Sony loads music and movies onto MicroVault Click USB drives, can't locate any buyers

Gee, Sony. We wonder how well this initiative will go over. In fact, we wonder what bigwig signs off on such a blatantly bad idea? In case you missed the memo, selling overpriced music on flash drives is not the next big thing in content delivery, though in fairness, we will give you the movie side due to file size limitations alone. All rants aside, Sony has just introduced new pre-loaded MicroVault Click USB drives, and the first three include Michael Jackson's Thriller (2GB; $19.99), The Da Vinci Code (4GB; $29.99) and Men In Black (4GB; $29.99). What's odd is that the outfit doesn't bother sharing how much free space is left for other uses, nor are we told that the likely DRM-laced material can be exported elsewhere in order to liberate memory on the stick. In other words, we'll pass. Gladly.

[Via CNET]

[Boarderwoot @ Dec 16th 2008 9:32AM]

Wow, that's a lot of hate for one post. I don't know what you guys are talking about though, if I had 20 bucks lying around with absolutely nothing else in the world to use it on, I'd buy a flash drive that would help me practice my thriller moves anywhere i could find a port.

[loocas @ Dec 16th 2008 11:34AM]

Sure. If you start distributing movies on these things for 20 bucks, I'll gladly welcome this initiative! Better than scratchable discs, in my opinion. Also easier to store and move around. If the flashes will be Read-Only, but I could bring it to my friends' and watch it on a USB ready HD TV or a projector, man, that'd be sweet! But I don't mind the music too, although, the DRM sucks and I can't plug in in my car-player :(

[UnixSystemsEngineer @ Dec 16th 2008 2:12PM]

The question is whether you can copy the files off onto your computer and then use the flash drive for other purposes. If you can, it's not a bad deal. If you can't, it's a terrible deal. Sony does not have the best reputation when it comes to this kind of thing, sad to say...

[Jarhead2012 @ Dec 16th 2008 3:32PM]

Agreed with the original post, I think that flash media could be the next big alternative to CD/DVD. Flash drives are easy to maintain, and they don't require to be handled with as much care as CD's and DVD's, which are easily scratched. It might come in the form of memory cards instead of flash drives, but personally I think USB-like drives would be better, as they are cheaper to manufacture and are larger, making them easier to keep track of.

[jon @ Dec 16th 2008 9:34AM]

Those flash drives look sweet tho. :)

[strider_mt2k @ Dec 16th 2008 9:40AM]

Pity Sony has such great manufacturing and design capabilities but so often misses the mark with what consumers want with some things.

Pull it all together Sony!

[Tarnation @ Dec 16th 2008 9:42AM]

They should just manufacture the hardware and let someone else figure out the software side of things.

[dark star @ Dec 16th 2008 9:55AM]

sony, its no baloney
:)

[Gaucho @ Dec 16th 2008 10:53AM]

@ dark star

. . . awesome spelling.

[suprxtragrav @ Dec 16th 2008 11:28AM]

I bought the 1GB one over the summer out of impulse because it was like $12. Its actually pretty sweet, when you pull it out of your computer it automatically retracts (by design), So when i lend it out to anyone (im a student, so we're usually swapping flash drives) it usually gets a few comments.

It certainly gets all the ladies at the bar.

[KIFF @ Dec 16th 2008 9:34AM]

I view this as more of a buy a flash drive, get a free movie kind of thing. As usual expensive for a 4GB stick, but I am sure retail will cost less than that.

[16-bit @ Dec 16th 2008 9:36AM]

Only 29.99 for MIB?! Where do I sign up? I'd gladly pay a ridiculous amount for an 11yr old movie.

[Rob @ Dec 16th 2008 9:41AM]

Uh, at least they're not on Memory Sticks? I'm reaching here.

[94 taurus owner @ Dec 16th 2008 10:04AM]

Sign me up for all three,plus I think in the future DVD's will no longer be produced and movies will be stored on Memory sticks such as these.

[Scott @ Dec 16th 2008 10:04AM]

Sony is SO arrogant. Does anyone remember the Sony DRMed CD dropping the rootkit on PCs? And the SOB from Sony who said most people don't even know what a rootkit is? DRM does not work as a business model or a technology - period. I'm surprised that they "standardized" on the USB drive format. They could have easily designed a USB drive form factor with a rectally inserted Memory Stick, they probably still have a billion of those lying around in warehouses!

[Kspraydad @ Dec 16th 2008 10:07AM]

Did a SONY exec kill your dog or something? It is a piece of CE...buy it or not.

[94 taurus owner @ Dec 16th 2008 10:07AM]

It's a shame I won't be able to place any of these movies on my PSP.

[baltwade @ Dec 16th 2008 10:38AM]

Does anyone know what format the movies are in? I'm kind of interested in these because my DVD player has a USB port on the front and plays .wmv, .avi (DivX and XviD included), and .divx video files. They're nice looking thumb drives, but the price should be a little lower and you should have the ability to port the movie to another storage device or computer; otherwise you'll just end up with a bunch of thumb drives scattered all over the place (and they're not labeled).

[MarbleMind @ Dec 16th 2008 10:43AM]

Tsk, tsk, tsk. The main selling point of these stick is obviously their motorized, retractable end, which frantically blinks and oscillates back and forth when the stick is plugged into an USB port. It's to scare off thieves, y'know.

...

Well, those with arthritic fingers atleast.

[Robbie @ Dec 16th 2008 10:50AM]

Only Sony can incorporate an overpriced usb stick and an overpriced movie with the possibility of a root kit and still no doubt make millions from it.

[Cheddar @ Dec 16th 2008 10:55AM]

Honestly folks, I think the pre-loaded movie idea is great. I had actually thought about it a couple years ago about how convenient it would be to sell USB sticks with movies pre-loaded rather than DVD's since they consume less power from laptops on planes and are much more convenient.

Now I have to say an airport kiosk where you can copy any movie you want to a USB drive would be even more convenient but this idea is not too bad. The music side makes no sense to me, however.

[StalematE @ Dec 16th 2008 11:58AM]

the music side does make sense. there are a lot of head units in cars that have USB ports for playing mp3s, also if you stuff one in an xbox 360, you can play your own music in place of game music. Perfect for playing gangsta rap while murdering aliens in halo.

[Eli Gundry @ Dec 16th 2008 5:20PM]

Maybe it makes sense on paper (that statement is reaching though) but this has gotta cost more money for Sony in the long run and hurt the environment. Think of all the energy spent mining the materials that go into a flash drive, how much oil is used to transport said drives, and all the pollution this makes just to try to prevent consumers from copying shitty movies from DVD's. And I'm not saying that the production of DVD's are the most eco-friendly way to distribute media, but they must be cleaner and cheaper than a flash drive a movie.

It's a shame that companies don't try to take advantage of the internet, which would be more profitable in the long run, but instead stick with antiquated methods of distribution that hurts the consumer and mother earth. What's even more sickening is when this same dumbass companies complain about losing money and want legislation passed so that they can continue to fuck us consumers over and make the same mistakes over and over. The day Sony gets bail out money is the day I stop believing the American dream.

[webmaster @ Dec 16th 2008 10:57AM]

I like the idea of a movie on a flash drive, but I wouldn't want to be forced to keep the flash drive for the movie.
Having a bunch of flash drives laying around would be a mess and difficult to carry more than 1.

Sony should make it so that as you watch it, it is transferred to the hard drive and fingerprinted so that it can only be
transferred back to the original flash, but watch as many times as you want on that computer.
If you want to watch it on another computer, you need to transfer it to the flash drive with a transfer util that removes
the fingerprint from the hard drive copy.

http://afewtips.com

[Daza @ Dec 18th 2008 10:02AM]

Actually some really good ideas, but you had to ruin it with your link. If you haven't noticed, Engadget comments are considered link-spam free, I would avoid adding it. Sure, most of the comments are garbage, but try not to link back to your site.

[dvsbstrd @ Dec 16th 2008 11:15AM]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820208060

+

{insert bittorrent link for Men in Black, Da Vinci Code, or Thriller here}

=

Superior

[bandigolo @ Dec 16th 2008 11:36AM]

Why do these companies even make 1-4GB sticks anymore?

Oh, that's right. So they can keep prices of higher-capacity offerings artificially high.

[andy @ Dec 16th 2008 11:47AM]

Sony is more interested in locking you into their latest ripoff scheme than they are in selling you a compelling product. When will consumers learn?

[Haro! @ Dec 16th 2008 1:39PM]

Honestly, I'd get the Thriller one if it weren't for the fact that the 2GB one is black and green.

[bradwjensen @ Dec 16th 2008 1:48PM]

Do the songs come in non-DRM-ed FLAC?

[hectors92 @ Dec 16th 2008 3:43PM]

hahaha..haha.. you are joking aren't you? this is sony you're talking about.

[Tam @ Dec 16th 2008 3:23PM]

Since obviously they're marketing to those who want to keep a physical copy of the movie, what would be awesome is if they could sell movies for about $15 on read-only media with around 4-8 GB capacity...

Looks like more clueless death throes as Sony continues to circle the drain.

[Professor STFU @ Dec 17th 2008 8:10AM]

Here are two things I don't like:

1/ Sony
2/ RIAA

Thanks, bye

[Mark @ Dec 27th 2008 8:48AM]

One thing I have learned is that there are some very smart people that work for these companies, don't under estimate their ability to understand things. Blu-ray DVD players are expensive and missed their opportunity to go mainstream. The major expense is the drives. Net Flix and Blockbuster are going on-demand, so are many other makers of DVD players by incorporating a CAT5 connector right into the player with the software built in. Current models up-convert to 1080p and are cheap. If you supply a HD video via a USB or CAT5 connection than the drive is not needed.

Between DivX, USB, and video on-demand Blu-ray is dead. I play all my movies from my USB pocket drive or a flash drive in DivX format and the picture quality is great. Is it high def? Depends on the original source and how I obtained it. Rip a Blu-ray movie to your computer, play it back via USB connection and you have no need for a stand alone player that costs $250. There are many websites that provide HD content for downloading as well. A Blu-ray drive for my computer was $89 and with that I am able to buy inexpensive DVD players that play at 1080p (provided the content is in high def). Most people could afford only one Blu-ray DVD player, but may have more than one HDTV. Up-converting DVD players pass the signal through and give you HDTV on the cheap.

Western Digital recently released a box that does this very same thing for $129, and all it does is provide a HDMI output and USB connectors, passing HD content to your TV. That very same capability is now in cheap DVD players, so which company really missed the mark? I would say Western Digital is late to the game with a product that has no useful purpose when a $59 DVD player that up-converts, plays DivX, and has a USB connector does it all.