Intel launched their ‘Intel Insider’ service in India yesterday at a press conference in Mumbai. Intel Insider is a feature that lets users stream HD movies from content providers on the same day of the movie’s release. Insider is built into Intel’s new Sandy Bridge chips that sets up a secure layer that content providers can make use of to stream high quality videos directly to the users. In India, Intel has announced a tie-up with Hungama.com wherein the website will act as the platform from where users can stream/download Indian/foreign movies.
Intel Insider was first unveiled at CES 2011 in January and the feature quickly came under criticism for being very familiar to DRM (Digital Rights Management). Intel has defended the technology stating that all Insider does is provide an “extra layer of content protection” so that content providers (such as movie studios, distributors etc.) are willing to stream high quality content straight to the end user. However, detractors have accused Intel of hard-coding DRM into machines that come with Sandy Bridge processors and also “attempt(ing) to control what you can and can’t do with the media and hardware you’ve purchased.”
Another variant of criticism leveled at Intel Insider (at least in the U.S.) is that it would amount to monopoly if content providers such as Hulu embrace the service. If such an event happened, then only machines with Intel Sandy Bridge processors would be able to view the content, leaving machines running on AMD, VIA and older Intel chips out of the loop. However, it is unlikely that Intel would approach content providers until Sandy Bridge chips gain a major foothold in the market and it’s also a possibility that Intel could license its technology to the competition to escape monopoly accusations.
via Technology@Intel & Thinq_
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