On the Internet, a hoax can spread just as fast as a genuine news story. That’s the lesson from the bogus story published in an obscure UK business magazine yesterday that claimed Microsoft is about to unleash a new single-play DVD format.
Paul Thurrott reprinted the story without giving credit to the original source. Bink.nu picked up the story from Paul and reprinted it verbatim.
Techdirt commented on the original story, with attribution but without any fact-checking. So did John Walkenbach.
The funny part? There’s no truth to the story. None whatsoever. In fact, the original story sparked a flurry of e-mails around Microsoft as people in different groups tried to figure out where on earth this story came from. After the head-scratching stopped, a spokesmen told me, they concluded that the story was not true. “It appears to be confusing an existing feature within Windows Media DRM that allows for single-play of promotional digital material. This has been an option for content owners to use for some time for the Windows Media format – it does not apply to MPEG2 content found on DVDs.”
Downloaded content in the Windows Media format can be DRM-protected, and if the content owner wants to limit it to a specific number of plays, or to set an expiration date for the content, that’s an option, just as it is with subscription-based music services. But it’s only one of many options, and it has nothing to do with DVDs.
So, case closed. The single-play DVD format can go back to the 1990s, where it rightfully belongs.
Update: No, Virginia, there are no cheap, disposable DVDs from Microsoft in the pipeline. Get the final word from Microsoft here.
[Cross-posted at Ed Bott's Windows Expertise]
Dang… they would have been perfect for use as the restore CDs that computer makers no longer give you…
Seriously, thanks for catching this. We need someone to police this stuff. As a link blog, I don’t have the resources of factchecking every link for content validity. If enough links are coming into our aggregators with the same story (in this case, a Microsoft DVD format from LEGITIMATE sources), we’re linking to it too.
For folks cutting and pasting content to pass off as their own is just as good as spam blogging. At least give some original credit so the guy at the end of the line who first reported can get blamed when something like this happens.
yep., it’s a hoax! microsoft won’t allow any misconceptions about this…
Is it, or isn’t it?
http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=26808
Ignore my previous post please, posted in error (my error of not reading ALL the way thru and getting all the facts)