Tech Goes Boom

Video iPod and Ripping Your Own DVDs

Michael Gartenberg pointed out on his blog that one of the big reasons the Video iPod isn't ready is that people cannot rip their own DVDs like they can their CDs. While it is true that it is currently illegal to rip your DVDs for use on other devices, there is nothing preventing a company like apple from licensing that ability from the DVD consortium. Apple could agree to impose DRM like fairplay to the resulting files as a stipulation of the licensing.

While this arrangement wouldn't be as unrestricted as ripping your CDs, I think most people would find it an acceptable solution given that there is no currently legal way to back up your DVD movies.