Sean Parker, best known for founding Napster and getting in early on Facebook, has a strange new line of work. The entrepreneur has a startup that's meant to let you watch new-release movies in the comfort of your own home, in return for a small fortune.
Obviously, the only way Parker is ever going to persuade a movie exec to let him do digital rentals of brand-new movies is with a bunch of anti-piracy features. So, a man whose piracy-enabling software probably caused DRM to become popular is now thinking of crafty ways to prevent piracy.
Parker's startup, which has yet to launch, is called Screening Room. The basic concept is you'd pay $50 to stream a movie the same time it came out in theaters. The idea is that rather than paying $40 for four movie tickets, then buying popcorn, you'd just invite a couple friends over, and stream the movie on your couch instead...