Ultraviolet's Attempt to Corner the Market

[lujan]

Re: Ultraviolet's Attempt to Corner the Market

I've always thought it would be nice to have the ability to transfer digital rights. This has been brought up before. IE if you die you can't leave your digital collection to someone else to add to their's. ...

Not sure what you mean? I have plans to leave my "username" and "password" to relatives in my will so don't know why you couldn't leave the digital rights to anyone. All they need is the address, username and password. Am I missing something here?

[Walter-S_North_Carolina]

Re: Ultraviolet's Attempt to Corner the Market

Not sure what you mean? I have plans to leave my "username" and "password" to relatives in my will so don't know why you couldn't leave the digital rights to anyone. All they need is the address, username and password. Am I missing something here?

only the paperwork to finalize my adoption to you.

[Nygiantsfan3342]

Re: Ultraviolet's Attempt to Corner the Market

Not sure what you mean? I have plans to leave my "username" and "password" to relatives in my will so don't know why you couldn't leave the digital rights to anyone. All they need is the address, username and password. Am I missing something here?

This method would require signing out of their account and signing in with yours. When I'm sitting in front of my PS3, the last thing I want to do is have to enter another username and password with my harmony remote. It would be nice if accounts could be merged somehow. For instance, if I were single and got married to someone who had her own UV account, it would be nice if one email/password combo could access both of our accounts.

For all I know, that is allowed now? Can't one vudu account access more than one UV locker?

[Walter-S_North_Carolina]

Re: Ultraviolet's Attempt to Corner the Market

This method would require signing out of their account and signing in with yours. When I'm sitting in front of my PS3, the last thing I want to do is have to enter another username and password with my harmony remote. It would be nice if accounts could be merged somehow. For instance, if I were single and got married to someone who had her own UV account, it would be nice if one email/password combo could access both of our accounts.

For all I know, that is allowed now? Can't one vudu account access more than one UV locker?

they thought of this. you can link UV accounts. Your previous generation's library and your own UV library will show combined. No need to sign on twice.

Same concept if you marry someone with a UV account.

[jeremymc7]

Re: Ultraviolet's Attempt to Corner the Market

This method would require signing out of their account and signing in with yours. When I'm sitting in front of my PS3, the last thing I want to do is have to enter another username and password with my harmony remote. It would be nice if accounts could be merged somehow. For instance, if I were single and got married to someone who had her own UV account, it would be nice if one email/password combo could access both of our accounts.

For all I know, that is allowed now? Can't one vudu account access more than one UV locker?

They can be merged. I'm pretty sure I mentioned it. I've merged three accounts. Then deleted the two after merging. Now the main account has all the movies and the other two accounts are closed. I think you can do this five or six times. Problem is it can't be undone so if you break up you can't give movie BACK.

[jeremymc7]

Re: Ultraviolet's Attempt to Corner the Market

they thought of this. you can link UV accounts. Your previous generation's library and your own UV library will show combined. No need to sign on twice.

Same concept if you marry someone with a UV account.

You can LINK OR MERGE. I've linked accounts but VUDU wouldn't show more than two accounts combined. I then merged and deleted. As far as UV is concerned it's now more or less one account. Each VUDU account can still see their own movies but only the primary VUDU that is linked to the merged account can see all of the titles. The other accounts have no UV access anymore either.

[Jake]

Re: Ultraviolet's Attempt to Corner the Market

Probably a better way of thinking about UV *itself* (rather than a cloud service or market to corner) is (as described in the UV docs) an "ecosystem" of consumer, app/device manufacturer, retailer, streaming provider, and content owner. Really anyone not the consumer or content owner is a middleman at some level (and they all want their cut, of course!) I agree digital distribution eliminates many of the inefficiencies of physical media, hopefully allowing lower prices in the end. But the concepts are the same...

If you are *really* interested in the gory details of UltraViolet and are technically minded, almost all of the specs are actually publicly available:

http://www.uvvu.com/techspec-archive.php (start with the "System" doc for a high level overview, and "CFF Media Format" for when you have severe insomnia

[lujan]

Re: Ultraviolet's Attempt to Corner the Market

This method would require signing out of their account and signing in with yours. When I'm sitting in front of my PS3, the last thing I want to do is have to enter another username and password with my harmony remote. It would be nice if accounts could be merged somehow. For instance, if I were single and got married to someone who had her own UV account, it would be nice if one email/password combo could access both of our accounts.

For all I know, that is allowed now? Can't one vudu account access more than one UV locker?

Not true in my case as I'm the only one in my family with a Vudu account.

[Walter-S_North_Carolina]

Re: Ultraviolet's Attempt to Corner the Market

Probably a better way of thinking about UV *itself* (rather than a cloud service or market to corner) is (as described in the UV docs) an "ecosystem" of consumer, app/device manufacturer, retailer, streaming provider, and content owner. Really anyone not the consumer or content owner is a middleman at some level (and they all want their cut, of course!) I agree digital distribution eliminates many of the inefficiencies of physical media, hopefully allowing lower prices in the end. But the concepts are the same...

If you are *really* interested in the gory details of UltraViolet and are technically minded, almost all of the specs are actually publicly available:

http://www.uvvu.com/techspec-archive.php (start with the "System" doc for a high level overview, and "CFF Media Format" for when you have severe insomnia

thx for the light reading. I also reach for the RFC's for the same purpose. Zzzzzzzzzzzzz



I do think we (You, me, & Mr. Mumpower) all understand what UV is and how it operates.

When a movie company wishes to distribute a title digitally, there are few options. UV has all but cornered this decision.

In my view, checkmate can be called.

This to me is the same as saying they have cornered the market. You may disagree, but the way of describing it is an exercise in semantics.

sincerely,

-Walter

[canadien37]

Re: Ultraviolet's Attempt to Corner the Market

Probably a better way of thinking about UV *itself* (rather than a cloud service or market to corner) is (as described in the UV docs) an "ecosystem" of consumer, app/device manufacturer, retailer, streaming provider, and content owner. Really anyone not the consumer or content owner is a middleman at some level (and they all want their cut, of course!) I agree digital distribution eliminates many of the inefficiencies of physical media, hopefully allowing lower prices in the end. But the concepts are the same...

If you are *really* interested in the gory details of UltraViolet and are technically minded, almost all of the specs are actually publicly available:

http://www.uvvu.com/techspec-archive.php (start with the "System" doc for a high level overview, and "CFF Media Format" for when you have severe insomnia

Jake, I just took a look at the CFF stuff and man, my head blew up..........Took me back to calculus class for cryin' out loud.....I am waiting for that part of UV to be deployed......

[nyunole]

Re: Ultraviolet's Attempt to Corner the Market

Wouldn't a better comparison between UV and Apple be UV account activation against Apple TV sales? http://venturebeat.com/2013/01/23/apple-tv-awkwardness/

Seems like if you're serious about collecting movies through Apple's ecosystem, you'd spring for at least one Apple TV.

Having seen both of these ecosystems in action, for me, UV is the clear choice. I share with remote family members, and it works through devices I already own.

[Walter-S_North_Carolina]

Re: Ultraviolet's Attempt to Corner the Market

Wouldn't a better comparison between UV and Apple be UV account activation against Apple TV sales? http://venturebeat.com/2013/01/23/apple-tv-awkwardness/

Seems like if you're serious about collecting movies through Apple's ecosystem, you'd spring for at least one Apple TV.

Having seen both of these ecosystems in action, for me, UV is the clear choice. I share with remote family members, and it works through devices I already own.

Funny you should mention, and 'Yes' I do personally think that would be a better comparison.

On a side note, I have an AppleTV box in my home on the downstairs flatscreen. Awhile ago I...

1) Ripped each of my DVDs
2) Did a Handbreak conversion on them to Apple's M4V format
3) Loaded them into iTunes

This took just a COLOSSAL amount of time. Plus, I am running a 1.2Tb USB drive on my laptop to store the ripped media.

The AppleTV interface is slick. I figured since I owned the media, no harm in doing so for my own personal use.

I even took the time to get artwork for each title and update the descriptions. With those two things, the AppleTV interface is a very slick way to have your DVD collection at your fingertips. But again, it took an amazing amount of time to get to that stage.

I have a Roku-XD upstairs. I can view these movies via the Roku PLEX app. This is not as slick of a setup as the AppleTV, but still not too bad.

On both TVs I can view Vudu. The Roku has it native. Downstairs, I use a PS3 with HDMI out.

I can say, for the amount of time and effort and money (I had to buy a 1.2Tb USB drive), Vudu is a much better option. I do not have to loose sleep over the USB drive crashing and having to go through the process again. If memory serves, it took about 2-3 months to rip the collection. Then adding all the artwork and descriptions took about another month. Yuck!

With Vudu, I need ZERO storage. That is a service I would gladly pay $2 for and to be able to bump my DVD into 1080p for an additional $3 is a great deal in my estimation.

I have never purchased a movie from AppleTV. I felt it would be a bad idea to be stuck with Apple. For some reason, I do not have the same pause with Vudu. I buy movies from them all the time. In fact, I have about 50 titles in my Wishlist waiting for funds to buy. This time next week, I will be trotting back to Walmart to add some more titles from my DVD collection via D2D. Each time I do, I delete the ripped files from my iTunes Library.

Eventually, I will have everything safely in Vudu. That will be about a year though.

After that, the AppleTV box will just be used to access pod-casts.

Also, there is the Disney portion of my DVD library (that is, until Disney gets religion).

Anyway....

[Speedaddict81]

Re: Ultraviolet's Attempt to Corner the Market

I even took the time to get artwork for each title and update the descriptions. With those two things, the AppleTV interface is a very slick way to have your DVD collection at your fingertips. But again, it took an amazing amount of time to get to that stage.

I can say, for the amount of time and effort and money (I had to buy a 1.2Tb USB drive), Vudu is a much better option. I do not have to loose sleep over the USB drive crashing and having to go through the process again. If memory serves, it took about 2-3 months to rip the collection. Then adding all the artwork and descriptions took about another month.

I have a 2TB NAS waiting for CFF to launch, and I'm hoping that the container will support a good amount of metadata including thumbnails and descriptions, and preferably everything listed on a movie's tab in Vudu. Having that info pre-loaded would save a lot of time and hassle.

I have never purchased a movie from AppleTV. I felt it would be a bad idea to be stuck with Apple. For some reason, I do not have the same pause with Vudu. I buy movies from them all the time. In fact, I have about 50 titles in my Wishlist waiting for funds to buy. This time next week, I will be trotting back to Walmart to add some more titles from my DVD collection via D2D. Each time I do, I delete the ripped files from my iTunes Library.

I do the same thing, and I am less hesitant to buy on Vudu knowing that if a title becomes UV enabled it will be added to my UV library.

[goneviral]

Re: Ultraviolet's Attempt to Corner the Market

Funny you should mention, and 'Yes' I do personally think that would be a better comparison.

On a side note, I have an AppleTV box in my home on the downstairs flatscreen. Awhile ago I...

1) Ripped each of my DVDs
2) Did a Handbreak conversion on them to Apple's M4V format
3) Loaded them into iTunes

This took just a COLOSSAL amount of time. Plus, I am running a 1.2Tb USB drive on my laptop to store the ripped media.

I can say, for the amount of time and effort and money (I had to buy a 1.2Tb USB drive), Vudu is a much better option. I do not have to loose sleep over the USB drive crashing and having to go through the process again. If memory serves, it took about 2-3 months to rip the collection. Then adding all the artwork and descriptions took about another month. Yuck!

...

With Vudu, I need ZERO storage. That is a service I would gladly pay $2 for and to be able to bump my DVD into 1080p for an additional $3 is a great deal in my estimation.

...

Also, there is the Disney portion of my DVD library (that is, until Disney gets religion).

Walter, thank you for your continued thoughts on the subject. I am obviously a loyal Vudu user, which is why I frequent this forum. It was a bit amusing to pull up that post and see it be a link to something I'd written a while ago. I too have discovered that Vudu is the optimal movie service of the moment. I also have requested that Vudu provide the ability to upgrade my various licenses to 1080p on multiple occasions. Here's hoping that the option is provided to Vudu customers soon. (Hint hint, Jake)

Judging from your Handbrake comments, I suspect that we are quite similar with regards to our movie behavior. I have so many TiVo files and Handbrake rips that we have roughly 21 TB of external hard drives filled with stuff. I am now gradually cleaning out those drives as I purchase the titles via UV. This is the elegant nature of cloud, or as Jake would prefer Digital Rights Locker-based services. The process is impressively streamlined relative to older practices such as DVD purchases/rips and VHS tape archiving prior to that.

As a lifetime movie lover, all I have ever wanted is to have instant access to a movie. Not that long ago, we had a pair of 400-DVD changers that were filled with discs we had to rotate constantly. Between Amazon and Vudu, we now possess more files in an easier manner. I cannot state in finite terms how much time this has saved my wife and I in terms of alphabetizing discs, loading/unloading them from the player and updating spreadsheets with current collection information. If Disney ever joined UV, it would be the perfect solution.

Thank you for reading BOP. You are exactly the sort of intelligent reader we have attempted to attract/cultivate over the years.

[Jake]

Re: Ultraviolet's Attempt to Corner the Market

I have a 2TB NAS waiting for CFF to launch, and I'm hoping that the container will support a good amount of metadata including thumbnails and descriptions, and preferably everything listed on a movie's tab in Vudu. Having that info pre-loaded would save a lot of time and hassle.

From what I have seen the CFF has a fair bit of metadata inside the file (just for the movie, of course - not anything like ratings, reviews, similars, etc). Also not as many thumbnails as VUDU, but at least the basic chapters.

Again for those who want the gory details, it is available

http://www.uvvu.com/docs/public/tspe...data-1.0.5.pdf