Online video site Guba is clearly in the good graces of Hollywood these days. Fresh on the heels of last week’s deal with Warner, Guba announced a second internet film distribution deal with Sony this evening. Favorites like Spider Man 2 headline the content. In the short-term the experience will mirror the Warner deal, so many of the limitations/issues raised by TechCrunch readers after the last post remain. Still, the deal is good for Guba - any distinction is a plus in the crowded online video space.
One of the more interesting aspects to the deal is the fact that it’s Sony. It’s a toe in the water; not a dramatic move, but at least it’s something. With hardware and gaming and limited internet success to date, will this deal be one of many that signal a change in Sony’s digital and internet strategy?
See all
Post
Or will Sony find another way to mess up people’s computers?
I honestly don’t get the way these studios think. Why must the VTO be accompagnied with so many restrictions, that the video is basically useless. Who wants to pay full dvd-price for something that only shows well on something like ipods and PSP’s?
And why the DRM? DRM only harrases paying customers. All the pirates already downloaded a HDTV DivX version without any restrictions via BitTorrent ripped from DVD. The only thing this policy achieves is killing any attempt at legal downloads.
Music and video is the only commodity I know of, where you get a lower quality if you actually pay for it. If you buy your music in a store or from iTunes, you’re restricted in where you can play your music, maybe it will damage your computer, and generally what you can do with it…
The entertainment industry must be the only one in the world, that punishes paying customers and then are supprised, that they’d rather download the music off the internet. DRM never stopped a pirate, but it has annoyed the pants of a whole lot of paying customers.
I agree, I was using napster’s subscription service for some time, but having discovered allofmp3 I am a little torn. Your right the prices are far too high considering you don’t get physical product and the quality I can only guess will be worse than if you bought the thing. It’s almost like they are pushing people to buy in the traditional way. Also all these great advances in TV are great but when is anyone going to offer them in the UK aswell as the USA. I guess we may get it faster than some other countries.