Microsoft and Tesco strike up 'virtual DVD' partnership

Starting this autumn -- which is sort of like now -- Tesco stores in the UK will be offering "virtual DVDs" to customers who purchase certain home video titles. Promising no less than a "DVD-equivalent" experience, the new service will be replete with all the menus, copyright warnings and extra bits you'd find on the disc itself, plus additional exclusive content and movie viewing parties with online chat. We're not entirely sure films need all the added interactivity Microsoft has cooked up, but ambitions are to expand the bonus content and to offer the service in other markets "eventually." And hey, seeing as it's based on Silverlight, all that good stuff will be available on Mac too.

[(Unverified) Posted Sep 9th 2009 7:07AM]

please tell me that after re ripping my entire dvd collection more times than i can count trying to find the right dvd jukebox solution that i havent just ripped my dvd collection into large vob files with ac3 sound for nothing. Do we think that this means that media center extenders will in the future be able to handle dvd menus or does this look solely like the creation of a virtual only solution. I

[(Unverified) Posted Sep 9th 2009 8:07AM]

Does a "DVD equivalent" experience mean I can loan or sell my content when I'm fed up with? Does it mean I can play it with non-Microsoft software? Does it mean I don't need a broadband internet connection? Does it mean I do not have to perform any validation with a 3rd party service in order to play it? If not then maybe calling it an equivalent experience is nonsense.