Sony to distribute content in DivX format

[Zer0-Sum]

Sony Pictures Television announced today that online retailers will soon be able to offer Sony content for download in DivX format. The news came as part of a partnership with DivX, Inc. that will also let those files be playable on DivX Certified devices. "We are dedicated to finding legitimate outlets for our content and to that end are excited to be working with DivX to provide retailers with an expanded ecosystem for the digital distribution and playback of our digital media," said Sony Pictures executive VP of Digital Distribution & Mobile Entertainment, Michael Arrieta.
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A spokesperson for DivX, Kristina Weise, told Ars that this would offer consumers high-quality Hollywood content in DivX for the first time ever, and that the deal would cover "all titles in the Sony Pictures Television library." She also said that all titles would be download-to-own, but that there will be some type of unspecified DRM. Tracking down those DivX Sony movies might be a challenge, though. "We have no announcements with retailers at this time," she told us.

The news comes just a few weeks after Sony added official DivX support to its PlayStation 3, which had been announced in November. Microsoft beat Sony to the punch, however, with its fall update to the Xbox 360 that included support for DivX. At the very least, owners of next-gen consoles (save the Wii, of course) will be able to watch Sony's movies whenever they become available. When will that be? Wise said that the movies will be available in DivX format on the same day as the DVD release of each title. Assuming there will be retailers to sell it, that is.

The move is definitely good news for the DivX camp, which hails the deal as the first with a major content distributor. Fans of shows from Sony—which include such hits as Jeopardy!, Dawson's Creek, and Seinfeld—can rejoice, because they'll finally have a legal way to download their favorite shows.

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080108-sony-to-distribute-content-in-divx-format.html


This is such awesome news I cannot even begin to describe!! We will now be able to download DivX content via the PSN Store I suppose. I just hope they make the DivX version cheaper than the DVD versions. It is a good move by Sony none the less.

[VG Aficionado]

Interesting :)

[Sephiroth_VII]

Interesting!? It's more than that, it's a huge feature PSN has been lacking!

[Zer0-Sum]

Opening up DivX for downloads is huge to me too. The possibilities are ENDLESS. Imagine if other studios get on the band wagon? They could even make them HD DivX files. SWEET!!!!

[GD|eNSo]

Seems interesting ...even more so when we see the price tiers.

I'm guessing no "game-share"? :p

[jako]

Will those DivX be the same bad quality as those you get on the internet or will it be HD movies ?
I wonder if sony can compress Blu-ray to sent it with DivX technology and then the cell can render the blu-ray format, so that even if you don't have an internet connection with very high download capacities, you'll still be able to download blu-ray format.

Do someone know if that is possible ?

[GD|eNSo]

DivX is not "bad quality" it depends on how the author chose to compress the orginal file.

He is an example of a DivX file running in HD:

http://www.stage6.com/user/avenfou/video/1995415/Wall-e---HD#
1920 x 816 -Resolution
35 mb - File size

[Sephiroth_VII]

The reason a lot of DivX is low quality is because it gives lower file sizes, meaning faster upload/download times, attracting downloads.

[Domination]

http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080108-sony-to-distribute-content-in-divx-format.html


This is such awesome news I cannot even begin to describe!! We will now be able to download DivX content via the PSN Store I suppose. I just hope they make the DivX version cheaper than the DVD versions. It is a good move by Sony none the less.


I think this quote says enough:

Wise said that the movies will be available in DivX format on the same day as the DVD release of each title.

Like I said, with Sony owning a lot of their content, they will have a superior strategy for downloadable content. In case you're wondering what I'm talking about, the competition are only able to do this six to ten months after the movie leaves the theater. To clarify that in their words, after a movie leaves the theater it goes to DVD, then Pay-Per-View; after this is when we finally get it.

[jako]

The reason a lot of DivX is low quality is because it gives lower file sizes, meaning faster upload/download times, attracting downloads.

Yes but I was thinking, even though I 'm not a tecky, that Sony could compress very strongly the HD video and then, thanks to the cell, they could de-compress it to give us almost the same quality as a blu-ray.

[BruceWayneIII]

Yes but I was thinking, even though I 'm not a tecky, that Sony could compress very strongly the HD video and then, thanks to the cell, they could de-compress it to give us almost the same quality as a blu-ray.

That's unfortunately not how it works. When compressing video material, you actually remove image information, but the compression algorithm tries to do it in areas where it would least be noticeable. Once it's gone - it's gone.

It's just like photocopying a magazine. It's not possible to go back.

If you are thinking of using a ZIP-compression or something alike, it won't work. There's already a lot of redundant information gone in the actual file and therefore a ZIP-compression (or anything like that) won't be able to reduce filesize further.

Hope that clears it up. :)

[jako]

Yes that clears it up.........+rep for you

[GD|eNSo]

Jako, that won't stop them from using the their own compression method, which can be later decompressed on the PS3, as you mentioned. Not a bad idea. Pretty similar to how games are are already delivered.