UltraViolet Shutting Down on July 31, 2019

[p w]

Originally Posted by FrodoBagginz

FandangoNow was formerly MGO, I think.

yup: mgo + flixster usa became fandangonow
https://variety.com/2016/digital/new...or-1201692324/
https://variety.com/2016/digital/new...er-1201708444/

Originally Posted by curtishd

Just trying to understand:
I have an UV account with one other person and both of us have full access and both linked to Vudu and MA. What happens after July 31st? Will we both have all the movies?

any uv title should still be in both of your accounts after july 31st. ma titles should also remain in both of your accounts and available on all ma services. while uv only titles will become vudu only titles or fandangonow only titles - until such time as those studios join MA.

so between now and then, do not unlink your uv account. any uv or ma titles should take care of themselves. now, that being said, i got burnt by the MA bug last year where i lost 1/3 of my library for about 75 days. so i am keeping track of my title count on vudu, uv, and ma. i even made a text file of all film titles i own on uvvu from any provider not named vudu (you can filter your results by provider on uvvu).

[crackedknee]

Originally Posted by p w

there were more: cinemanow, mgo, flixster, targetticket, vudu, sonypictures, paramount movies, barnes and noble (nook), kaleidescape and i might have forgotten one or two..

Sony, Paramount etc were studio sites, they weren't full-blown viewing services where you could really view anything like CN, FN, Vudu, and Flixster that you could find any any device (Samsung, Sony, Roku). And yes, M-Go became FN. So CN, FN, Vudu, and Flixster are the four I meant.

Targetticket was before my time, so not sure about that one (how well it worked), also never heard of Barnes and Noble being a thing with UV. I have never seen Kaleidoscope around as a service anywhere, at least certainly not like those four. Fios was an option on my Samsung device and I considered connecting it to UV, but it would not work on my device, and I never saw it again on any other device that I had (i.e. Roku).

[Alan Gordon]

Originally Posted by TheDean

Right. I keep forgetting some places gave 4K and some don't. But with pretty much only Paramount doing UV it doesn't seem like a problem.

WB, Sony, Paramount, and of course older Lionsgate titles are still UV.

Originally Posted by TheDean

I thought that family sharing ended over a year ago.

As stated by someone else, people already sharing were grandfathered in.

[DaBargainHunta]

Originally Posted by rdodolak

Just received this email from Vudu:

I got that too.

I'm honestly not too worried.

Other than Cinemanow screwing me out of movies while they were still around (all free crap though, so it doesn't matter), I've never had any real issues with digital. I'm not a huge digital consumer compared to some though.

Even the 1-2 movies I had in Flixster survived its demise.

My only real concern is all the codes I've been too lazy to redeem yet.

[MachoKing]

From Vudu e-mail
You currently have an UltraViolet Library connected to your Vudu account, and all of the titles you have in your Vudu account today will continue to be accessible in your Vudu account up to and after UltraViolet shuts down.

To ensure continued access to your titles beyond UltraViolet shutdown, please do not unlink your UltraViolet account from Vudu.

[p w]

Originally Posted by crackedknee

Targetticket was before my time, so not sure about that one (how well it worked), also never heard of Barnes and Noble being a thing with UV. I have never seen Kaleidoscope around as a service anywhere, at least certainly not like those four.

Targeticket wasn't bad. It actually could have stood a chance to break out. The UI was responsive, even back in 2013. However about the time it launched, target got burned by a credit card breach and nobody wanted to give target their credit card information in 2013/4.

Barnes and Noble wanted to use UV on their Nook tablet in 2012/3. But the partnership with microsoft didn't exactly work out. Eventually they dropped out of UV. You can still find a leftover link to their old attempt here

personal favorite of the uv provider horror stories, cinemanow. bought by the same billionaire that owns filmon they pulled the plug on cinemanow not long after buying it. no warning, just turned it off. you could actually sideload the program on devices for a few weeks after it closed and still d2d titles into uvvu.

as for kaleidescape, highend home entertainment systems and installations. not for the bestbuy/walmart/target crowd. they dropped out of uv around the ma launch i believe, might have been sooner. amounted to they went with apple in the streaming choice.
https://www.kaleidescape.com/

[TheDZA]

Just remember for anyone concerned, Vudu and the others don't want to see anyone lose content. They want you to continue using their services with trust. The last thing they want is people losing half their collections and not visit their services any longer. They're just businesses and their bottom line depends on people's trust that their purchases will remain.

[jay166]

I can't believe no one has even mentioned the real "worst part" about all this:

The fact that so many Blu-ray purchases over the years will now have REDUNDANT Ultraviolent banner art tainting the covers of so many movie I have bought.

Perhaps it was more of an intrusive issue here in Australia than other countries...

Originally Posted by Mobe1969

Hah, just amazing. I'm honestly not surprised. I'm Australian, and 99% of all of our useless digital codes that come with blu rays are ultraviolet - but in australia there is not a SINGLE decent service for it or a proper device that you can stream properly on home theater gear. I think there were three providers at one stage, then down to one. I only tested one title, and that provider shut down and it never showed anywhere else. The only fans are small screen movie watchers.

I hope they are fully dead in Australia as well and they will then have a real service that is of use for home entertainment gear users, not mobile device BS.

Heck, the Australian Ultraviolet sight still links to flixster as a provider! It takes you to a 404 web page!

Agreed completely - UV was such a waste of time in Australia. I redeemed everything I have/had through Flixster, but most of the movies on there ended up being in SD anyway! I think it could connect to a Chromecast on the teev, but what the hell is the point of watching is SD anyway?!?!

The end result for us; those movies redeemed on Flixster will be viewable as long as the app continues to work; eventually it will fail anyway because the creators haven't updated the app work with new phone/tablet software, so it will become faulty and the those movies will be lost to the sands of time. What a waste of time!

Not that it matters, but we can't even see AUS redeemed titles in o'seas UV providers like Vudu because of region locking! So they will be truly lost!

It was a messy system that never worked. What a waste of time.

Perhaps Movies Anywhere will launch in Australia - the cross-platform connection between providers works much better, not that there are any digital providers other than iTunes down here. I guess there really isn't that much of a market for it.

[p w]

Originally Posted by jay166

Perhaps Movies Anywhere will launch in Australia - the cross-platform connection between providers works much better, not that there are any digital providers other than iTunes down here. I guess there really isn't that much of a market for it.

it's possible that google play will be rolled into youtube at some point. there have been rumors and little blurbs about the possibility since 2017. with google its hard to know when they will do something though. but if ma via google play got a nice ui upgrade into youtube (you can already play ma films there inside the usa but its a bit of a pain) - maybe ma could expand worldwide on youtube's back. hard to say what the next 2 years will bring, just that the rest of the world needs some form of MA because uv/flixster aint going to be the answer.

[rdodolak]

Originally Posted by p w

personal favorite of the uv provider horror stories, cinemanow. bought by the same billionaire that owns filmon they pulled the plug on cinemanow not long after buying it. no warning, just turned it off. you could actually sideload the program on devices for a few weeks after it closed and still d2d titles into uvvu.

That's good info since they screwed me out of my remaining balance.

[crackedknee]

Originally Posted by p w

personal favorite of the uv provider horror stories, cinemanow. bought by the same billionaire that owns filmon they pulled the plug on cinemanow not long after buying it. no warning, just turned it off. you could actually sideload the program on devices for a few weeks after it closed and still d2d titles into uvvu.

Originally Posted by rdodolak

That's good info since they screwed me out of my remaining balance.

I remember though people knowing CN was going to cease operations, just not exactly when. So it was a race to use up credits that people had before that unknown date.

However, when it did happen, it happened without any warning announcement whatsoever. One day it worked, the next day did not work.

[ITDEFX101]

Originally Posted by DaBargainHunta

I got that too.

I'm honestly not too worried.

Other than Cinemanow screwing me out of movies while they were still around (all free crap though, so it doesn't matter), I've never had any real issues with digital. I'm not a huge digital consumer compared to some though.

Even the 1-2 movies I had in Flixster survived its demise.

My only real concern is all the codes I've been too lazy to redeem yet.

Back when the first box set for the twilight movies came out there were codes for the first few movies that worked for CN and the last one for Vudu/UV. Some how those movies went POOF from my Cinemanow account.

[rzetlin]

I got an email about the UltraViolet shut down.

This is one of the reasons why physical release is superior to video streaming.

[ITDEFX101]

I wish there was a away to tell what movie was linked to what service. All I know is that back in the day I always entered my digital copy codes into vudu even if the paper said go to their site (the studio site).

[p w]

Originally Posted by rzetlin

I got an email about the UltraViolet shut down.

This is one of the reasons why physical release is superior to video streaming.

yes because all titles are lost.. oh wait, not one digital title was.

Originally Posted by ITDEFX101

I wish there was a away to tell what movie was linked to what service. All I know is that back in the day I always entered my digital copy codes into vudu even if the paper said go to their site (the studio site).

you can at uvvu, sort the filter option by retailer in the 3rd tab/box
https://www.myuv.com/library

[Canada]

Walmart’s Vudu Warns Customers to Not Unlink UltraViolet Accounts Ahead of Shutdown

[steve_dave]

Originally Posted by rzetlin

I got an email about the UltraViolet shut down.

This is one of the reasons why physical release is superior to video streaming.

And yet, you got an email from Ultraviolet so you did use this at some point. And streaming still isn’t dead. It is thriving for music although the movie studios are actively doing thier best to kill it... Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime, DC Universe, CBS All-Access are the cockroaches avoiding the feet of Hollywood executives who won’t move foward with customer trends.

[shinobipopcorn]

Originally Posted by Undeadcow

Go with iTunes when possible if a title is Movies Anywhere eligible (searchable on MA) because iTunes gives free UHD upgrades (see 4ksheet.com for specific titles) and ports everywhere by MA.
Otherwise go with your platform.of choice.
Avoid redeeming directly into Movies Anywhere when possible because that will give you only MA rights and not rights primarily with the vendor (so if MA goes your license isnt attached to a platform). For example if you redeem with a vendor that title sticks with the vendor even if MA is disconnected rather than depending on MA link (vendor redeems give both).
Ensure the redemption vendor has highest quality rights for a title. For example if they dont host UHD on a 4K code it will downgrade your code. See 4ksheet for UHD redeems.
Expiration dates are often extended so ignore those.
Paramount, HBO, and maybe some older Universal codes redeem into both Vudu and iTunes (multiple redeem) so use or sell both portions.
Personally I prefer Vudu but your mileage may vary.

I wondered if that might work. Went back and got 2 of the 3 Star Treks in my Vudu account. The first was a CD so no-go.

[K i r a]

Sucks for people who have a shared UV, but VUDU talks that any movie in your VUDU library ported from UV will remain in VUDU after the closure makes me feel more at ease about it all.

[TheDean]

Originally Posted by Alan Gordon

WB, Sony, Paramount, and of course older Lionsgate titles are still UV.



As stated by someone else, people already sharing were grandfathered in.

I meant UV only non MA participants. Thats why I only mentioned Paramount. I do kind of forget old Lionsgate movies are UV.