Disney's "Movies Anywhere" Cloud Based Storage Locker Pros and Cons

[Yowza]

Cloud Based Storage lockers such as Ultraviolet are now a thing of the past.

Movies Anywhere from Disney now is the only official one in the U.S. that works by:
*Putting in Applicable Digital Copy Codes from Physical Disc Purchased. Disney has
contracted with each of the 5 major studios except Paramount. Independent movie studios likely will not be on this service. This is meant to encourage buying physical copies. Not only is the movie included on MovieAnywhere but also on the 9 major TVOD streaming websites in the U.S.

*A movie can also be purchased purely digitally from the 9 Major TVOD Services in the U.S. and appear on MoviesAnywhere if the appropriate logo appears next to purchase. This includes the 3 app stores (Microsoft, Itunes, Google play), 2 service providers (Xfinity Cable, Verizon's Fios), 4 Digital Movie Storefronts (FandangoNow, Vudu, Amazon, Google's Youtube).
Disney leaves out Redbox that also now allows to purchase movies as they tried suing them. Any movie purchased from any of these providers with a MoviesAnywhere logo will appear across all 9 storefronts as well as the Movie'sAnywhere website. Sometimes additional special features will even popup when accessing owned digital movie from somewhere else.

There are a few interesting caveats I have noticed since signing onto MoviesAnywhere:
*Only titles with a MoviesAnywhere logo work with this service.
*Vudu's Disc to Digital (current version only works on Vudu app not the website) doesn't work with any Disney titles. You have to purchase at full price to work with MoviesAnywhere.
*MoviesAnywhere is contracted with each of the 5 major studios except Paramount. Independent movie studios likely will not be on this service as well.
*Like Vudu's Disc to digital or any digital movie purchased online, a version of the movie will appear that is the currently accepted version. What this means especially for certain older Disney titles is that the film may've been edited in a newer release if certain parts are no longer considered culturally appropriate. Hence, physical copies of older releases are still desired.

 

[DarkKnight88]

These digital releases are good if you want to watch the film once or twice and may disappear somewhere down the line when this all becomes obsolete.

If you actually want to “own” it, watch it forever, buy a physical copy while you still can and backup your own copies.

 

[Yowza]

The digital copies disappearing is another drawback. Most of the copies I own are through Vudu's disc to digital that cost less to own than rent. There are special deals all the time so somehow I ended up with a collection rather quickly.

I could download the copies in hd by buying drives to store it on as backup but just keep a simple inventory list on what I own (vudu has a mylist area for this). For instance, a list of movies owned appearing on moviesanywhere, vudu only, fandangoonly, and so on i do from my vudu account. That way if someone is over at my place and wants to browse available movies I just cast vudu on the tv and simply cast from a different app from my phone if movie is only on fandangonow or somewhere else but they can pick from list of movies from mylist area.

I should get a drive I can hook up to my TV to download everything on too I suppose. I just more casually collect at the moment while of course using the list feature to track if something is erased.

 

[Primal Slayer]

Even Amazon made it known that the digital movies you purchase from them are essentially only "renting" and can disappear at anytime should they choose to do so.

 

[Yowza]

That is an obvious drawback. Yes.

It is still nice to access a library on the go though especially one personally curated by oneself. A way around this is of course is to download or in my case keep a list tracking what own to see if lose anything.

It has become a bit of an ongoing joke about trying to sift through ever shifting options on SVOD sites like Netflix to find content judiciously. Angryvideogamenerd made a video parodying this.

Original content is the main reason I even subscribe to SVOD sites.

 

[Prison Mike]

Even Amazon made it known that the digital movies you purchase from them are essentially only "renting" and can disappear at anytime should they choose to do so.

Didn’t a woman sue Amazon over this? And she still purchased videos on Prime even after suing...lol

 

[Wheels]

I. would keep getting physical media except I'm not in love with the Blu-Ray format honestly. I miss the hey day of DVDs.

 

[psylockolussus]

I. would keep getting physical media except I'm not in love with the Blu-Ray format honestly. I miss the hey day of DVDs.

Same here.

I never really upgraded to blu ray/4k hd when it comes to movies/tv shows. I wish they kept the name of DVD, or called it DVD2 and DVD3 for the technical upgrades of the discs. Which reminded of HD-DVD.

 

[Web-Head]

I used to be worried about digital, but it's the way of the future. Studios are going to focus more and more on digital sales compared to physical media. I can see physical media becoming a thing of the past sooner than later, or only for "collectors"

 

[DarkKnight88]

Of course the studios want that. They don't want you to "own" the movie. They want to keep you on a premium price forever if they could. I get why the general public doesn't care as movies are disposable to them. Watch once then forget about it.

But if you truly love a movie, you should own a physical copy. You never know what might happen to them otherwise "out there" in the ether.

 

[Teelie]

I prefer physical releases for that very reason. They can't come in and take away a copy you already own. Obviously it is impractical to buy every movie or television series that way but ones I want to own, I buy physical copies of. Other stuff I can rent or watch off SVOD.

 

[Web-Head]

Of course the studios want that. They don't want you to "own" the movie. They want to keep you on a premium price forever if they could. I get why the general public doesn't care as movies are disposable to them. Watch once then forget about it.

But if you truly love a movie, you should own a physical copy. You never know what might happen to them otherwise "out there" in the ether.

And I still do buy physical for the most part. I'm just saying that the fears of "losing" your digital copy of the movie is unlikely unless you just delete your Movies Anywhere, Vudu, etc account at some point

 

[Yowza]

I know Vudu typically keeps your movie up on their site even if you can no longer buy it. You'll have to manually scroll through your library to find it though from what I've heard.

That's not to say there won't be issues with Fandango having bought them out from Walmart recently but overall the issues a year ago mainly seemed to stem from movies being linked to Ultraviolet's storage locker after it went down. It seems some lost movies or lost HD quality seemed to resolve with time though if purchase stemmed from Vudu. I never used Ultraviolet only going with digital movie buying and linking to MoviesAnywhere this past spring so haven't encountered anything so far. That's not to say it won't happen at some point though.

There are ways to contact customer support asking for a file of all movies purchased though to see what is missing. I've read on the Vudu support boards about a number of people (some of whom own over a 1000 movies on Vudu which is crazy) going this route. Most of the time it seems credits are applied when movies are lost if the customer is diligent enough to find and prove it but this may not be the norm if enough people start doing that.

Overall, downloading I think is key but requires too much storage space especially if 4K. I hope better options for digital movie collecting will present themselves in the future. There'll always be a spot for physical collecting to keep a certain version intact as well as accessing all those special features not to mention the aesthetical aspects of the packaging for those really into collecting.

I just don't have a lot of room in my condo otherwise I would get a shelf somewhere that can gather enough dust to be out of site out of mind most of the time while going about daily business. It's also nice to be able to access an entire collection by phone and cast it on the TV if visiting somewhere too or if someone wants to access your library and watch it.