Call me old fashioned, but even in the age of the digital download, I'm still prone to heading to my local music/DVD shop or visiting the latest "clicks and mortar" establishment, spending my money, and adding to my collection of album covers, jewel cases and box sets.

While I admit that I regularly downloaded music during the original Napster era, I always looked at it as sampling a single, much like one would at a kiosk in your local music store.  Why?  Many times I actually went out and ultimately bought the full album after first being exposed to new artists online.  But as bandwidth grew and video downloads became the trend, I simply never jumped on that bandwagon. 

Music and video downloads, in my opinion, are two truly different elements.  When one would download an "unauthorized" audio track, there is the hope that the user would legally seek out the artist's catalogue either in the stores or online.  However with video, once you have the whole disc why would anyone purchase a legal copy?  I doubt the 10 minutes of outtakes, trailers and director's commentary slapped together as "Special Features" would be incentive enough.

For years I never viewed, let alone owned a downloaded or bootleg video, staying perfectly content with my collection of legally purchased movies and concert discs.  Until this past week that is.  A friend lent me a DVD movie which from first glance looked perfectly legitimate.  It was about five minutes into the movie where the audio trailed from the video and the picture would pixelate and jump.  Stopping the disc and looking at it closely, I realized that it was nothing more than a DVD-R with some incredible packaging that made it look identical to a regular cover.  Regardless, I wasn't prepared to sit through another 90 minutes of stops, skips and jumps, along with an inferior picture.  While I enjoyed the first five minutes or so of the movie, I'll make sure to rent it the next time I'm at my local video store.

After experiencing illegally downloaded videos first hand, I've concluded that those who do download videos not only open themselves up to spyware and viruses but also a truly inferior product.  If there was any upside to audio downloading, not that I am advocating it, at least the bit rate was often high and the music was of a decent quality.  To each their own, but when it comes to the latest comedy or concert DVD, you'll catch me browsing and shopping at music/movie retailers.