Apple schemes mobile movie streams

the future

wow this could be very cool indeed, at last some forward thinking in the entertainment industry.

I would love to be able to access all my content any and everywhere I went without having to carry several huge ipods and put up with the associated quality reductions. Also I have always thought it crazy that entertainment content be it songs, movies or whatever was one of the only commodities thats price largely depended on the format it was sold in. Why should I have to buy several versions (or potentially break the law by ripping and reformatting) of the smae film to be able to watch it in the lounge, on my laptop, on my ipod, on my phone, on my console etc? I dont pay different amounts when I buy a tomato for a salad at home than when I buy one for a sandwich or picnic! I know they put 'extras' on but that with a few exceptions has always seemed to me to be an attempt at justification rather than a real difference or benefit.

Even better would be if all content was stored centrally and then we could access anything at any time, either by way of micropayments or for favourite items one off lifetime payments. Now that would be truelly great and I imagine would cut an awful lot of privacy. New artists could even wave initial micropayments to build interest and a following. No one would need to constantly upgrade their storage, and the cloud could optimise the stream for what ever the quality of the device it is you are enjoying the content on!

But I guess im just dreaming seeing how luddite the copyright holders seem to be!