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The One-Use, Self-Destructing DVD Returns
Posted by
kdawson
on Wed Jun 04, 2008 02:45 AM
from the renting-a-media-experience-while-polluting-too dept.
from the renting-a-media-experience-while-polluting-too dept.
BonrHanzon writes "Looks like DivX (the stupid one, not the codec) has been resurrected in the form of Flexplay. Staples will be selling these movie disks for 5 bucks a pop at the checkout counter. The disks can be played in any DVD player, but a special adhesive will render the disk unplayable 48 hours after the package has been opened. As if our landfills weren't already overflowing with enough crap." The blog post notes that Flexplay has actually been around for 5 years; the Staples distribution deal is what's new.
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Heh, pirates ahoy! (Score:5, Insightful)
2. Rip it to harddrive.
3. Dispose of movie.
4. ???????
5. PROFIT!
Re:Heh, pirates ahoy! (Score:5, Funny)
2. Discover a cheap 'hack' work around (boil in water, spray with hairspray etc)
3. Keep the disposable movie
4. ????????
5. Profit?
Parent
Re:Heh, pirates ahoy! (Score:5, Insightful)
2. Keep movie forever
3. There is no step three.
Parent
Re:Heh, pirates ahoy! (Score:5, Insightful)
It may be a while before the average person has that setup [...]
I'd be inclined to say the average person will never have that setup, if for no other reason than the space constraints - most people don't live in houses big enough to dedicate a whole room just to watching movies (to say nothing of those living in apartments).
Parent
Re:Heh, pirates ahoy! (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Heh, pirates ahoy! (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Heh, pirates ahoy! (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Heh, pirates ahoy! (Score:5, Funny)
But do they have two robots who sit next to them and talk back to the movie? That's what really matters.
Parent
Re:Heh, pirates ahoy! (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Heh, pirates ahoy! (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm not too good at math, so help me out: How many times does this have to happen before your home theater (including original purchase, time/money for installation and periodic setup, wear and tear, preventative maintenance, taxes, loss of use of part of your house, and popcorn) begins to pay for itself?
I know this is the popular rhetoric around these parts but I still don't comprehend it. Here we have a self proclaimed geek forum; a hangout for people who routinely spend weeks' and months' pay cheques on new computer and other electronic equipment but who can't see the beauty of a home theatre setup?
A few points to clarify why I wanted a home theatre for myself;
There are definitely some cost savings benefits to the home theatre, but that's not the only benefit.
As to the costs associated; I choose what to buy (component wise) and when to buy it. Usually I'll find a piece or set of equipment I want then wait for a sale. I also make what I believe to be rational purchases; for example, I want a PlayStation 3 which will double as a high definition Blu Ray player, it'll play regular DVDs as well as take over as the home network media centre.
If done correctly you don't have to pay an arm and a leg to get a very good theatre setup and with 0% finance options at the big box stores you can leave your money in the bank earning interest while you pay small instalments. When you factor the cost of an evening's entertainment even for as few as t
Parent
Re:Cheap Hack Workaround (Score:5, Interesting)
Since you already have rights to the work's initial medium, does this mean than hacks are not violations of DMCA?
They provided technology for the ORIGINAL disk to self-destruct. You are not breaking tech to make copies, you are *preventing breakage*.
Parent
Re:Heh, pirates ahoy! (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Heh, pirates ahoy! (Score:5, Funny)
And the joy of making him 5$ richer? Umm, wait. Gotta think about it a bit more. Brb, torrenting.
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Re:Heh, pirates ahoy! (Score:5, Funny)
My deep rooted concerns for our environment, the glaciers, the ozone layer, my grandchildren, his grandchildren, and even your grandchildren prevent me from paying for movies, since it will add more worthless junk to our overflowing landfills.
Downloading movies produces significantly less waste; therefor, pirating all my media is the only way any responsible, eco-friendly person can be entertained, and still be able to sleep at night.
does that sound good to everyone else?
Parent
Re:Heh, pirates ahoy! (Score:5, Funny)
Back in the day, no one asked this question. It was pretty well accepted that AOL would decide how many coasters you needed.
Parent
Re:Heh, pirates ahoy! (Score:5, Insightful)
you fail at English.
The English language has no central authority to decide what is and is not correct, all it takes is for me to tell enough students one thing, and it will catch on and become part of the language!
HA!
Parent
Re:Heh, pirates ahoy! (Score:5, Funny)
I think you have overlooked the fatal flaw in your plan: that it hinges on students paying attention in English class.
Parent
Re:Heh, pirates ahoy! (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Heh, pirates ahoy! (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:Heh, pirates ahoy! (Score:5, Interesting)
Are any of the many lawyers that read Slashdot able to shed a light on this?
Parent
Re:Heh, pirates ahoy! (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
How's that different from... (Score:5, Interesting)
Well, how's that different from...
1. Rent movie.
2. Rip it to harddrive.
3. Return it.
4. ???????
5. PROFIT!
Effectively, this is just a simpler way of renting movies. In fact, so simple that any regular store can get into that business. They don't need to keep track of who rented what, who's overdue, find and replace scratched movies, etc. It just lets them use their normal logistics, which they have in place and are already in place. And it makes it a lot simpler to "rent" them by mail over the internet too.
It also makes life simpler for people like me, who live half a city away from the nearest movie rental shop. It's more convenient to chuck it into the bin, than have to make a second trip to give it back. In fact, it would save me a lot more trips, since now I'd be able to just go there once and buy a small stack of disposables, and watch them whenever I have time. (The clock starts ticking when you opened it, not when you "rented" it.) No more "omg, I got the whole LOTR trilogy, so it's time to drop everything else and stay awake until 1AM to watch it all. Or just order a small stack of them by mail.
Of course, it has the same caveats as rentals. Including that if someone wants to rip it, they can. It's not a new problem, though. And I'll venture a wild guess that if it wasn't the end of the world or of the movie business before, the new version can't be that much more destructive
Parent
Re:How's that different from... (Score:5, Insightful)
1. Rent movie.
2. Rip it to harddrive.
3. Return it.
4. ???????
5. PROFIT!
Rental $2.50
Longbox $.50
Photo paper $.25
Ink - $.75
To copy a rental could easily cost you $4. For an extra $1 I presume you get the case and cover. That's not so bad.
Parent
Re:How's that different from... (Score:5, Funny)
A zero layer disk. I'd like to see that
Parent
Re:How's that different from... (Score:5, Funny)
Old news... They put TWO in every spindle of CD-R/DVD-Rs... One on the top, one on the bottom.
Parent
Re:Heh, pirates ahoy! (Score:5, Interesting)
The only place I've ever seen one of the self destruct discs has been in a truck stop. These have not been sold to geeks to rip. They are sold to convience those on the road without alternative diversions such as high speed internet and blockbuster. No returns on the road is the selling point. How they intend to sell the overpriced product in Staples is a mystery to me. They don't compete with the $5 bin at Wal*Mart.
Parent
They Are Recyclable (Score:5, Informative)
You can recycle them. You can return them to the store you bought them at for recycling. You can even get a free mailing label and ship them to flexplay for recycling.
You can also shoot yourself in the face if you're dumb enough to buy this crap.
Re:They Are Recyclable (Score:5, Insightful)
Read: technically, we could recycle them, but this has not been important enough for use to develop. We have not come beyond some pilot programs that could have been tested by consumers if we bothered to actually implement them. We will keep telling you the discs are recyclable till people notice we're not actually recycling them.
Parent
Re:They Are Recyclable (Score:5, Insightful)
To add to your point, just because something is recyclable does not mean there are no energy costs to recycle.
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Re:They Are Recyclable (Score:5, Insightful)
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I don't understand all the eco-fuss... (Score:4, Insightful)
This is a drop in the ocean compared to that. Heck, the snack foods consumed while watching the movie will probably create more garbage than the DVD.
Parent
Why? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Why? (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:Why? (Score:5, Interesting)
If you long haul truck, in a week, you may be over 800 miles from the rental store. The only place I have ever seen a Flexplay disc is at a truck stop. Staples is a new one... I wonder who their target demographic is.
Staples and those far from home doesn't make sense except for business travelers, then I would expect them in airports instead of Staples office supply stores.
Parent
$5 disks? (Score:5, Insightful)
I saw the first full page ad for Blu-Ray disks in a supermarket catalogue today. If the shops keep pushing those, DVDs are only going to get cheaper and cheaper.
This is going to work... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:This is going to work... (Score:5, Insightful)
So you're saying that having a less-than-brilliant business model should be illegal? As in, Congress or state legislature should pass a law banning bad business ideas? If so you're just as screwed up as this FlexPlay crap.
Parent
Why risk your player? (Score:4, Interesting)
But still, would you want to the first person to discover you have left one of these in your player and it just happens to be a rogue one in the batch that has written off your player.
As someone else has said, renting the film for a week is cheaper and buying them new isn't loads more anyway.
The only place I can see these having any place in the market is for the Mission Impossible box set.
Advantages over rental (Score:5, Informative)
- You have a limitted time in which to view it.
- You have to return it. Not everyone lives near a video rental store.
- you will be charged if the disk gets damaged or lost.
If you buy a self destructing DVD- You can buy it on spec and watch it some other time (these have a shelf life)
- You just throw it out when you're done with it.
- The maximum cost is the cost of a disposable DVD.
The environmental damage isn't as big a problem as people seem to think. Much smaller than takeout, and probably less than the waste from a day's food for most people. That and they're recyclable.The main problem is making people realise that this is a rental and not a purchase. When they own the physical media they think they own it. Prices are also a little high, but they don't need a vast number of customers. Just enough movie fans for stores to justify the shelf space.
Re:Advantages over rental (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Advantages over rental (Score:5, Insightful)
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Ah, good old NewSpeak (Score:5, Insightful)
No flexibility, and after 48 hours no play!
DIVX vs DivX (Score:5, Informative)
Case matters.
Too late, Netflix has already cleaned their clock. (Score:5, Interesting)
Netflix is positioned to become the next "cable company" without having to lay all this cable. You can pick what you want, when you want it, pause it, skip around, and given 15 seconds or so it will spool up the data and play a perfectly reasonable picture. And with no commercials...
I haven't had cable TV at home for the last decade, because it doesn't provide what I wanted. All I wanted recently was Heroes and Battlestar, but to get those two I had to buy 40 channels of other crap, including commercials.
Or I could just wait for it to come out on DVD. Or lately a bunch of us have been gathering at a friends place for it.
The installed base of DVD players is huge, but Netflix will already bring you the plastic disc, to your home, so it's only missing the ability to have an impulse buy the plastic disc.
For the $100 box, you have the ability to get what you want without having to wait for the disc to arrive, don't have to return it, and can watch all you can stand.
Netflix is poised to eat a lot of other folks lunch.
Sean
Windows uses same model (Score:5, Funny)
It's a calculated plot..... (Score:5, Funny)
Obviously, they must be running out of people to sue for downloading movies. This new technology is clearly designed to frustrate even more consumers, and drive them to download so they can keep their profit margin high with lawsuits.
Fortunately (for me), there hasn't been a movie coming out of Hollywood in 20 years that I have the slightest interest in either wasting money on, or risking an infringement lawsuit for downloading.
$5 (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Landfill fodder (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Nonsense (Score:4, Funny)
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Re:Of all the reasons this is dumb... (Score:4, Insightful)
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