Media Group to Create Digital Video ‘Ecosystem’

We all hate the restrictions put on us by DRM and especially when we can’t share legitimately purchased content between devices. eWeek are report that a consortium (including Microsoft) it working together to create a digital Ecosystem for sharing content, details will released a CES in January and I hope Media Center has a part to play in it. The vision is ‘buy once, play anywhere.’  which if that means I can buy a video from Xbox Live and then watch it on my Zune or Media Center then I would be very happy. One noticeable absence on the list of names is Apple.

The consortium of Hollywood studios, retailers, service providers, and consumer electronics and information technology companies, called the Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem, or DECE, is working on a "uniform digital media experience" but won’t announce details until the Consumer Electronics Show in January.

The consortium said it will call for interoperability of devices and websites, and usage rules that allow consumers to copy content onto household playback devices and to burn their content to physical media, DECE President Mitch Singer said.

The plan also would provide customers a "rights locker" or virtual library where consumers’ digital video purchases would be stored for retrieval in a manner similar to accessing an email account, Singer said.

The consortium plans to design a logo that will be placed on products and websites to let consumers know that those products and services are compatible with DECE standards.

The consortium includes Alcatel-Lucent, Best Buy Co Inc, Cisco Systems Inc, Comcast, News Corp’s Fox Entertainment Group, Hewlett-Packard Co, Intel, Lions Gate Entertainment Corp, Microsoft Corp, General Electric Co’s NBC Universal, Viacom Inc’s Paramount Pictures, Philips, Sony Corp, Toshiba, VeriSign, and Time Warner Inc’s Warner Bros Entertainment.