DivX finds legal employment

DivX, a technology long associated with online movie piracy, has taken another step toward becoming a format for legal downloads and video-on-demand services. Broadway Television Network, which produces and distributes digital recordings of Broadway musicals, has launched a video-on-demand service at BroadwayOnline.com that uses the DivX video-compression technology. For $5.95, customers can purchase 5-day rentals of productions such as "Jekyll and Hyde: The Musical" and "Smokey Joe's Cafe." The rentals are available for $4.95 to BroadwayOnline.com Club members for the same period, after which the files become inaccessible.

Content from the Broadway Television Network is also featured on DivX.com, a recently redesigned site from DivXNetworks. That company has a similar agreement with alternative film distributor Strand Releasing. The DivX technology allows a feature film to be transferred over a high-speed Internet connection in about 30 minutes, according to the company's Web site.