iTunes, and my hard drive melted into a puddle of metal that burned a hole through my desk and set my pants on fire. Someone must do something!
Legit is a funny term for an industry cartel (Score:5, Insightful)
Let's not confuse "adding DRM" with "going legitimate" please.
DRM to be considered harmful (Score:5, Insightful)
(Last Journal: Wednesday February 28 2007, @05:10PM)
In the end, the easiest thing for a consumer to do will be to just open up The Pirate Bay and type the name of a movie they want. It's sure to work wherever they want, provided they have the codec to play it. And if they don't, they can convert it to MPEG-2, or any other such standard.
Consumers do not want to buy a separate version of their music for their iPod, their Zune, their Gigabeat, their [insert name of portable Flash/USB player here], etc. They don't want to spend hundreds upon hundreds of dollars on new technology to hear what they want, either. Audio CDs have worked for nearly two decades. This goes for video as well. The *AA's need to realise that.
Then again, it's what Apple and Microsoft want: to lock people into their player, so that they must buy another if it breaks. Interoperability would just make every player equal... Oh no, we have to actually think of new features for our players instead of just relying on lock-in to bring us sales! What should we do?!
P.S.: Many stories on Slashdot seem to revolve around DRM lately. I have an impression of déjà vu...
Re:DRM to be considered harmful (Score:4, Interesting)
(http://www.hyperlogos.org/ | Last Journal: Wednesday July 18, @08:19PM)
They're not locked out, they're reduced to a lower resolution. You can still watch them.
If they don't have a codec to play it, they probably don't have a codec to convert it.
Of course, if you buy the CD and rip it, you don't have DRM problems. Just a copyright flag that pretty much all software and even hardware ignores.
The paranoid among us might believe that Steve Jobs would release an open letter condemning DRM just to take the heat off Apple for using DRM. It might even be true. But I don't that's actually all that likely.
Microsoft, on the other hand, definitely operates through vendor lock-in.
Apple has never been the most open company or anything, but they're not as bad as Microsoft in that way. (They are worse in others; they have been known to attempt to hide evidence of their abuse of customers. So I think they both suck.)
WHY? (Score:5, Insightful)
(Last Journal: Wednesday September 22 2004, @11:13AM)
Why? If failed because it is defective by design. It failed because they (whomever "they" are) don't have control over all the various bits and pieces. It failed because DRM deliberately breaks things, on purpose. DRM fails, unless you have complete and utter control over all aspects of distribution/playback, and simply put, they don't have control over people's PCs. Nor will they ever.
And, it is simply unacceptable. But rather than look at the real problem (DRM), they are blaming the distribution protocol (BT).
One last point: The whole "whatever the cause" is turning a blind eye to the real issue, which is DRM cannot work on systems (not just computers) that they don't control. PERIOD.
I just wish the industry technocrats would just look at the obvious. DRM doesn't increase (or maintain) control, it decreases satisfaction in the customer, which makes it
DRM (Score:5, Insightful)
OK, I'll get flamed to death, but oh well. To make a statement like that is silly. That's like trying a new piece of software and then condemning all software in that category because one failed. Apple has shown that properly written DRM can have a minimal impact on the "user experience". Just because the DRM mechanism used by BitTorrent sucks, I guess the naysayers feel the urge to exclaim, "It was the DRM" (visions of MP and Death with outstretched fingers). In reality, it was BitTorrents DRM, and hugely important distinction. We cry and moan when one flaw in OSS causes critics to then paint all OSS with the same brush, but we are so quick to do the same when it suits us. But hey, I guess that means that we're only human.
Why bother? (Score:4, Interesting)
In the Sci-Fi category.
4d Man "rent"
A Clockwork Orange "rent"
Alice in Wonderland Broadway production "rent"
Buncha "Alien" movies. "all rent"
Animatrix "own"
Yuck. I wouldnt even download this garbage from Thepiratebay.com , and they're free. I also looked at other sections that piqued my interest, and the similar veneer of crap was about them all.
Why should I pay for a "rental" or a "own" when there are plenty of websites that provide it for free, along with more rights than I would gain with "bittorrent.com" ?
Answer that, and you solve the majority of piracy. And shutting those sites down is not an acceptable answer, as the USA interests are not shared globally.
Is the objection to DRM or Microsoft DRM (Score:5, Interesting)
(http://albanach.com/)
So, is the argument that we shouldn't be able to rent a film using our computer or is it just a complaint that they use a poorly implemented Microsoft DRM that isn't compatible across platforms. If, say, Real who already offer applications on each platform were to make some DRM that works on *nix, OS X and Windows would the
I can't see how services like this can be delivered without some way to restrict viewing after a period of time. Is there another option I'm missing?
Re:Is the objection to DRM or Microsoft DRM (Score:5, Insightful)
(Last Journal: Thursday December 09 2004, @09:25AM)
Renting is a antiquated term when viewed with respect to digital media of any type. The biggest issue is that there has been a tiered pricing model in the past based on length of access - that access was limited by a physical medium. Both the software and music industries recognized that there is no "rental" when the data is so easy to reproduce as to be trivial - and in response they made certain that copyright law forbid the rental of the physical media which contained those works (I don't have the citiation, but in the US it is true). For video, it was relatively expensive and/or inconvenient to copy the works, and rental stores flourished. I still remember annual and initiation fees (many north of $100) just to have the priveledge to rent the movies.
The idea of renting something doesn't really make sense in a world where there are no incremental costs to produce, and no exclusivity of use of an item. But there's the problem, too. Most consumers put a lower price expectation on a "loaned" item than to own the item - that's natural because we've all grown up to believe in scarcity. There is no scarcity in digital media - the first copy costs an insane amount to produce; the second costs almost nothing. Now, on the opposite side of that debate are the content providers/producers. They value their end-user item at a fixed cost, as if there were an incremental production, packaging, handling, and delivery cost - just like they've always had. In return for reducing or eliminating most of those costs, a lower fee may be paid for a time-limited use. Except that digital media eliminates nearly all of the incremental costs.
So we're at a stalemate where consumers expect a $2-$3 product and the producers want to sell a $20 product. No, let me correct that - the producers expect to sell a $30 product - the "suggested retail price" - even though consumers are used to finding the traditional product at a significant discount, closer to $20. So you've got a 10:1 expectation gap as a result of the data revolution. Until that gets settled, there will be DRM, and nobody will really be happy.
Tried it.. worked ok (Score:5, Informative)
I would have been up in arms as well - but I noticed the yellow banner which told me to enable scripts.
The movie I tried (Broken Arrow) worked and the quality was fine. I consider it about the same as a movie ticket - but I do wish they'd allow more than 1 day to watch the movie after you start watching it(yes, I know you have 30 days to begin watching it - but I wanted to check to make sure it worked first). If I were buying the video I would have been much more annoyed with the DRM - but since it was a rental I wasn't too irked.
Download time was 1 hour (255 KBytes/second average download)
Re:Tried it.. worked ok (Score:4, Funny)
If you are trying to tell me the quality of the movie, "Broken Arrow," was acceptable, I have to call BS. I don't think you ever watched it.
why? (Score:3, Insightful)
Underpants Gnomes, where are you? (Score:2)
1. Make really large files full of random numbers and pretend they're movies
2. Market the hell out of some fictional movies.
3. Sell the files and tell people they can't view them because of the DRM
4. Profit!
Note that I haven't actually to pay for the cost of making a movie here. It's sheer genius!
Wake me up When We have Watermarking (Score:3, Insightful)
(http://blog.bfccomputing.com/ | Last Journal: Tuesday August 07, @06:50PM)
You've got to get over your Control-Freak needs to tell people where, when, and how they can use their media (DRM) so you can get on with making a profit by actually selling huge amounts of it.
Once you give up on the idea of selling me Back to the Future 25 different times over the next half century this is all going to work out well for you.
ethical issue (Score:1)
The only sad thing is that it takes the creators of such futile technologies approximately a decade of losing face before they give in to decreased or no revenue, and/or outright failure of such technologies.
Bittorrent sucks. (Score:1)
(Last Journal: Monday September 11 2006, @09:36AM)
fail on purpose (Score:3, Interesting)
(http://webtrotter.com/blog)
Why? (Score:3, Interesting)
Why would anyone sponsor the big movie companies with their bandwidth, storage and cpu power? I fail to see why anyone would want to do that without receiving a piece of the action, i.e. monetary compensation. This is just a plot by the movie companies to be able to sell movies and have the users pay for the infrastructure.
Why sell over Bittorent (Score:2, Informative)
Bittorrent is by definition a "Peer-to-Peer" protocol.
--- There are no peers ---
There are only the clients and the source.
Hence it would be infinitely simpler to just use a perfectly ordinary HTTP (or whatever), download service from the source to the client, client--server.
Bittorent is perfect for downloading the latest ultra-popular freshly pirated movie, or downloading all six Slackware 11 isos at high speed (as there were so many peers after it was released), but using Bittorent to download a file from a point source, when there are probably negligble other seed/leech sources is simply counterintuitive, and ultimately a suboptimal use of the protocol.
Its no surprise that download speeds may be rubbish, that's a quirk of the protocol (and a function of its probable non-popularity).
As for the DRM, any half-baked excuse for an almost sentient attempt at a life form with more than working brain cell and with its head not buried in the sand (or in its wallet), could tell that DRM simply doesn't work, and merely annoys the user. This has been discussed to death over the last few years in great detail, and if even enormous companies like Apple can twig and get the hint by making their legally obligatory DRM as unobtrusive and transparent as possible (they partially succeded), then these "five movie studios" can do so too...
Overall I judge this as a method of "testing the waters", rather than a serious attempt at making money, or providing a service. Ultimately the conclusion is inevitably negative.
Netflix got it right (Score:2)
DRM or bad programming? (Score:1)
Watchable on TV/DVD? (Score:1)
Does anyone know if BitTorrent makes it difficult to put content onto a DVD-player readable DVD?
Legit? (Score:2)
Tried it. It sucked. Now how do I pay the artist? (Score:3, Interesting)
My friends told me that Little Miss Sunshine was a wonderful heartwarming film. Sounded like a perfect mood lifter. So I headed over to Bittorrent.com, signed myself up and with little hassle got myself a nice link to a
The problems started when I tried to play the movie. I launched the downloaded file in windows media player 11, and immediately hit a roadblock. There were some messages to respond to, perhaps signing in with my BT.com username + pw, then a message stating that I had a limit of 2 machines to try this on. Click OK. Number goes to on. Sure. Giving me an extra. OK. Then I get the message the the good folks at ARS got about WMP "encountering a problem." Cancel and retrying gets me nowhere, so I try the "Web help" option" which turns out to be a page about updating the sound drivers. I try windows update - nothing there. I try the freshest drivers from the sound card manufacturer. I still get the same message. I Google the error code. Many links later I get one helpful tidbit from a support forum (non-MN) to downgrade to WPM 10. Desparate I go for it. I use add/remove to downgrade to WMP 9, my previously installed version. I try to play the movie just to see what will happen even though I know BT.com tells me to use 10 or 11. Now I get a message telling me that I'm out of licenses. I guess I'm out $3.99, too.
Having paid for the movie, I decide to download it the old fashioned way. It took the pressure of having to watch it in 24 hours off, which is nice since I'm pretty busy and might like to watch it over a couple of nights. The download took a bit longer, but it worked. The movie played when I hit play. I was touched by the experiences of the quirky people. I had no headaches fiddling with driver updates, support forums, WMP downgrades, time-limited and disappearing licenses. I'll probably delete the file soon, as I don't watch too many films twice. Kind of like a rental. I just wish they would make it easier for me to pay them. I mean what do I do for my next rental? Do I go to BT.com, pay ignore their DRM torrent and find my own? Seems kind of silly. If I'm paying I'd like to get the higher download speeds. (YYMV, but my "community torrents" go slower that the one I got from BT.com.) This method would also work for when I switch back to Linux.
Any suggestions? I do believe in paying the artist - enough so that I'm willing to pay the media giant that stands between us.
-Jon
My ideas (Score:1)
Second, the fact that they rely on user's codecs is an error, since various codec packs can create a real mess on the computer and many users simply don't understand *why* they have to install codecs in order to be able to play X or Y.
Third, you have to select/purchase the movie from the web-browser, download it with bittorrent and watch it with a media player. At least 3 applications are involved, which is somewhat distracting and annoying.
Projects like democracy player (http://www.getdemocracy.com/) are much more integrated and don't require you to switch from app to app to whatch a movie.
In my view, the best app which does everything right is LiberTV (http://www.libertv.ro/), which is a romanian service, and should launch internationally soon (http://www.libertv.tv/).
The downloads go several megabytes per second, no codecs needed (except for quicktime for some videos) and you can start watching the movie in several seconds, because files are split into smaller parts before being transfered with a bittorrent-like protocol. So users have a 'click and watch' attitude towards the app, not 'click, install, launch, switch, download, switch, play, crash, try again, damn DRM!'