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General discussionIntroducing GOG.com DRM-Free Movies(632 posts)(632 posts)
(632 posts)
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This is my favourite topic
Posted August 27, 2014
Cause there's no business like show-business!

Our DRM-Free approach to digital distribution has been the foundation of GOG.com since day one and we're convinced it is now firmly rooted in the gaming industry landscape. More and more users start to expect and demand the digital content they paid for to be free from any kind of restrictive mechanisms that limit access to their collections and get in the way of enjoyment. We think this is a good time to take the next step in our quest to make digital entertainment better for everyone. Today we set out to spread our DRM-Free ideas across the movie industry! That's right: GOG.com now offers DRM-Free movies.

Our goal is to offer you cinema classics as well as some all-time favorite TV series with no DRM whatsoever, for you to download and keep on your hard drive or stream online whenever you feel like it. We talked to most of the big players in the movie industry and we often got a similar answer: "We love your ideas, but … we do not want to be the first ones. We will gladly follow, but until somebody else does it first, we do not want to take the risk". DRM-Free distribution is not a concept their lawyers would accept without hesitation. We kind of felt that would be the case and that it's gonna take patience and time to do it, to do it, to do it right. That's quite a journey ahead of us, but every gamer knows very well that great adventures start with one small step. So why not start with something that feels very familiar? We offer you a number of gaming and internet culture documentaries - all of them DRM-Free, very reasonably priced, and presenting some fascinating insight into topics close to a gamer's heart. Now, what do we have in store for you?

- There's a whole new Movie Catalog for you to browse!
- All the movies we sell are priced at $5.99 (that's a launch promo price for a few of them), and we aim to have that as the main price point for most of our future releases
- Two of the movies - The Art of Playing and TPB AFK: The Pirate Bay Away From Keyboard are available for FREE, so that you can test our new movie distribution features
- Most of our movies are in Full HD 1080p quality, some in 720p. With those of you with limited bandwidth or download quota in mind, we also supply much lighter 576p versions.
- Apart from downloading your movies you have the option to watch them streaming online, right here on GOG.com
- GOG.com is famous for its bonus goodies - each movie will come with as many of them as we can muster
- You can expect subsequent movie releases each week

That's it. GOG.com Movies is a go, time to get some popcorn!
Posted August 28, 2014
errr.. no thanks, I think I'll pass. I come here to play games and that's it.
Posted August 28, 2014
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Valoric: Do you mean original like lossless? Does compressed lossless video like FLAC exists? That would make GOG a world first if they had lossless video encodings for purchase. Hell, if they did I wouldn't mind paying their prices as well.
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DebugMode: I meant the files provided by the content creator. The stuff has most likely been converted a few times. Now if you reencode them into webm, daala or other formats (like you mentioned ealier), you'd end up degrading their quality.
Creators have master files which are stored in lossless codecs (for example lossless Dirac). Then they encode them for you in any format you ask. If GOG don't have lossless copies, they can't easily produce other options without degrading quality as you said.
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synfresh: It's probably been asked before but who exactly is GoG competing with here? Itunes? Amazon? Streaming services like Roku or even Netflix?
Any of them, since none of them provide DRM-free video and don't care to improve that situation. Let GOG take them on! The only other DRM-free video store is Headweb, but it's limited to just a few countries.

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somberfox: They aren't competing with anyone, they're trying to fill a practically non-existent niche.
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synfresh: There's been a demand for DRM-Free movies? Especially in this era of streaming services?
It's irritating that so many people equate streaming with DRM. It's nonsense. Who said streaming has to come with DRM garbage attached? DRM-free streaming please! Backupable files which can be also streamed from the cloud in standard, HTML fashion which doesn't require any junk DRMed clients which are limited to "supported platforms". That's exactly what GOG is doing.
Post edited August 28, 2014 by shmerl
Posted August 28, 2014
I'd buy movies from GOG.com, and TV series too, should these ever become available.
The only thing stopping me from buying movies so far was DRM - I don't have an HDMI display to play DRMed content from iTunes, and even if did I'd still say they can shove their movies where the sun won't shine if I can't watch something I paid for where I want and how I want.

I hope we'll see some big movies and series on GOG.com some day!
Post edited August 28, 2014 by Rathori
Posted August 28, 2014
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DebugMode: I meant the files provided by the content creator. The stuff has most likely been converted a few times. Now if you reencode them into webm, daala or other formats (like you mentioned ealier), you'd end up degrading their quality.
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shmerl: Creators have master files which are stored in lossless codecs (for example lossless Dirac). Then they encode them for you in any format you ask. If GOG don't have lossless copies, they can't easily produce other options without degrading quality as you said.
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synfresh: It's probably been asked before but who exactly is GoG competing with here? Itunes? Amazon? Streaming services like Roku or even Netflix?
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shmerl: Any of them, since none of them provide DRM-free video and don't care to improve that situation. Let GOG take them on! The only other DRM-free video store is Headweb, but it's limited to just a few countries.

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synfresh: There's been a demand for DRM-Free movies? Especially in this era of streaming services?
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shmerl: It's irritating that so many people equate streaming with DRM. It's nonsense. Who said streaming has to come with DRM garbage attached? DRM-free streaming please! Backupable files which can be also streamed from the cloud in standard, HTML fashion which doesn't require any junk DRMed clients which are limited to "supported platforms". That's exactly what GOG is doing.
I ask again, who exactly is clamoring for this? Because the technology trend with streaming devices (roku, fire) and services (netflix, amazon prime) is going the other way. I don't know anyone who even buys individual movies any more, whether it be on disc or digital.
Posted August 28, 2014
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synfresh: I ask again, who exactly is clamoring for this? Because the technology trend with streaming devices (roku, fire) and services (netflix, amazon prime) is going the other way. I don't know anyone who even buys individual movies any more, whether it be on disc or digital.
Anyone who is opposed to DRM, and all users who don't want to rely on courtesy of DRMed services to provide some sick client for their platforms and devices (which they usually never do). Netflix on Linux anyone?

I buy individual movies on disks because it's the only DRM-free way of buying them (DRM on disks can be ignored, since it's trivially scrapable). I'd buy all in digital, but all services like Netflix are poisoned with DRM and I won't touch any of that junk. So GOG's idea appeals to me a lot.

Streaming is a convenience, not a renting restriction. So again, don't equate streaming with renting or DRM.
Post edited August 28, 2014 by shmerl
Posted August 28, 2014
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synfresh: I ask again, who exactly is clamoring for this? Because the technology trend with streaming devices (roku, fire) and services (netflix, amazon prime) is going the other way. I don't know anyone who even buys individual movies any more, whether it be on disc or digital.
Then again, there weren't a huge demand for DRM-free games either, the fact that most big-budget games require online authentication through Steam, Uplay, Origin, or some developer- or publisher-specific platform doesn't stop them from selling in huge amounts.

I, for one, prefer to buy a piece of media (game, book, movie, music) once and then have it available to use however I wish (Video DVD's and Audio CD's, I can make copies of to use them without the disc, on any device that I own, GOG and books from Storybundle are similarly unrestricted), rather than subscribe to a service that require authentication (whether that be a service that's free with individual one-time payments for the products, like Steam* or Origin, or monthly payments for the service with the products included, like Netflix or Spotify). I realise I'm in the minority, but I'm not alone.

* I do realise that Steam does not mandate DRM on the products available from the store, but the majority use it.
Post edited August 28, 2014 by Maighstir
Posted August 28, 2014
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Maighstir: I, for one, prefer to buy a piece of media (game, book, movie, music) once and then have it available to use however I wish (Video DVD's and Audio CD's, I can make copies of to use them without the disc, on any device that I own, GOG and books from Storybundle are similarly unrestricted), rather than subscribe to a service that require authentication (whether that be a service that's free with individual one-time payments for the products, like Steam or Origin, or monthly payments for the service with the products included, like Netflix or Spotify). I realise I'm in the minority, but I'm not alone.
You have my axe. Far too many people are blithely giving up their consumer and property rights.
Post edited August 28, 2014 by Sabin_Stargem
Posted August 28, 2014
Minor nitpick: Would be great if the shelf color would be seperate from the game shelf. Wood for games & dark for movies; or the other way around. Currently its shared. Other than that some classics like "Satyr" or "A Witches Tail" would be nice :P
Posted August 28, 2014
This is undoutably a very ambitous and potentially revolutionary undertaking.

I doubt that it'll evolve into something that could interest me. Kinda expect it to carry the same stuff that is readily available elsewhere on streaming services and such. In Germany we have several of those, all of which are worth it to subscribe for a month or so and take a look at the few interesting things on there.

There's certainly a lot that can be done with the idea: Classics that aren't readily available on DVD (say, stuff by Hou Hsiao-Hsien), independent productions with limited theatrical exposure, subbed versions of films and series that have never been released outside of their home countries.

I've always hoped for something like this. The possibilities are just endless. I doubt that GOG have the connections and resources to really pull it off, but you can always hope and of course there's the possibility that someone else can take up the idea and run with it.
Posted August 28, 2014
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Maighstir: whether that be a service that's free with individual one-time payments for the products, like Steam* or Origin, or monthly payments for the service with the products included, like Netflix or Spotify.
I find the whole idea of giving limited time access for a monthly fee without allowing to back up a DRM-free copy to be unreasonable and unfair.

With normal physical goods giving limited time access (i.e. renting) is needed in order to reuse the object. When the access time is up, object is returned and can be lent to another person. Because of that, price of renting is naturally lower than price of buying.

In case of digital goods, one doesn't need to return anything really, since they can be easily copied for any next customer. So it's not an expense for the vendor to create another copy. Let's say the vendor can charge the monthly fee for offering a convenience of streaming. That I can understand - streaming eats bandwidth and loads their servers so it's not unreasonable to charge some periodic fee for such service (it can be hard for GOG to cope with bandwidth of the size of Netflix without charging some monthly fee). But why should the vendor prevent the user from backing up the file in such case? There is no need. If user backs it up and uses it from the local computer for further replaying, then bandwidth is not used and it's not an expense. So the bottom line, there is no logical reason to ever use DRM, even if the service offers a streaming feature and even charges a monthly fee for it.

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Ivory&Gold: This is undoutably a very ambitous and potentially revolutionary undertaking.

I doubt that it'll evolve into something that could interest me. Kinda expect it to carry the same stuff that is readily available elsewhere on streaming services and such. In Germany we have several of those, all of which are worth it to subscribe for a month or so and take a look at the few interesting things on there.
See above. Limited time access with no way to back things up it not logical, yet it's commonplace for some reason. GOG offers something new and refreshing here, which on the other hand had to exist to begin with for a long time already.
Post edited August 28, 2014 by shmerl
Posted August 28, 2014
Well, it was worth a try...
Posted August 28, 2014
Movies.

Movies?

Games, boys and girls, games!

Games.

Don't go Stepford. Don't become a grey one.
Posted August 28, 2014
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shmerl: I find the whole idea of giving limited time access for a monthly fee without allowing to back up a DRM-free copy to be unreasonable and unfair.
I actually don't.

I don't like renting at all (physical or streaming), but I don't find the practice of "digital renting" unfair. Because on streaming services such as Netflix, you're not paying to access a single movie or show (as you are at a physical renting store), you have access to the whole library - and in that business model, DRM-free downloads would not really be viable (pay $10 for a single month and download hundreds of movies for permanent access? how much would the business lose on that?).

For Spotify, your subscription gives you mobile access and removal of commercials. Free accounts only have access on through the Windows/OS X application and website, and get commercials every once in a while. As far as I know, that is. I don't use the service, so I don't keep up with possible changes.
Post edited August 28, 2014 by Maighstir
Posted August 28, 2014
I'm really impressed, I've got my eyes on some of these movies for a while and not only are they now on GOG some of them are the cheapest they've ever been! So of course I just had to grab a few of them.

I'm curious to see where this goes, I'm not sure if going for mainstream movies and series or even the classic everyone already has on DVD or Blu-ray is the right path to go after. But for as long as there is some indie movies and documentaries here, I'm sure to keep buying a few of them, wich I think is the case since you now have the option to contact GOG in order to publish your movies.

All in all, I'm happy with the things their offering, I'm amazed at the price and convenience. And it this goes on, this might be one of my go-to places to buy indie movies :D

Keep up the good work GOG team, you consumer friendly basterds :P
Posted August 28, 2014
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shmerl: I find the whole idea of giving limited time access for a monthly fee without allowing to back up a DRM-free copy to be unreasonable and unfair.
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Maighstir: I actually don't.

I don't like renting at all (physical or streaming), but I don't find the practice of "digital renting" unfair. Because on streaming services such as Netflix, you're not paying to access a single movie or show (as you are at a physical renting store), you have access to the whole library - and in that business model, DRM-free downloads would not really be viable (pay $10 for a single month and download hundreds of movies for permanent access? how much would the business lose on that?).
No, it's not reasonable. First of all, what is DRM used there for? To enforce the renting restrictions? So, they assume that without that DRM, people would somehow just download whatever they want from Netflix without bounds. Do they realize that those who want to do such a thing can easily do it without any Netflix using Bittorrent networks already? So what exactly does that DRM do there? Nothing it seems. Then the whole logic crumbles. I find such business model to be based on false reasoning. It works because people are paying for convenience of streaming, not because they appreciate the time limited access. Since most of the videos they get there are one time consumable films, they just don't feel the time window limitation.

To straighten that mess up and avoid DRM they can estimate the price. Let's say on average users watch N films a month. And they pay M money a month for the service. Then they can charge something less than M / N per video + some minimal monthly fee for covering the streaming expenses. It would roughly give them the same income while preventing your potential abuse of downloading the whole catalog at once.

To clarify, even models when they charge you per month and allow watching whatever you want can be acceptable, I just see DRM as unreasonable and not needed in such case as well (as explained above why). To prevent massive abuse you can also easily put a monthly limit on such streaming plan (let's say if you want to watch / download more than N different films - you'll have to pay extra), all that without using any DRM.
Post edited August 28, 2014 by shmerl
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This is my favourite topic
Community
General discussionIntroducing GOG.com DRM-Free Movies(632 posts)(632 posts)
(632 posts)