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from the we-don't-need-no-stinkin'-DVDs dept.
Remember when you could watch Netflix videos without an internet connection? With something called "DVDs"?
Well, now you can again, and you don't even need those circular shiny things. Netflix has finally made movies and TV shows available to download, so you can watch them offline, whenever you want, wherever you are.
In IT Blogwatch, we can't decide what to binge watch first.
So what exactly is going on? Laura Roman has the background:
On Wednesday, Netflix announced and implemented...the ability to download TV and movie titles on mobile devices.
...
At no extra cost...Netflix subscribers will now be able to save select content to their iOS or Android devices, then watch on the go without the need for an internet connection. Say goodbye to...in-flight movies, Netflix is now airplane-mode compatible.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by anubi on Saturday December 03 2016, @11:01AM
My concerns is if it is something like an MP4 that will play on anything, or is it some proprietary format that must be played on some proprietary player software.
Once I use proprietary software, I am also forced to accept whatever snags that software has in it, while being legally required to hold him harmless for what he does in my machine.
Not only that, if his player enforces things like requiring me to agree to things or forces ads on me, I have to forfeit any enjoyment I would have gotten from the content if I refuse to obey the demands the software places on me.
Too many marketers pull fast ones these days. I will hold my horses on this one until I see if it is really an improvement, or yet another way of forcing obedience from me.
I remember passing up on a lot of DVR's I saw in WalMart because they would not record the content in a standard format, instead I was being cooed into buying some machine that would enforce its business model on me - at my expense. If it did not encode a standard .MP4 file, I really had no use for the thing. Just as I have no use for a keyboard that does not support ASCII.
If any of us buy into this, we agree to obey whatever crap the player may demand of us in order to watch the movie.
Far as I am concerned, its like buying olives with the pit still in 'em when I can get pitted olives just as easy.
Not .mp4? No sale.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]
(Score: 3, Informative) by r1348 on Saturday December 03 2016, @11:34AM
I assume it will have some DRM built in, and yes you can only watch it with the proprietary app... like anything on Netflix. The file format is irrelevant.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by opinionated_science on Saturday December 03 2016, @11:39AM
this. Netflix has made convenience sufficient, the community doesn't feel the need to crack it.
We all know their catalogue ebbs and flows...so we've come to terms with what we need to acquire elsewhere....
This is neat for flying though - they make their own stuff, which for an 2x4 hour flight is pretty decent.
Let's not forget the airlines charge $10/min for wifi....(ok maybe $10 a flight, but they wont let you access Netflix - united want you to use their buggy app to access *their* catalogue...).
So all in all, a +ve move....
(Score: 2) by takyon on Saturday December 03 2016, @06:45PM
Netflix has been cracked in the past as a source of 4K rips.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by opinionated_science on Saturday December 03 2016, @08:24PM
ah ok. I hadn't been following because *mumble mumble* online sources....
(Score: 2) by Wootery on Tuesday December 06 2016, @09:17AM
Well, isn't it obvious?
...and only those devices. It's DRM'ed. Of course it's DRM'ed. And frankly, there's nothing wrong with this: Netflix is a subscription service, not a purchase-oriented marketplace.
(Score: 1) by anubi on Tuesday December 06 2016, @10:25AM
I will put this another way... Its not that I am concerned with paying a maid to clean my house... rather my main concern is that the maid may acquire information about my personal things, business affairs, whatever, while having access to the inside of my house, then sell that info on the open market. Or maybe once in my house, she duplicates my admission credentials so they can return uninvited anytime they want. Or start wasting my time with ads.
Its just getting too risky for my blood to admit business-backed softwares into my machine, as I simply do not trust it. Having pages of EULA/disclaimers tucked away in a little window tells me immediately this business has a lot of things they may do to me that they are claiming legal protection against my recourse.
Many businesses have betrayed customer trust big-time in an effort to monetize information they glean from their customer's machines, often without the customer's knowledge.
Or they use their admission to my machine to carry out wish-lists for others. Like nuking FTDI chips.
Even the nation's biggest businesses will stoop to this. Demonstrably. A lot of us permit ourselves to be treated this way. Some of us get madder than hell when someone goes out of their way to get in our machines to glean data, insert advertising, or wreak havoc.
In reaction, many customers ( myself included ), are very leery of running business-provided executables in our machines.
Especially with this new-fangled DMCA law out which forbids us from reading the code and determining what it does. To some of us, this is like handing us a legally-binding contract for our signature ( click "I accept" ), while making the reading of that contract illegal. Even illegal for others who can read it to warn us of its misleading content. Unless that, too, comes from businesses authorized to do so.
"Prove all things; hold fast that which is good." [KJV: I Thessalonians 5:21]