WAVELENGTH: THE NEXT BIG THING IN ONLINE VIDEO SHARING
Wang, a longtime Wall Street analyst, has just launched Wavelength, a service that lets people share movies they own with their friends, over the Web, for free.
This is one of those ideas that tech folks love, because it takes a behavior that’s no big deal in the physical world — Want to borrow my “Star Wars” DVD? Come on over! — and extends it into the digital world.*
So far Wang, the former lead media and Internet analyst for Credit Suisse, hasn’t been able to get Hollywood to sign on to his boot-strapped company. But for now, he seems to be able to work without their blessing, since he’s playing by rules Hollywood created.
Wavelength takes advantage of the UltraViolet cloud locker system the movie studios set up a few years ago, which is supposed to let consumers buy a single copy of a movie and stream it to multiple devices. Interesting and crucial fact: UltraViolet lets movie owners share their library with up to six people, presumably to allow family members to see each others’ movies.
But they don’t have to be family members. So Wavelength lets you post your collection of UltraViolet movies, and let your friends watch them at will; up to three people can watch the same movie at a time.
Wavelength doesn’t host copies of the movies themselves, but sends users to an online portal run by the retailer that originally sold the film (Walmart’s Vudu, for instance), which streams the film.
Wavelength is free for now, though Wang says he can imagine creating a paid version eventually.
Sources:
recode
theverge
So far Wang, the former lead media and Internet analyst for Credit Suisse, hasn’t been able to get Hollywood to sign on to his boot-strapped company. But for now, he seems to be able to work without their blessing, since he’s playing by rules Hollywood created.
Wavelength takes advantage of the UltraViolet cloud locker system the movie studios set up a few years ago, which is supposed to let consumers buy a single copy of a movie and stream it to multiple devices. Interesting and crucial fact: UltraViolet lets movie owners share their library with up to six people, presumably to allow family members to see each others’ movies.
But they don’t have to be family members. So Wavelength lets you post your collection of UltraViolet movies, and let your friends watch them at will; up to three people can watch the same movie at a time.
Wavelength doesn’t host copies of the movies themselves, but sends users to an online portal run by the retailer that originally sold the film (Walmart’s Vudu, for instance), which streams the film.
Wavelength is free for now, though Wang says he can imagine creating a paid version eventually.
Sources:
recode
theverge
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