The Walt Disney Co. is reportedly working on a digital initiative, dubbed “Keychest,” that would allow consumers to purchase movies and TV shows online and watch them on their computers, mobile phones and other portable media devices.

While availability of movies and TV programming on the Web already exists, the Wall Street Journal reported that Disney’s business model would focus on replacing dependence on physical ownership with a digital copy with expanded digital rights management.

The concept, which mirrors a similar effort known as the Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem (DECE) by Sony, would also appear to mimic Time Warner’s “TV Everywhere” model that earmarks consumers having free access to TV programming across multiple platforms provided they subscribe to it somewhere in the distribution channel.

Keychest would allow consumers to store movie files on separate Internet servers allowing for easier access and reduced storage space demands on users’ computers.

Analyst Richard Doherty, director of The Envisioneering Group, who said he has been briefed on Keychest and DECE, lauded Disney for going public with what he characterized as a “very consumer centric” concept.

“I welcome Disney’s disclosure,” Doherty said. “I think it is wonderful timing. What they are doing is bound to turn up the pace on DECE.”


http://www.homemediamagazine.com/disney/disney-eying-physical-media-alternative-17368

In a bid to transition consumers from buying DVDs to buying digital movies, Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment will reportedly unveil technology next month that could make digital movies as accessible to consumers in coming years as the DVD is today.

Dubbed Keychest, consumers would pay one price for permanent access to a movie or TV show across a wide variety of digital formats, be it iPhones, cable services, PCs, Blu-ray Disc players, connected TVs and other devices capable of playing back digital films, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal.

Disney’s initiative would apparently shift the digital business from one in which consumers buy digital movie downloads that can only be played back on a limited number of devices, to one in which consumers could access films they buy from a digital cloud for on demand viewing on any number of devices.

Some digital movie companies already store digital movies in digital lockers for consumers, similar to what Keychest proposes to do. Amazon, for example, stores downloads consumers purchase through its Amazon Video on Demand service on a digital locker so that consumers watching on a PC never have to download a copy of a film or TV episode to their computer. CinemaNow also has said it plans to move to a cloud model, so that digital movies customers buy are never downloaded but always accessible.

But Disney would seemingly seek to make digital films available through a much broader range of devices than those services and others are currently available on.

Disney execs weren’t available Wednesday to provide details on the initiative.

http://www.videobusiness.com/article/CA6703371.html

Thanks but no thanks...

I'm not averse to DL something but I am more than capable of storing something safely myself.

Beware of schemes where someone says you bought and own something but they decide when and where the service begins and more important....when it ends...

Thanks but no thanks...

I'm not averse to DL something but I am more than capable of storing something safely myself.

Beware of schemes where someone says you bought and own something but they decide when and where the service begins and more important....when it ends...

Shrug. The same exists with AACS and BD+.

Shrug. Not quite...

http://newteevee.com/2007/12/27/wal-mart-kills-video-download-service/