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Media
Information > Media DVD Coverage 
Archive
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| Updated January 11, 2005 DVD
NEWS DIGEST December 25 issue - Billboard: Top 10 DVD Sellers in US 1 -
Spider-Man 2 (Widescreen Special Edition) Columbia TriStar Home
Entertainment
Nearly every movie produced today is available on DVD and many older movies are being moved to the DVD format. Often, a movie is released on DVD before it comes out on videotape because the manufacturing and distribution costs for DVDs are so much lower. There are many features to look out for when purchasing a DVD player. These include a Dolby Digital decoder that allows the DVD player to decode the Dolby Digital information from a DVD and convert it to six separate analogue channels. If you are going to hook the DVD player up to a TV or a stereo system with only two speakers, a DVD player with simulated surround processing will give you some sense of surround sound without the extra speakers. Purchasing a DVD player has become almost mandatory in the home entertainment stakes. Most video rental stores now stock mainly DVDs for two reasons: it's cheaper to buy from the distributors and the lifespan of a DVD far exceeds that of a VHS cassette. It is also virtually impossible to copy a copyrighted DVD.
Internet DVD rental clubs are sending out one film every second to homes across the UK, threatening the long-term survival of the high-street video store. By the end of next year, it is expected the number of DVDs rented using postal delivery will outnumber the total number of DVDs and videos picked from the shelves of a major rental chain. Companies offering the delivery service believe it could even threaten pay-per-view movies offered by cable TV companies. Almost seven in 10 homes in the UK have a DVD player, and almost 10 million adults rent at least one DVD a month.
In the largest counterfeit movie and music bust in U.S. history, pirated DVDs, CDs and video games representing potential losses of $200 million to companies were confiscated in raids in Los Angeles and Orange counties. Confiscated were 79 "stampers", devices containing the data to manufacture CDs and DVDs, at five undisclosed businesses that manufacture CDs, DVDs and video games. Police estimate that piracy costs the film industry about $3.5 billion annually in revenues and it has stepped up anti-piracy efforts dramatically in the past year. The music industry estimates annual loses to pirates of about $4 billion. The Recording Industry Association of America's West Coast anti-piracy office has undertaken several enforcement operations in Southern California during the holiday season. Since Thanksgiving, approximately 250,000 illegal CDs and DVDs offered for sale have been confiscated. Dec. 13 - The Times [UK]: DVD Pirates will blow a £1bn hole in film market Britain is becoming the world’s black market film capital with three million pirate DVDs seized in 2004 — a rise of more than 3,000 per cent in three years. But the seizures represent just 5 per cent of the market in pirated films which will earn an estimated £450 million for organised criminals as diverse as the IRA, Chinese “snakeheads” and the Russian mafia. By 2007, the illegal trade is predicted to be worth £1 billion. Gangs deliberately target Britain because it is the largest English language market outside the United States. Within three days of a film being illegally copied in an American cinema, tens of thousands of DVDs will be on sale in Britain, long before its offical UK release.
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