It’s tough to compete with ease of use…

I bought a season pass to watch Mad Men on iTunes. But, with my Mac out of commission, and my only working computer my EEE netbook, I’m finding that playing video with iTunes open, even if it’s the only program running, is still too intense for the processor and/or RAM. It buffers, even though the entire thing has already dfownoaded.

So I downloaded the same episode from Rapidshare. It wasn’t piracy, really, since I have already legitimately paid for the episode in DRM format. I just can’t get any use out of it that way. The .avi file that I downloaded (in less time than it took the iTunes version to download), played easily and without buffering in VLC, a free, no-frills player notable for its small footprint.

So what should AMC and similar companies do about this type of thing?

The show itself should be available as a free download, available immediatlye. That download can include commercials or other branding.

Would someone make an edited version that didn’t have the branding? Of course. But AMC could guarantee a high-quality, always-available, fully legal, guilt-free DRM-free download. And that would be enough for a lot of people to just go ahead and watch the AMC file, including myself.

Actually, I wouldn’t mind watching the commercials that AMC ran with Mad Men when it was on TV yesterday. The integration is often interesting, and ads are on the viewer’s mind, so it’s hard to look away.

Oh, well.