In a bid to curb the widespread availability of pirated films on the Internet, five major movie studios have entered an agreement to provide an Internet-based movie-on-demand service, Daily Variety reports.
Sony Pictures Entertainment, Universal Studios, Paramount Pictures, MGM and Warner Bros. will have equal shares in the new yet-to-be-named company, currently known as Moviefly. The service is expected to launch sometime next year.
The company will use technology developed by Sony over the past year to supply movies that can be downloaded over the Internet using basic PC setups. Download time will reportedly range from 20 minutes to more than an hour, depending on the user’s connection speed.
With the service, each movie will be available for playback for up to 30 days after the download, but will only be viewable for 24 hours after the initial viewing. The releases will be able to be played using the Real and Windows Media players.
The services will be similar to Amazon.com, with searches by title, stars, director or writers available, but each studio will set separate pricing for its movies.
Studios will also have non-exclusive agreements with the company, which will allow them to distribute their films through other Internet and cable TV companies.
Other studios, like Disney, 20th Century Fox and DreamWorks will also be able to distribute their films through Moviefly.
