Studios try again with Movielink
Having already failed once with Movielink, Warner Bros, Paramount, Universal, Sony Pictures and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer are trying again, hoping to re-boot in collaboration with SBC Internet Services, which in turn wants to boost its broadband trade via an SBC Yahoo DSL offering.
Movielink – an early Hollywood attempt to thwart online p2p file sharing – went online at around this time last year. However, it was then, and is still was at the time of writing, Americocentric, not to coin a phrase. That’s to say, anyone outside of the US of A looking for one of the 170 titles such as ‘A Beautiful Mind,’ ‘Ocean’s Eleven ,’ or even ‘Breakfast at Tiffany’s’ was out of luck.
Non-Americans saw, and at the time of writing still see, “Thanks for your interest in Movielink, the leading source for movies delivered directly over the Internet. We want you to enjoy our powerful movie download experience, but it is presently unavailable to users outside of the United States.”
But even if it had been online for those (including people on the other side of the US border) domiciled elsewhere, only teenagers and above would have been able to use it.
Before the USA Only warning, the five studios had a ‘trailer’ site which said Movielink was closed to, and would not accept any information from, that consumer group known these days as ‘pre-teens’.
‘If you are under 13, please exit the site,’ they told non-teenie boppers. The precise nature of the leading-edge software WB, P, U, SP and MGM would use to make the site ‘unavailable’ to little kids, and/or to determine visitors’ age, was a closely guarded secret between them and IBM, which was providing Movielink technology services.
Now, at about $4 per title, “The high-speed Internet access provider, a unit of SBC Communications, has teamed with Movielink to create a co-branded Web site of video downloads for subscribers to SBC Yahoo DSL, the companies said,” states a CNET News report on ZDNet.
“New members will receive $10 in movie rentals from the service, which is powered by Movielink. The online video company, a joint venture of five major Hollywood film studios, lets people rent, download and watch movies on a PC for roughly $4 a title.”
The original Movielink wanted $US1.99 to $US4.99 per encrypted download: the movies (apparently of less than VHS quality) killed themselves if they weren’t watched within 30 days. The same thing happened 24 hours after ‘play’ was clicked. And files could be viewed only through RealNetworks or Microsoft players.
Movies rented under the new deal will also self-destruct after 30 days if they’re not viewed.
“For Movielink, the deal promises greater exposure among its target market: broadband subscribers,” says CNET. “The company has long faced difficulties in winning moviegoers over to rent films online. But as increasing numbers of people sign up for high-speed Net service, it has more opportunities to sell its movie downloads, which are less likely to result in a shaky picture on a PC, or on a TV set fed by a PC, if a broadband connection is used.
“The partnership should also help Movielink and its studio backers to fight Internet-based piracy. Movielink–owned in part by MGM, Paramount Pictures, Sony Pictures Entertainment, Universal Studios and Warner Bros. Pictures–is bent on gaining awareness of its legal film rental service among the very Web surfers who are most apt to download new release films via peer-to-peer networks such as Kazaa without the permission of copyright holders.”
