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UltraViolet Digital Locker Closing

History

UltraViolet was the first digital locker available to owners of digital movies and TV. They started the service back in 2011 with major studios including Warner Brothers, Sony Picture, Fox, Universal, Paramount, and Lionsgate. It was the first service to allow your digital rights to be shared between retailers like Vudu, CinemaNow, Flixster, and FandangoNow. Disney was the only major studio that did not participate.

Owners could purchase a qualifying movie or TV show and it would go to all linked retailers that participated. When it first came out, there were incentives to link your retailers by providing you with free digital movies. I know when I was linking accounts, I managed to get over a dozen free movies. I was more than a little disappointed with Disney not participating especially when they acquired Star Wars and later Marvel. Let's face it, that is more than have the blockbuster movies nowadays.

Disney waited and launched Disney Movies Anywhere in 2014 that allowed you to link your Amazon, Google, iTunes, and Vudu accounts. In October 2017, Disney rebranded this digital locker to Movies Anywhere as they were able to swing all but Paramount and Lionsgate over to their service. This was the beginning of the end for UltraViolet. FandangoNow was the first to drop support for some newer UltraViolet movies.

With all the successful studios now using Movies Anywhere instead of UltraViolet, it was no surprise to me that the service would eventually close. It should be noted that while Movies Anywhere has a much better retailer base, it still lacks this feature for TV shows that only UltraViolet provides.

January 31, 2019, UltraViolet posted they were planning to close effective July 31, 2019.

What Should You Do

If you are have a current account that is linked to retailers, UltraViolet recommends you continue to use there service (as do I). This will ensure any purchases that are UltraViolet only will continue to go to all the current retail partners. When Disney Movies Anywhere temporarily closed, all linked retailers kept a copy of my content but future content was only available in the retailer I redeemed or purchased from. I expect the same will happen with your UltraViolet purchase. All UltraViolet content will remain with all your currently linked retailers. Please read https://www.myuv.com for full details about the shutdown.

WARNING: Do not unlink retailers or delete your UltraViolet account. Doing so will prevent future purchase from syncing with other retailers and may have additional negative impact.

Future

Unfortunately, TV shows are not a priority for the Movies Anywhere digital locker and I don't believe UltraViolet's closing shows it is a profitable venture. I would like to believe this will be the push needed to get Paramount and Lionsgate into Movies Anywhere. So many series in Paramount I would like in all my digital retailers. There is always the possibility that we may see a Movies and TV Anywhere appear. I can think of some shows I would love to see that happen to but I don't expect it to happen anytime soon if ever.

What are your thoughts about UltraViolet closing? Would you like to see Movies Anywhere work with TV series? Let us know in the comments.

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