Arguably, MovieBeam is a vertically-integrated video jukebox service, although it doesn’t seem to be taking off so far. Presumably, it would sell better if it gave people the option of ripping their existing DVDs onto it. And it would also probably sell better if its DRM scheme weren’t so restrictive.

That’s a good article about the iPod. However, I don’t see anything there to support the claim that Apple would have vertically integrated EARLIER if the Diamond decision had gone the other way. If DMCA-backed vertical integration can deliver results to consumers earlier, where’s our vertically-integrated video jukebox service?

Knauss noted that there were no demands to add FairPlay, Apple’s copy-protection technology, which was appended to the second-generation iPod to coincide with the introduction of the iTunes music store.

“There was no discussion of (digital rights management),” Knauss said. “Their belief was DRM would hurt sales when they rolled out the music store. They specifically wanted no DRM in the original iPod.”

So at a minimum, the iPod would have been held up until the ITMS was set up, right?

To this day, many customers mostly put their existing CD collections on their iPods rather than purchasing music from the ITMS. How successful would the iPod have been if people had had to purchase an iPod and then immediately start rebuilding their existing music library with iTunes songs? I doubt I’d own an iPod today if I’d been forced to spend hundreds of dollars re-building my music collection.

Knauss noted that there were no demands to add FairPlay, Apple’s copy-protection technology, which was appended to the second-generation iPod to coincide with the introduction of the iTunes music store. “There was no discussion of (digital rights management),” Knauss said. “Their belief was DRM would hurt sales when they rolled out the music store. They specifically wanted no DRM in the original iPod.”

So at a minimum, the iPod would have been held up until the ITMS was set up, right?

To this day, many customers mostly put their existing CD collections on their iPods rather than purchasing music from the ITMS. How successful would the iPod have been if people had had to purchase an iPod and then immediately start rebuilding their existing music library with iTunes songs? I doubt I’d own an iPod today if I’d been forced to spend hundreds of dollars re-building my music collection.

http://www.wired.com/news/mac/0,2125,64286,00.html

Thanks for commenting!

If DRM had been designed into the CD format, the RIAA would have won Diamond and Apple would probably never have invented the iPod (remember that the iPod came out 18 months before the ITMS). Certainly that might have reduced piracy, but it strikes me as throwing the baby out with the bath water. Is your contention that it would have been better (from a policy perspective) if Diamond had lost and non-industry-approved MP3 players had been declared illegal?

I agree with your general point that permitting devices like Kaleidescape makes it easier, on the margin, for consumers to infringe copyright. There’s clearly a trade-off that must be weighed. Personally, I like the balance the courts struck in Sony and Diamond better than the post-DMCA balance in which the entertainment industry effectively has a veto over what devices the consumer electronics industry can make. I think that the anti-piracy benefits of the restrictions are over-stated, and the harm of banning circumvention devices is underestimated.

As to the availability of free music on Grokster vs DVD ripping, note the differences. The Grokster world is one of substantial uncertainty, where the downloaded software can junk up machines in a strong way. Ripping DVDs would have few of the practical risks associated with the p2p ecosystem, and you can see how easily you would stumble into ripping and storing. The movie is due back to Hollywood Video, you haven’t finished it, don’t want to pay the late fees? Just rip it and store it. Entering the p2p system is much more of a discrete, noticeable step–downloading the software. It would be easy to slide into DVD ripping.

What’s to stop you from doing that also with your computer, dvd decrypter and a dvd burner? Or your own local storage array /NAS? Nothing, at my peak of blockbuster.com rentals i was getting 12 dvds a month. >:)

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=585212

I think the practical answer is that most people wouldn’t do so, for the same reasons that most people still pay for music even though they can get it for free from Grokster or their friends’ CD collections. Some people will use their kaleidescapes to steal movies, just as they do with their iPods, VCRs, and TiVos. But I don’t think that’s a sufficient reason to ban the technologies in question.

As a legal matter, with the VJ in place, how would we preserve the distinction between rental–temporary access–and ownership–permanent access?