The digital-content landscape could look very different in the months ahead if a group of more than 20 companies has its way.
The Digital Entertainment Content Ecosystem (DECE), a consortium that includes seemingly all the major players except Apple, officially announced Monday plans to define and build a new digital-media framework using industry standards. The goal is to allow consumers to acquire and play content across a wide range of services and devices.
The DECE is anchored by Alcatel-Lucent, Best Buy, Cisco, Comcast, Fox Entertainment Group, HP, Intel, Lionsgate, Microsoft, NBC Universal, Paramount Pictures, Philips, Sony, Toshiba, VeriSign and Warner Bros. The consortium hopes to clarify what it calls growing consumer confusion about buying, downloading and playing digital content.
A Laundry List of Promises
“This is great news for consumers hungry for access to a wider array of digital content they can enjoy on any device they own. We formed this consortium to give consumers that kind of power and choice,” said Mitch Singer, president of DECE.
Singer said the group’s efforts will open the market for digital distribution with a specification that connects a wide variety of services and devices. He added that DECE is taking the lessons learned from the “buy once, play anywhere” experience that consumers have with CDs, DVDs and Blu-ray discs and applying them to digital media.
DECE is promising plenty. For starters, the group promises a licensable specification, along with a recognizable brand and logo for compliant products and services, to assure consumers that content they download will play on their devices. The group is also promising the specification will outline the hardware and software requirements for companies to follow as they define new consumer experiences.
According to the announcement, the specification will also define how consumers can view content on an assortment of devices, or even remotely. The…