You Don’t Really Own the Digital Movies You Buy
As the entertainment industry shifts its distribution strategy to let people buy or rent movies closer to—or simultaneously with—their release in theaters, you may find yourself amassing a larger digital library than you’ve had in the past. But when you buy a movie from a digital service like Amazon Prime Video or Vudu, does it really belong to you? What if you buy a song on iTunes or download one to your phone from Spotify? Are these files yours forever? If you cancel the service or, as unlikely as it may seem, one of these huge companies goes out of business, what then?
The answer is a little complex, but the short version is, no, you don’t actually own the digital media files that you purchase. This doesn’t mean you’re imminently at risk of losing every digital movie and TV show you’ve ever bought at the whim of a megacorp, but it is possible. Here’s what you need to know.
What do we mean, exactly, when we talk about owning something digital? Everybody knows—or hopefully everybody knows—that it doesn’t mean you can turn around and sell that digital item to someone else, broadcast it, or otherwise distribute it en masse. You don’t need to dig far into any terms-of-service agreement to find such actions expressly forbidden.
