I smile from ear to ear when I read these stories. An article on [Salon] titled “Replay it again, Sam” brings home the point that digital technology is here to stay and so long as the political heads don’t diker with “fair use laws” there are some coll devices coming our way in the near future.
Microsoft is pushing a new computer that will make trading TV shows as
easy as using … Napster.
There’s one big difference between the Windows PVR and stand-alone devices like ReplayTV: On a PC, you can do a lot more of the things Hollywood hates. Microsoft’s PVR software records TV shows into a format that will soon be playable virtually anywhere. The company’s new desktop Windows Media Player will be able to play all Media Center’s TV files, and Microsoft says it will make available the codes to let other companies’ players — such as Real Networks’, for example — play the shows as well. Recorded TV shows may also be stored on DVDs and played back on any consumer DVD player. Media Center owners will thus be able to send shows to people who don’t have Media Center PCs, using either physical media or the Internet — a prospect that’s got to have the
Hollywood executives seeing red.