As I <a href="http://www.scotlandsoftware.com/blog/?post=/movies/johnny_english.html">mentioned previously</a>, I 
saw the movie Johnny English recently. Today, I bought the soundtrack CD and also visited the 
<a href="http://www.johnnyenglishthemovie.com/">website</a>, and was 
pleased to discover that they exhibit many of the hallmarks of good movie tie-ins.

Specifically:

• The site offers desktop pictures (“wallpaper”, if you must) in sizes greater than 1024x768, as well as the usual 800x600 and 1024x768 itself.
   
• The site includes audio clips from the movie. I like that.
   
• The site offers a Mac OS X-specific screensaver, as well as Windows and classic Mac OS ones. (Admittedly, I couldn’t get the OS X screensaver to work, but you have to give them credit for trying).
   
• The soundtrack really is the soundtrack; it includes both songs and score from the movie, in proper order. This is incredibly important!
   
• The soundtrack is not copy-protected. I don’t trust protected CDs in my hifi equipment, and certainly not in my PowerBook.
   
• And quite probably more.

 



Other movies' tie-in sites/soundtracks would do well to emulate the positive points mentioned above.