Hi all,
We are pleased to announce that Mininova is testing a new technology which allows users to download and watch licensed movies and TV shows for free. These videos will be packaged by Hyper MP technology and are going to be distributed using Mininova Content Distribution for free. The unique feature of this system is that the videos can be downloaded and played anywhere in the world (no geo-targeting), and will make use of a new in-video advertising technology.
The first beta test release for this technology trial is an amateur feature length comedy titled “Battle Therapy”. The film, produced by Australian film school students, is a wacky comedy about an unorthodox psychologist and his obsessive compulsive patients.
Make sure to check our this movie by downloading the following torrent: http://www.mininova.org/tor/2020297. The movie is packaged in a Windows executable and is free of viruses and DRM, so don’t let that deter you from downloading it. After viewing the movie, please feel free to send feedback on your experience with this technology to feedback@hypermp.com.
Please note that this first release is a trial only and it is not representative of the quality of feature length content that will follow upon the official release of the service. In order to assist in polishing the technology, all the feedback you are willing to provide will be greatly appreciated.
That’s it for now, stay tuned for more updates soon!
i’m interested. when will a linux version be out?
Good to hear! Keep up the good work!
dwpbike: never, or at least not soon. why? because linux suxx
a movie distributed in an exe?
seems prime for abuse.
no thanks, i’ll wait until someone extracts the video strips the ads and releases as an avi.
Now an online streaming option with BitTorrent DNA and Mininova is going to be the next YouTube!
awesome development, we are waiting…
Hmm why not an video format that works on the current players? A new player seems really big step to take for an average video downloader. Also Windows only.. thats a bit sad
@Jelle:
There is no existing video format that offers dynamic overlay advertisements, let alone click-able ads. This player doesn’t require an installation, it comes with the movie, which is a big advantage IMHO.
THANK YOU WILL WAIT TO SEE, THANKS ALL THE BEST SKY
yeah, let’s download 1 GiG exe’s …
In my opinion, there is only one problem: trust. Nowadays I trust mininova with my life, as I know they can be trusted. But distributing an exe file, I think that a lot of people have already learned that you should not click exes from strangers, and will not trust it. With an avi, if it ends up being a fake, it’s just a bad movie. With an exe, you never know.
You have lost my trust. The reason why people like bittorrent is that it is free from ads and can be played universally - I don’t see how I am going to be able to stream this to my tv via my ps3 or transcode it onto my ipod. You say there is no drm but:
IT IS DRM.
You are restricted to only using one video player to watch your video files. You can only watch it on one platform. You need to be connected to the internet in order to play the file. In effect, this DRM your trying to introduce is just as bad as all the rest. What happens if the HyperMV site goes down? What happens if I want to watch it on the move? What happens if I use linux?
You are also distributing this as an .exe. Once people become used to downloading and running exe’s for videos files on mininova whats to stop them from falling into a simple “download this exe for a video” trap on other websites and perhaps even on mininova itself?
For the sake of Mininova, please stop this as soon as possible. You built up a reputation of upholding the virtues of filesharing, and this is about to bring that all down.
@Crandom:
I think you’re taking this a bit too serious. If you don’t like this idea of an embedded media player, you’re probably not the person which Hyper MP tries to target. This is not meant for people who transcode videos and watch stuff on their HDTV box, it’s for the regular BT user who wants to watch a movie without worrying about codecs, download speeds (remember: Mininova CD provides the bandwidth), etc.
The description clearly states that the .exe is not a trojan, add up that it’s a CD torrent and this should be pretty clear.
And remember: you’re not forced to download this, neither will it replace an existing feature. If you don’t like it, don’t use it: it’s that simple
have to agree…..distribution as an exe is just asking for trouble…not to mention, turning away Macs and Linux….why bother…..just do and avi or mov like everyone else and enjoy the result
This is a no go, bad idea, and I wont be downloading it.
It’s not ‘the Bit Torrent’ way, which to my mind is about freedom.
I think the .exe might be helpful to some people but if a virus dose somehow get into one on the files people might not trust mininova anymore. So far its been a no risk download with avi but anything could happen with exe
Not a chance I am going to download an .exe from you or anyone else. Are you guys nuts? This is a tremendously stupid idea.
can you make this videos work with boxee? then I’m interested. Otherwise, you’re just creating yet another program that can only play videos from a certain source.
Yeah, when’s a Linux version going to be out?
Thanks, now when my non-geeky friends hear about how movies are in EXE, I’ll have that many more computers to fix.
USERS ARE DUMB ENOUGH ON THEIR OWN, DON’T HELP THEM RUNNING UNVERIFIED EXEs IS SAFE.
“The description clearly states that the .exe is not a trojan” - Neik
You just made me lose faith in humanity. You, and the woman who sent $400,000 to a Nigerian 419 scammer because “he said he was a family member, and even used my first name”.
@Niek: I generally like the idea of being able to distribute movies for free and finance it with clickable overlay ads. But distributing it as an .exe file? come on!
You did not address Crandoms points. The point is not that we don’t trust the files since they’re distributed by Mininova. But as you said.. you’re targeting the average user. Now is they average user supposed to learn “exe files are generally bad, but if you get them from mininova it is okay.”? This is dangerous. And you shouldn’t have to trust Mininova.
I admit I’m not sure if there is any other way to get this done, but distributing huge .exe files can’t be it. If you want to do it the DRM way, offer a downloadable player (or just include it with the torrent) and have the movies in a format only playable by this player. Later on you could offer an option to “buy” the movie, so that the player decrypts the file into a DRM-free format. This way you would service both.. the average user and the geek complaining about DRM.
Stupid idea. Really makes me think differently about mininova now…
@Niek.
To address the following comment, and I quote:
“it’s for the regular BT user who wants to watch a movie without worrying about codecs”
VLC takes care of all that. On *nix and windows.
But honestly? An .EXE, with ads? Over my dead body.
Put me down as no.
I’ll take your word for it that your initial offering might be virus/trojan free, but I just won’t trust an exe and the minute you start pulling bait and switches adding more crap to the exes and you know you will, we know you will, well then you’ll loose what little cred you have left.
This is a jackass move and very disappointing. Anyone who tangles with exes is asking for trouble.
I trust this and future releases not to be trojans, but that isn’t the problem. The problem is this is just DRM under the guise of openness. I am fine with ads; in fact I would download an ad-laden version rather than an ad-free version if I knew that the ads supported the creator of the content. But I cannot stand for DRM.
And the award for most stupid idea ever goes to…
No linux/mac support AND it’s an EXE file. FFS people you are asking to be pwned. The EXE file is DRM. These idiots are saying that we give you the right to watch the movie, as long as you can execute any code that we will give you on the platform that we give you the right to do this on (Windows only).
Sounds like those dialers from 90’s Internet. You CAN go look at porn, as long as you let us disconnect from your ISP and start calling eastern europe.
Great to hear its a Fully sick Australian film!
interested , good work they are doing. viva
Downloaded to test it out and upon opening the executable, I get error stating the executable has generated errors and will be closed by Windows. Test fails for me.
Also, next time it would be a little wiser to use a short film for initial trial, so that more people would be inclined to try it out.
Interesting progress Mininova. P2P video distribution is the next big step for bittorrent.
well guys its not like you have to download it if you don’t want to. The fact that mininova is trying to work with companies here should show you some improvement, should it not?
Wouldn’t you like to watch all these films knowing your not breaking the law?
an exe file for a movie??
very bad idea, drm is much better of this crap
nice website…………..
this is my favarate websiteeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
thanksssss
How long will it take before someone spoofs this and inserts a malicious exe in place of the movie? It is just asking for trouble, as well as alienating mac and unix users.
If the goal is to insert ads into the file then surely you realize they will be stripped out very quickly. Your best bet is to release the films as AVIs and make sure you have enough hi bandwidth servers to make sure yours it the preferred source for the movie.
Or even better use one of the torrent streaming technologies that are out there and because you are the torrent/stream origin the ads will be in place in the stream.
I am just curious, who told you this was a good idea?
I would have to agree with most of the comments here, .exe for movies you guys are nuts.
IT IS THE SECOND TIME THAT I AM HERE, I HAVE DOWNLOADED AND WHEN OPEN … HAD TO CLOSE BECAUSE IT HAS A TROJAN…….WHY……
BY THE WAY THE MININOVA PAGE ALL DAY TODAY THOSE NOT OPEN …. WHY IS THERE A PROBLEM …. PLEASE HELP I LOVE THIS SITE. THANKS
SKY
Theres alot of request for linux but what about mac. No problems on mac with exe because mac dosent run it. If there was some way to stream avi then it might work
Cool Mininova, go ahead and rock with innovative technology.
stupid idea man , but i guess you already now that by now
This an excellent idea done badly…
What they should do is release a new player and maybe a new format(open standards ofcourse)so people dont have to download an exe everytime. The format can contain tagging information such as the targeted audience so that the ads can be tailored appropriately and dynamically.I wouldnt even mind geolocation-based ads to increase relevance as long as no personally identifiable information is stored.(To those paranoid of privacy this would be no more intrusive than say gmail or google adwords)All they have to watch out for is to not make the ads to intrusive to the viewing experience.
Come on people…. a system similar this could mean we can get premium content free. That would mean no longer having to download stuff like heroes or prison break illegaly off torrents.
The future of screwing up viewable content has just begun…
@Niek:
Can I just verify (I may have been slightly over zealous on my previous comment) what will happen if your local player cannot connect to the internet when you are playing the movie; are you
1. Unable to watch the movie?
2. Able to watch the movie but without ads or
3. Are there inbuilt ads that play without an internet connection?
As long as it is distributed as an open format (and not .exe’s) and people am able to watch it without fear of being unable to do so in the future, this could be a relatively good idea. Even though I personally would be adverse to downloading anything ad based there are numerous people who aren’t and these people could help build up this system.
I suppose that, on reflection, this could help if you sign up many content distributers who are making money through your site in your upcoming court case against BREIN (all the luck to you for that anyway). If we have to look critically, if this ad based system proves to save mininova, it may be a necessary evil.
Do it the Hulu way, the NORMAL way. You watch it for a while, fade out and then, oh my, an ad. 30 seconds and off with the content again. It’s that simple. And .exe it’s just annoying. You can’t burn it to watch it later on a dvd. It’s so not flexible.
how do i get a tourent
The future of screwing up viewable content has just begun…
Doomed to fail.
Sam
And people wonder why DRM continues to fail.
You have the ability and audience to try forward thinking directions and this is what you come up with.
I’m all for viewing content legally but come on.
Not a chance.
You’ll never catch me downloading an .exe ever. “This doesn’t contain a Trojan” means nothing.
This is a BAD idea.
“Never have to worry about codecs” - I’ve NEVER had to worry about codecs
hi
Do we really have a choice?
mini nova
keep up the good work
mini nova espanl
Mininova Dont Leave U Alone in the Dark Pleasee
We need You . You rock. Have a Good Work. See You. BYE
dont do it leave alone. dumb idea
Never will I download a movie in an .exe file.
Bit mistake you’re doing, guys.
The future of screwing up viewable content has just begun…
If i have to watch it on a PC, it’ll never catch on.
When people download movies, unless they’re crazy or lazy, they watch it on a DVD, stand alone divx player, or some form or streaming media player.
This idea, as far as i understand it, makes it unlikely to be portable to existing devies, and therefore, sucks ballz.
Good to hear! Keep up the good work!
im trying to download shaolin soccer but it keeps coming like an eror
This is a bad idea on top of a bad idea. Lets get all the noobs and non tech’s downloading exe’s and lure them into a false sence of security so that the virus spreading dorks of the world have an even easier time of it. Talk about being out of touch with it’s audience, I download TV rather than watch it on free to air DTV because there are no ads in the downloads. Lets call it what it is “Mininova and Hyper MP testing new DRM”, the sneeky kind that tries to hide it’s real self and prey on the ignorance of most of the Internet users.
I agree with everyone that feels that this is a good idea that has been executed in a (very) bad way. No DRM would mean that I could play this file anywhere if I felt like it, on any platform, using any hardware, if I want to stream media to my PS3 I should be able to. Also, to everyone that says “who cares if Linux users can’t use .exe files” guess what, the PS3 is running a version of Linux, and every modern Mac computer also has foundations based on Unix. Anyways, good work on trying to develop a good idea, but next time consider the growing *nix, and Mac community and don’t bother with restricted, encoded, Windows based nonsense.
dont understand why i need to do all these………….
??????
hello evry body
that’s good i like that
Son of a gun! .exe for a movie?! the world gone nutz or what!
i don’t think you people ever considered the flexibility of viewing the movie on other systems? just windows? not only windows is required, but windows PLUS internet connection! most likly a broadband connection for the streaming
It would have been better if they released their own player..and perhaps make different versions of it for linux/mac and a mobile version would cool too…but having an exe for a movie is totally..stupid..in the world we live in..trust is a hard thing!
and come to think of it, streaming the video in an exe..the question is..while streaming, where does the data of the streamed video really go? i mean..it’s gotta be somewhere on your PC,probably Application Data folder,that way you could find the video and copy it somewhere and convert it to a reasonable format..but what codec will the streamed content be? or how is the quality of it…
another thing they could do is,assuming that they could make their own player and perhaps some custom codec or something like that, the player is able to decode the movie into a more flexiable format after watching the movie in its original format atleast once..that way everyone is happy!
We Linux(Ubuntu) users could atleast hope it would work under Wine(windows emulation)..this way we don’t have to worry about the exe being dangerous and have it running under linux
and yeah..Video codecs is the least of my concern..as long as there is VLC media player! wish they had a mobile version XD
*.exe because of the ads so the viewer can click on them, this is not a really good idea, it scares a lot of people.
to administrators
we need xxx movies in your good site
please…
http://www.lankanew.tk
http://www.lankanew.tk
new sex site….
LOL I know another site who did something similar to this, thinking they were doing something good.
they lost about 60% of the users in 1 week
There are so many alternatives to mininova, you’d just sign your own death.
attempts the whole idea of freedom and flexibility. Furthermore Ads? what the hell… the ship is sinking, hope this kind of action is isolated.
Anyway, just my idea.
c de la merde
sdfgazdf
no no no never think about it to change it. The way it is great
Looks like the Mininove site is already dying.
The .exe curse has begun.
RIP.
An executable that IS the movie instead of providing an application that uses different extensions for its movie is an awful idea; it makes your average computer user more trusting of running an .exe and limits your distribution to Windows markets only. And virii writers will absolutely exploit this trend if downloading movies as .exes becomes standard. Your average computer user needs to be less trusting of executable code and not more trusting! A lot of people that know about and use Mininova are already capable of doing video encoding themselves. We don’t need another format, especially one that begs to be exploited.
Not a good idea in my opinion. Are you going to be phasing away from avis? If so, I’m uninstalling my toolbar and moving on.
Yo dudes…
What tha f… is this s… I am a tech guy who helps other people with there PCs, and I wonder…..
Why are you trying to implement .exe files in our daily movie watching???
When I help people with their computers (mostly friends who ONLY watch movies and listen to music) I always tell them:
If you want your computer to work a LONG time, well:
DO NOT INSTALL or ACCEPT ANY .EXE files..
The only way to get a virus (mostly, that is) is if you click on an infested .EXE
Why would one of the best sites on the web try to mess with that, is there only morons working there… Do you not have any education or computer experience???? What is your problem…
When I read about this (and the comments here) I kept wondering why it hadent been stopped before I saw it?? I should never have seen this… Please just remove the whole crap before more people start to think ill of you..
PS: I will find a new .torrent source if you keep this bull…. up. THIS IS BAD.. I like legal stuff, but I prefer illegal and smart to legal and idiotic.
I’ll _never_ test something like that.
Thank you very much for trying to do something new. It seems that people like to complain and few are willing to actually offer a better alternative.
Lol.. i have to say that i’m agree with NorwayASSMAN comment. If they do that i’ll just find another free torrent page.
bye everybody!!! been nice knowing you all but i’m outa here for good ,just thinking about this exe crap makes the hairs stand up on my neck as far as i’m concerned minova has just bit the dust ,,,
@Niek ever heard of flash? You could package the video in a swf which would make it cross platform too.
it is so good sute and tenks foor evrything
Niek
Count me out.
I don’t like it, I will not use it: it’s that simple
I for one (and looking at the previous posts will not be alone) will be looking elsewhere for my movie files in future…
As if the world needs more dodgy exe’s and even more ad’s rammed down their throats.
Its the advertising BS that’s killing the net.
Thanks! But NO THANKS!!!
well i i wish you try that what ever your trying to do on a dummy site… not on your actual site before hand…
and your site is being neglected… ahhh… this is the best site i had for downloading… now its been days your site is not working properlly… come on guys!!!
hey
i’s a very good idea &
i do agree with bobbert
flash is a great application why u don’t use it
i personly don’t trust exe
YES THIS IS NEW.. And I for one is not against trying new things,… but….. Well many people have tried new things before…
The question is if the new thing acctually is any good, if its at all new (maby its just an old idea with a new finish to it)…
Remember not all new things are good (remember Britney Spears or word war 1, it was a new thing til the second war, but not an very good idea)
This idea is also old, like the Apple DRM products… With this its easier to just buy movies from a store.. Then you at least can rip them to any media (Legal as long as you just view the thing at one place at a time and dont redistribute the thing) This is also the reason why .torrent is legal at all.
So the new idea is that we can get LEGAL movies from the net……or… we can get free crap from people who add ads to it…
Whats new??? Nothing.. its just an OLD IDEA with a new wrapper that is not all that good.. Lets face it, its a wrapper of bad ads with dieting products etc… Personally I get enough ads from every other page on the net, TV, the cinema, the street and every where else…
A good idea is to have perfect rips with a high bandwidth server and just sell them.. Then you could substract the cost of producing DVDs and covers from the sales price and we could buy REALLY CHEAP movies and abesloutely legal..
Well maybe this isnt a good idea, but its better than having to watch more ads..
Personally I hate them ads.. Bilboards, tv commercials, the web… Where is it going to stop???????
By the way.. The flash idea sounds better than much other crap
Mininova… what the hell are you playing at, distributing EXE’s????? come on guys and gals, whoever sold you on this idea needs taking behind the toolshed for a good ol’ fashioned ass-whooping. I’m 70yr old, and understand paying for bandwith ect ect but come on guys…. how long is it gonna be till some 18yr old hacker breaks the code and installs a virus or something worse…
Its not the fact i dont like paying for stuff,
A) its too expensive
B) some of it aint worth buying
I’d rather spend 2 days d/l a movie, then IF i like i go and spend at cinema (£7.50 JUST FOR THE TICKET!!) then of course the popcorn / drink ect ect… then i could always go and buy the dvd and merchandise.
You get better choice here, better service and its cheaper!!!
DONT DONT DONT go the exe route as someone already said, you’ve signed your own death warrant.
from a computer savy 70 yr old!
This is a dangerous move. Not even my mother trusts foreign exe’s. You will lose a lot of hardcore followers from this, as their trust has been sidestepped. Don’t tell me you forgot about the potential for Trojans to be injected into the slipstream…
So why I should watch this over Hulu?
And isn’t the number of OSX users growing rather quickly?
Painful indeed.
How long till we see infected video files (in an .exe)? Has it already happened?
Wait..there is no format for playing video and embedding clickable ads? Umn, Flash Media? I mean Adobe AIR can play flash media, you can embed your ads, its multiplatform, and YOUR NOT RUNNING MACHINE CODE!
Not only am i worried that someone will spoof the machine code download, im worried that an advertising company, NOT a software company, will write easily exploitable code, they will send someone else’s libraries along for the ride with a bunch of maleware, or i might end up with a dozen or so toolbars.
there are more than a dozen better ways of doing this. the three major media companies (Microsoft, Apple, and ahem..Real) all have DRM with embeddable ads.
Dont push horrid practices on people. Even entertaining this is risking peoples machines.
Downloading .exe = Noobs getting infected = more work for I.T guy = more money
Wont get past trial stages…
Wierd approach guys, think of this one while reading the paper on the toilet??
cool and i think this sort of piracy, if am not wrong but 4 the majority who can not afford to buy and hv access to internet, this a welcomed news
I really cant understand why anyone would want this. The fact that some people actually do want this scares the bajesus out of me. Those are the kinds of people who have hundreds of Trojans on their machines, feeding into worldwide bot nets. the types of bot nets the MPAA pays for to bring down torrent trackers (Google “mediadefender vs. Revision3″).
Treat executables from torrent sites like attachments in emails. If the poster says “No Viruses”, assume it has every known virus in it. If an advertising company wants to run code on your machine, which this is, assume its to track your machine.
Assume nefarious causes, and you will be safe. Assume all pure causes, and your damned.
And when it comes out that the only way to remove crapware installed by this or similar systems is to nuke your installation from orbit (its the only way to be sure), dont come to the people that warned you against it looking for help.
I don’t trust exe files and I watch downloaded shows on my DVD player/TV and almost never on the computer. But good luck with the project.
I absolutely salute the idea of legal sharing and am not bothered watching a couple of ads in return. After all, folks, if we like a show we should support the creators/artists.
you speak french please
I’m seeing the same thing repeated in the comments: the use of EXE is bad. There’s tons of virii infected EXE files on Mininova as it is so nobody is going to trust it.
I’m all for the use of legal distribution, but it has to be done right to succeed. Don’t give the illegal distributors reason to keep releasing their material. This is still in the early stages and there’s time to change things.
People have their own favored players and would like the freedom to use them. Aside from different operating systems, the speed and processing capabilities of machines can vary so one program might not work as well on one machine as another. And if you’re using Windows Media for your videos, (which has the advantage of remote control for those who have one with their TV card) then an EXE file is useless.
It would be better to use a more standard format like AVI but to embed the ads directly into the video either as pop-up headers and footers or as ad breaks in the video. If you make the ad breaks no longer than 30sec people won’t bother to FF past them. 15sec is even better; in trying to FF one can spend even longer than that finding where the show resumes. The problem with conventional TV is that it’s five minutes of show and five minutes of ads; when the ads end one often forgets what’s going on in the show.
This could work ok if the format is changed from .exe
Put the ads inside a normal video file, as long as they are not too frequent then it will be worthwhile to some viewers.
an exe can be open an thing can be added and can open a back door in any firewall 2 allowed what ever he or she wants and the ones doing the ads can do this or 1 of us
please fix the server(s) first.