Blackout Threats from the Studios

[theogeek_nola]

I'm a big advocate for cloud-based video collections, largely because I live in a house that once had a foot of Lake Pontchartrain in it and because I don't have to battle my bride for storage space with physical media. (I still have a rather large Bluray and DVD collection, but I keep most of it in a closet.) I'm not all that crazy about the fact that I'm sometimes stuck with mediocre transfers or movies in the incorrect aspect ratio in services like VUDU, though for the most part I am happy with the service.

All that being said, I get a little nervous about the "studio blackout" warnings in the terms and conditions of various Ultraviolet service providers. I don't know if you would call it a complete "blackout," but several of my VUDU/UV titles are not available at the moment on my Roku player, and I know of people with other models who have even fewer titles show up.

I was wondering what you guys who are advocates of digital video think. Is this language used by the digital video distributors just legal mumbo-jumbo to protect them in catastrophic events, or should we be legitimately worried that substantial portions of our collection (that we paid for) simply disappear into the night? (I'm not speaking about sales windows, which I know come and go.)

I just really wanted to get involved in a cloud based service in the event of another physical catastrophe like Katrina. But can I say with any confidence--can any of us--that the investment really is for the long haul?

I do, for the record, have over 1100 UV or VUDU titles (including some UV holdouts like Disney and MGM releases).