AV Magazines

It was just over a week ago that RealNetworks launched its '100% legal' DVD copying software RealDVD onto the world, but already the company has been forced to temporarily remove it from sale by US courts. Unsurprising.

One of the contributing factors could be the current legal actions by no fewer than six major Hollywood studios, all of which are suing the company and poo-pooing its claims of being a legal way to rip DVDs to your computer.

The studios - Paramount Pictures, Sony Pictures, Twentieth Century Fox, Universal, Disney Studios and Warner Bros - all claim that RealDVD simply encourages normally honest types like us to rent and copy their films instead of paying outlandish prices to buy them for good. Us? Never.

RealDVD's website has been down since 3 October, and though the message on the homepage reads with defiant confidence, we somehow doubt the studios are going to let up on this one anytime soon.

'Rest assured, we will continue to work diligently to provide you with software that allows you to make a legal copy of your DVDs for your own use'. We await the outcome with little confidence for the underdog.