A Disney revolution

Disney drops a bomb by creating a new business model for the sale of their movies.

The Wall Street Journal just released this scoop: the powerful Disney Studios is about to present a revolutionary new business model for video on demand (VOD) that is better adapted to Internet users, who are increasingly abandoning television and DVD players in favor of computers and mobile phones.

Keychest uses new technology to distribute video media for Disney and its partners, and will offer users a Web catalogue from which they can choose and stream movies or TV shows on their computers, multimedia handhelds, TV screens or iPhone.

Disney's digital locker will allow viewers pay just once for all kinds of video media, which they can then access on a cloud computing system from their personal account using a purchased key.

Executives at Disney ­ which is clearly trying to generate some business after the downward spiral of DVD sales and the disappointing launch of Blu-Ray technology ­ say the new model would make a profit in 5 years at the earliest.

A competing project called the Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem, or DECE, which is headed by Sony, is also underway, guaranteeing yet another technology war for users to wait out.