Digital Nation by Gary Dretzka

Sometimes you have to wonder if studio executives have even the vaguest of clues as to what goes on outside the confines of their offices, lots, limousines and the 310 area code.

Last week, for instance, it was reported that the Walt Disney Co. and Flexplay Technologies Inc. plan to pull the trigger on a DVD that literally self-destructs two days after the movie it contains is played for the first time. The initial selection is expected to include The Recruit, The Hot Chick and Signs.

EZ-D products, as they're currently known, will be cheap and readily available in all sorts of retail outlets. Aside from that, their primary benefit appears to derive from the fact that they don't have to be returned to rental venues.

Puh-leeze. Am I the only person who doesn't consider this to be a great challenge for American consumers?

Anyone who can't find a store that doesn't rent titles by the week, at prices below the cost of a box of concession-stand candy, probably isn't trying very hard. Then, too, one of the great things about making the effort to return videos is being inspired to rent others. It works for both retailers and consumers.

The primary reason DIVX technology was trumped by advocates of DVD was the notion that consumers should have to continue to pay for something they'd already purchased. When Americans buy a product, they would rather see it gather dust for an eternity than have it be rendered useless by some unseen hand. If anyone is going to destroy our toys, it's going to be us.

I'm guessing that the major distribution companies are still trying to find new ways to mess with the minds of video retailers. Clearly, the studios are still pissed off that they couldn't convince the Supreme Court to crush the rental business like a bug, in the early '80s, when it had the chance. Apparently, Disney would rather dump EZ-Ds in every gas station and 7-Eleven in North America – and risk devaluing the medium's artistic currency -- than cut retailers a break.

Likewise, the AOL and Timer Warner merger was supposed to accelerate the timetable for bringing about the direct, instant delivery of movies to homes. Investors were told that consumers couldn't wait to download Warner Bros. entertainment products, via AOL Broadband, thanks to synergistic marketing campaigns on AOL, the WB network and in such magazines as Time and Entertainment Weekly.

That idea worked pretty well, didn't it?

EZ-D probably makes a lot of sense to harried Hollywood executives, incapable of returning videos to the local Blockbuster without the help of their personal assistants. For years, the same geniuses have had the same problem with dry cleaning, but no one has asked Armani to consider self-destructing suits.

Here are a few other reasons EZ-D is an unnecessary product, at best.

1) Netflix: Renting by mail is an idea whose time has come. Netflix and Facets Multimedia offer thousands more titles than most local video stores, and they're almost always available. For about $20 a month, Netflix subscribers can order three titles at a time, and watch them as quickly or slowly as they want. The movies come with a prepaid return envelope that only needs to be dropped in the nearest mailbox when another title is ordered. It couldn't be simpler.

2) No matter how often the EZ-D concept is explained, some customers won't get it. Some will open the package and inadvertently start the countdown before they're ready to watch their new movie. Others will think they can watch a two-hour movie 24 times, before it self-destructs.

3) Like sales of used CDs, the market in used DVDs is exploding. Visit the used-DVD department at Amoeba and other second-hand stores and you'll find a larger selection of titles than at any Blockbuster, and prices that are impossible for movie lovers to ignore.

4) Unless EZ-Ds cost 98 cents or less, 48 hours is a ridiculously short amount of time to savor the purchase of any video product, unless it's being purchased for the express purpose of pirating the content. Try explaining to a 4-year-old why their new video just self-destructed without warning.

5) Americans collect; they don't throw away. Boxed sets of DVDs are the video equivalent of coffee-table books, and one of the key reasons the industry has outdistanced VHS in six short years.

6) I'm guessing that EZ-Ds won't contain the same often-wonderful bonus material as today's DVDs.

7) The same titles are readily available on cable and satellite TV, and can be recorded on discs, as well as videocassettes.

8) If the price of an EZ-D is too low, it will alert an even largest segment of the public to one of the entertainment industry's dirty little secrets: that pre-recorded discs are cheaper than tape and vinyl to produce, and the public is being gouged. It explains why so many people embraced Napster, before its demise, and don't feel guilty about buying albums at used-CD stores.

9) It just smells fishy.

Of course, I could be wrong. The studios could have our best interests at heart, and movie lovers will benefit from the self-destruction of intellectual property. Stranger things have happened … but not many.