Thanks to a new deal between Apple and Fox, now marked DVD titles will include a digital copy of the movie for use with iTunes. The title I tried out was the first one that was revealed — even well before the announcement, thanks to a lucky guy who grabbed a copy of the DVD early — Family Guy presents Blue Harvest. Upon opening the movie, two discs were found: the DVD with the featured movie, and a second DVD tagged as “Digital Copy”. The Digital Copy DVD read: “For use only in Apple Macintosh or Windows PC DVD drives. Disc will not function in a stand alone DVD player.” Also, apart from the two DVDs, one insert was found with the Digital Copy description, instructions, and a serial number to claim it. Windows users also have the option to transfer the Digital Copy to Windows Media Player, apparently.
Once the Digital Copy DVD was inserted into a Mac, it opened a window to prompt iTunes to open. But in my case, iTunes was already open, and the DVD appeared in the Devices list within the iTunes sidebar.
It also started an automatic connection with the iTunes Store for inputting the serial number.
When the serial number was entered, the iTunes version started downloading (that’s the term iTunes used, although everything was transferred from the DVD). The transfer was fast on my end, and was consistent in quality with other media from the iTunes Store.
Of course, I only have one question: why didn’t they include the Digital Copy within the same DVD the movie is featured in, instead of wasting another DVD’s worth, which will only be played once in your computer? Have they heard of DVD ROM features? And the movie is only 48 minutes-long — of course there would’ve been enough space for the Digital Copy feature. Ecologists, take note.
Overall, I’m happy that a deal was reached to start producing DVDs with iTunes content. This way, people will avoid the gray details of whether or not DVD ripping is legal, and — not to mention — saving time on the actual ripping process, which can be time-consuming in older Macs.
Steven on January 17th, 2008 at 12:30 am says:
The second disk is probably there because they don’t want the digital copy going out as rentals (netflix, etc.)
Frank on January 17th, 2008 at 6:22 am says:
Probably — but unless you have the serial number, it’d be useless… at least until someone finds a way to hack through it.
MSwanberg on January 29th, 2008 at 3:12 pm says:
This doesn’t sound that great to me. All it does is save you the download. They could easily have just inserted the code that would allow a free download from iTunes directly, sort of like a gift certificate that’s good for only one item. We don’t need the disc unless it’s going to be DRM-free.
I am assuming here that the FairPlay DRM is on the movie once it’s been transferred to the computer?
-Mike
Frank on January 29th, 2008 at 5:32 pm says:
Mike,
Yes, the movie does have the FairPlay v.2 DRM. But the movie really is transferred from the DVD — not the iTunes Store. All it needs the iTunes Store connection is for authentication, etc… Well, at least that would explain the ridiculously-high download speed from my slow internet connection. Still, it’s a waste of DVD plastic to include two discs, in my opinion.