Photo credit Fred

I have two little boys. One is five, the other is two. DVDs have a short life in our house. It is almost impossible to keep them out of little hands. What happens to when the boys find them, esp. when the two year old handles them, is not pretty! So, if not entirely for Green reasons, I am really looking forward to the day that DVDs are no more!

DVDs are going away, you say? Indeed they are. Dematerialization ftw!

DVDs will soon go the way of the humble casette tape or even the CD – you remember CDs right? Not so long ago they were the default way to buy music, now it is online via iTunes, Amazon, etc.

Similarly, for all kinds of reasons of convenience, I see DVDs being obsolete in the not-to-distant future.

The way I see it, movies will be universally available for download. Once you purchase them online, you download/stream to watch and will get the option to store them remotely (in a virtual movie library) and/or store them locally (local backup). Should you lose your local backup, you simply re-download at no cost.

Green advantages are the obvious lack of pressing, packaging and shipping of DVDs. Non-Green advantages include not having to keep DVDs on the higher shelves away from little hands and/or wondering if that DVD you just rented from your local store will actually play when you get it home!