I've spent a lot of time and digital ink advocating (some might argue "whining") about the consumer-unfriendly limitations built into the DRM for Xbox 360, but it turns out the PlayStation 3 is just as much a ticking time bomb - at least when it comes to movie purchases. Unlike the Xbox 360, the PS3 doesn't offer any provisions to redownload videos once they have been received by your console. (To be fair, Microsoft's movie downloads expire after a week, or 24 hours once you start watching, though you can mostly redownload TV shows and other content.) So, if you were thinking about deleting a movie purchased from the PlayStation Store to make room for more downloads, or if your console or hard drive fails (as all components and particularly magnetic media eventually do), you are mostly out of luck. Turns out Sony support may grant you one additional "courtesy download" at their discretion. Makes you wonder if video downloads for consoles just aren't ready to go mainstream yet - they're OK for overpriced rentals for those who aren't feeling the burn from Wall Street and the economic depression, but real movie collectors are going to want to stick with the more durable Blu-Ray discs for a few dollars more. Fortunately for Sony, they make out on that end too...
Comments (1)
I've been seeing quite a lot about this recently, and it really ticks me off. If one goes into a store and buys a movie, the ownership is permanent - you can watch it whenever you want, as many times as you wish. Why should these downloaded movies, which often cost as much as physical copies, be subject to such outlandish restrictions?
Posted by Curtis | October 16, 2008 6:30 AM
Posted on October 16, 2008 06:30