Media Wonk

Moondogging Kaleidescape - June 2, 2008

Press release of the day: Moondog Digital of Indianapolis has been approved for Kaleidescape loading services. Custom home-theater installers in the Midwest can now ship their clients' DVD collections to Moondog who will bulk-load them onto Kaleidescape servers and then ship the loaded servers back to the client. Moondog founder Craig Kelker tells Media Wonk the move reflects growing sales of Kaleidescape systems across middle-America after years of largely bi-coastal appeal.

The release serves as a handy reminder that the DVD Copy Control Assn. is scheduled to meet in Los Angeles on Wednesday, where one of the topics up for discussion is an amendment to the CSS license to allow "managed-copying" of CSS-protected DVDs. Kaleidescape, you'll recall, contends that it's servers are already licensed to perform managed-copying and that any attempt to amend the license now is at best unnecessary and at worst would be illegal. DVD-CCA thinks otherwise and has sued Kaleidescape for breach of the license. Earlier this year a California state judge ruled in favor of Kaleidescape, but that ruling has been appealed by DVD-CCA.

Where does that leave bulk loaders like Moondog? Kelker says Moondog uses speed loaders provided by Kaleidescape to perform its bulk-loading service, which, presumably, are covered by Kaleidescape's existing CSS license, making everything on the up-and-up.

But the DVD-CCA suit does not address the fundamental question of whether Kaleidescape users have the legal right in the first place to make server-copies of their own DVDs. In fact, as Media Wonk has argued before, the breach-of-contract suit was at least in part an effort by the studios to avoid a direct courtroom showdown over that question for fear they might not like the court's answer.

Now you have third parties creating for-profit businesses around out-sourcing the work, which raises the stakes considerably. It's getting very close to the time when the studios will have to call the bet, or fold.

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