Die Hard on the Go

Digital Rights Management or DRM has quickly become the whipping boy of the Internet. Little else has so much venom directed toward it. In an unexpected but not unwelcome move, Fox Home Entertainment is expected to announce that it will include a PC version of "Live Free or Die Hard" on the special edition release reports The Hollywood Reporter. While Warner Home Video has promised a downloadable version of "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix," that will follow the Die Hard release by nearly a month.

To access the download, the user will need to insert disc two into their computer, select "Digital Copy", and enter a code that is included in the DVD case. After about five minutes the file is "playable" while a full download will take around 45 minutes. The file is only usable by portable devices equipped with Microsoft's PlaysForSure technology. The Digital Copy feature is not Mac compatible.

While Fox is probably just trying to draw in long time "Die Hard" fans that were mystified and alienated by the inexplicable decision to release the long awaited sequel with a PG-13 rating (it's like I'm watching it on TV), we see this as a step in the right direction. The Playsforsure protocol doesn't seem like viralware of any kind (to our limited research) though having to purchase yet another product touched by Microsoft makes us uneasy (it doesn't have a red ring anywhere does it?). There are some questions we have though such as what will be the quality of the download, is there a limit to the number of computers/devices the file can be transferred to, and can a backup be burned. We'd also be interested to see if it is just the movie or if the extras are also available. This could be the first step to legally streaming movies over a home network or for creating backups of your movie. Stay tuned for more on this intriguing story.