How Studios Encourage Piracy

The popular internet streaming and DVD rental service Netflix was dealt another blow early 2012. You can read about the updates here. Basically, Netflix faces higher prices from HBO and doubled its DVD delays from 28 days from release to 56 days from release.

Large companies that produce content continually try to hold on to IP. Increasingly, technology makes it easier and easier to share (or borrow) content that previously existed in walled gardens. Everyone had a ton of Disney VHS tapes and other movies that filled huge cabinets.

Having recently moved, there are a lot of items in the ‘to sort and adjudicate’ category. One of the first things are the few hundred VHS & DVD collection that will live on a hard drive and not ever take up the huge amount of space I once allowed it. I find it hard to believe that people will want to go back to a world where physical copies are required.

At this point, I expect to be able to browse content from the internet or local network on my web connected TV. Those cabinets of VHS and DVD’s gather dust and remain totems of a time long gone from my home.