Disney+ is blocking support for Dolby Vision and 3D content on its platform in 11 countries as a result of a legal ruling.
Disney+ is once again disabling Dolby Vision and 3D content in countries across Europe. This comes merely a couple of months after Disney restored these formats back in March.
The reason is due to a patent case, where US company InterDigital won a case against Disney that spans across 11 countries in the EU, leaving users in affected regions without Dolby Vision HDR or 3D content (on devices such as Apple Vision Pro).
In a press release, InterDigital explains:
The Mannheim Local Division of the Unified Patent Court (UPC) ruled that InterDigital is entitled to an injunction over Disney’s infringement of an InterDigital patent covering certain video encoding techniques related to HEVC and confirmed the validity of this patent. The UPC is a pan-European patent court which issues decisions that apply across multiple countries in the European Union (EU); here, the injunction against Disney spans 11 EU countries
The exact regions affected have not been named, but seem to include Germany, Italy, France, Finland, Denmark, and others based on user reports we’ve been able to dig up.
FlatPanelsHD, citing reader reports and their own testing, says that Dolby Vision and 3D have already vanished for users, while HDR10 and 4K remain available. The publication also notes that Disney has removed these formats from regional support pages.
This likely won’t have an impact in other parts of the world, but it’s certainly a bummer for those in affected regions. While Disney will very likely appeal the ruling, it could take quite a while for these formats to be restored, assuming Disney can even work out a deal to do so.
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