Morgan Freeman gehört zu den Investoren hinter ClickStar, das es ab 2006 möglich machen will, Kinofilme am Starttag im Internet herunterzuladen – ohne zeitliche Beschränkung und vor allem legal:

“Morgan always says you must make content easier to buy than to pirate,” said Kevin Corbett, a vice president in Intel’s digital home group. “That’s been the philosophy behind the alliance and the reason why we launched the company.”

Corbett said consumers want flexibility and options, and they already look for first-run films on file-sharing networks. “What we want to do is get the content that we see consumers use now and make those movies available legally through the service,” he said.

Films will be protected by digital rights management, but will still be easy for consumers to move to portable devices, Corbett said. Allibhoy said ClickStar is in discussions with “entities” in the movie industry that would release films through the service but would not comment on any specific deals yet. Allibhoy said he was not worried that releasing films the same day they hit theaters will have a detrimental effect.

“You cannot replicate the theater experience anywhere else,” Allibhoy said. “It’s a social experience, it’s not just the film. We don’t really see this as having a negative effect on (movie theaters). We see this as being yet another distribution outlet.”

Ich kann inzwischen gut auf das social experience eines Kinos verzichten. Aber ich hab genausowenig Lust, vier Stunden Lord of the Rings auf meinem iBook zu gucken. Ich werde wohl bei einer kleinen Wartezeit und dem Medium DVD bleiben.