Studio to Release Full-Length on Internet
L O S A N G E L E S, Jan. 18 -- In an arrangement with a Pennsylvaniacompany, a major Hollywood studio will begin an experiment nextweek making full-length feature films available for download overthe Internet.
On Jan. 22, Miramax will allow its 1999 release Guinevere,starring Sarah Polley and Stephen Rea, to be downloaded for $3.49for a 24-hour viewing license. The 500 megabyte file will takeabout 30 minutes to download over a high-speed Internet connection.
Movie studios are struggling to develop an Internet strategy,hoping to have workable alternatives available before aNapster-like program makes swapping pirated films as easy asdownloading the latest Britney Spears ballad. Last year, thestudios succeeded in shutting down Scour.com, a file-sharing Website that allowed people to swap digitized films.
Many Companies Are Experimenting
Earlier experiments with producing original short films andanimation for the Internet failed, leaving studios wondering how touse the new technology while protecting their valuable copyrights.
Miramax Films, a unit of The Walt Disney Co. (parent company of ABCNEWS), signed a deal inApril 2000 with Mount Lebanon, Pa.-based SightSound.com to offer 12full-length feature films on the Web. The arrangement is anexperiment to see how and if consumers will be willing to viewdownloaded films on a pay-per-view basis.
Other studios have been exploring a video-on-demand strategy,making movies available over high-speed cable television lines orover private networks.
Video rental chain Blockbuster Inc. is testing a private networkit established with the Enron Corp. to stream movies, many fromMetro-Goldwyn-Mayer, from a central computer — a plan many inHollywood prefer because it keeps them in control of theirintellectual property.
And Sony Pictures will soon announce its own video-on-demandservice.
With the Miramax deal, SightSound is providing encryption andusing Microsoft Corp.'s video compression technology to shrink themassive computer files to a more manageable size. The companyalready has movies for download on its Web site and last yearintroduced what it billed as the first movie made exclusively forthe Internet.
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