THE DOWN LOW

DVD Jon, the guy who broke DVD encryption in 2003 with deCSS, has developed technology replicating Apple’s Fairplay DRM to allow music, TV show and movie downloads from sites other than iTunes to be played on iPods. iPod accounts for roughly 85% of the portable player market, which could make iPod-compatible formats an attractive option. Though, given the source of the technology and the questionable legality, would be curious if any studios or suppliers that haven’t cut movie deals with Apple would even consider it.

Johansen doesn’t think what he’s doing is illegal; he’s adding DRM rather than breaking it. He and Farantzos were giddy about the prospect of Apple’s iTV, hoping companies will pay up to get movies on the set-top box when it comes out, after seeing the ill effects of being shut off the iPod. Spurned by Apple? Step right up.

Wired pulls together a list of the top public domain movies that are widely available for download in its October issue. Among the those available are Night of the Living Dead, 1940s Superman cartoons and Reefer Madness.

Under the tent at the HD DVD promotional truck at CEDIA in Denver a week ago, execs were anxiously introducing reporters to Omar Wasow (he notes on his site "Wasow rhymes with Picasso (or if you know your African geography: Burkina Faso" helpful!). Who is Omar? I asked the same thing... many times.

Right now, Omar is a doctorate student at Harvard and eons ago he taught Oprah how to use email and also launched African-American tech site BlackPlanet.com. As far as I could tell, based on that experience, the HD DVD people welcomed him in to explain their format to the consumer press and I guess do interviews. (which, probably weren't all that different from mine, which involved a lot of questions about how he's connected to HD DVD.)

Omar explained that he got involved with HD DVD to "make it accessible to the consumer media." or translate from "geek to human," he said. He volunteered his tech expertise to them, they accepted.

It was hot and I was hungry and confused but after asking Omar like five questions about what exactly he does for HD DVD, I thought I finally got it: "So are you supposed to make HD DVD cool?" Omar laughed, "I wish. no."

Omar was good-humored, and while I'm still not sure what his relationship to HD DVD is, he's siding with it over Blu-ray.

Another day, another download rumor. The New York Post, quoting sources, reported Friday that TiVo and Amazon are in talks on a deal that would allow people to transfer Amazon Unbox movie downloads to the TiVo for viewing on the TV.

Meanwhile, everything-Netflix blog HackingNetflix has posted some images sent in of possible Netflix download page from the site...

Now that Amazon.com and Apple have unveiled their long-rumored movie download plans, the media focus is shifting to Netflix and its plans.

Earlier this week, the Motley Fool discovered a download link on Netflix when searching for "fitness." The link has since been pulled.

Netflix spokesman Steve Swasey said the company has nothing to announce and still plans to discuss its downloading plans in January.

Among the burning questions on its plans is is where its discussions with TiVo for a possible joint download service stand.

When asked Wednesday, Swasey recapped that the company announced they were in discussions with TiVo on a development deal in 2004 but said they have no comment on discussions around that.

Last week, at the CEDIA Expo, I asked the same of TiVo’s VP of product marketing James Denney who (surprise, surprise!) also declined to comment on Netflix discussions. “We’ve both said we like each other.”

Read into it what you will…

TiVo also plans to expand in the download space, but isn’t saying how just yet. The company has an Internet-connected box that delivers content to the TV, seen as key to the download market. Denney said the company is working with companies in the download space. “We’ve got some value to add there,” he said.

What do Warner Music Group, Sen. Ted Kennedy and The White House all have in common? They've all joined the YouTube bandwagon in the last couple days.

Warner Music will put up its library of music videos, artist interviews and behind-the-scenes content that YouTube users can then mash into their own uploaded shorts on the site.

Sen. Ted Kennedy put up a YouTube video urging net neutrality.

And, perhaps the most entertaining/disturbing?, the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy is putting up 30-second say-no-to-drugs PSAs on the site.

Surely, some mashup of the anti-drug PSA’s with some drug-appropriate song from the Warner catalog can’t be far off, no?

In the apparently high-stakes world of Internet video, revver last week lured the now outed LonelyGirl15 away from YouTube. Revver pairs uploaded videos with advertisers and splits the revenues with filmmakers. Timing couldn't be better - Revver officially launched Wednesday with a new interface that includes ratings on videos.

Unfortunately, I couldn't get any of the videos to load on their site. The L.A. Times followed Lonely Girl Jessica Rose around on her media tour (conveniently held in the Revver offices) last week for the latest.

Some videogame developers frustrated with PlayStation 3 delays have taken to calling it the POS3 (as in Piece of ...), which Googling, I see has also gotten some traction by gamers in various message boards like this one on GameSpot dubbed the "PlayStation Haters Union." Nice.

I'm in Denver for home entertainment installation convention CEDIA today where there are a surprising number of DVD execs showing off HD DVD and Blu-ray and checking out the rival format. While visiting the HD DVD Promotional group's truck parked outside the convention center, I spotted execs from Blu-ray backing studios Buena Vista and Sony who had just watched an HD DVD demo and were looking at set-ups of the XBox 360 with HD DVD add-on outside. Universal (an HD DVD-only studio) execs Craig Kornblau and Ken Graffeo were on hand, joking with their rivals and showing off bonus features on the upcoming Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift.

But don't read too much into it - I asked, Universal still has no plans to put out releases in Blu-ray and Sony and Disney aren't planning to put out releases in HD DVD.

There's the battle between HD DVD and Blu-ray studio and consumer electronics companies and then there's the more openly contentious and occasionally more entertaining battle between HD DVD and Blu-ray owners, which goes on at the AVS Forum and other geek message boards and includes not-so-easy-to-remember slogans like "Just say "No" to Mpeg2 single-layer HD releases with no advanced audio codecs!"

Now some HD DVD backers have begun petitioning Blu-ray only studios Disney, Fox, MGM and Lionsgate to put their movies out on HD DVD also. (They're still debating whether to petition Sony.) According to the petition sites, they've collected just over 500 signatures, but petition creator Edward Downer emailed me claiming 1,100. The petitions list 15 reasons studios should put movies out on both formats, citing things such as widespread rumors of Blu-ray production issues and the fact that there is no hybrid Blu-ray/HD DVD disc.

While we understand that you initially decided to support Bluray exclusively, the situation today is significantly different than promised a year ago.

HD DVD has successfully launched to market, but we believe that Bluray still has serious technical issues to overcome which will impede its success.

Given this situation, we feel you may lose sales if you only support Bluray, as there are many HD DVD owners who would like to buy your movies on HD DVD now.

Here's a link to the Disney Petition, Lionsgate, MGM, and Fox.