At this point, I can only think that either media providers are encouraging piracy or have the collective intelligence of a dung beetle.
Last night I took 4 new DVDs that offered digital copies and downloaded the files to my computer. I did this a few months ago for the Avengers movie and it worked like a charm. Three of the four used iTunes to download and one was a direct download. Three had a different format than the other. So there were plenty of variables here but there was one constant. Just about every media player I had refused to play them and the one that did had the voices out of sync.
Last month I realized that with the new laptop it would be great to have the LOTR movies on there because if there’s one set of movies we can watch over and over, it’s these. I pulled out the info from my BluRay box and went to the computer. The website said “offer expired” and wouldn’t acknowledge my download code.
Out of curiosity I checked a couple torrent sites and there were the LOTR movies, ripped off of BluRay with 1080p. I sampled one and there was absolutely no problem with the audio syncing and picture quality was stunning.
Now let’s talk about HBO and the other networks. Most TV networks will only keep their shows online for a finite amount of time. Some throw it to Hulu but often it’s not the complete series or even just samples. HBO has their GO platform to view their series but it’s limited to certain cable companies. And definitely not a rural cable company like mine. I understand HBO is somewhat caught between a rock and a hard place. If they made content available to anyone online, the cable companies (their golden goose) would be up in arms. But sooner or later, they have to make a move
Now I can stream a HELLUVA lot of programming through Amazon Prime and that’s our standard content source. But it irks the bejesus out of me that we are still so limited by everyone but Amazon. Piracy is insanely easy compared to dealing with these idiots and that’s not a good option for anyone. I am in no way advocating or sponsoring going after free content. But I am also greatly frustrated.
Every time you start playing a DVD, there’s bound to be a warning about piracy. Yet the movie and TV content providers do their damnedest to make piracy the easiest option. Like the music industry and publishing, they refuse to believe that their business model is stuck in the mid-90s and we’re almost two decades away from that. They work like stevedores to shut pirates down when the simplest solution would be to provide content without hassle, without technical glitches, from one or two reliable places. We’ve been in this digital age long enough for some self-awareness, but they’d rather rend their garments and gnash their teeth. At this point, maybe they should just start providing links to torrent sites and get it over with.
