RealNetworks was forced to temporarily stop the sales of their RealDVD software, due to the legal action initiated by the movie industry. “Due to recent legal action taken by the Hollywood movie studios against us, RealDVD is temporarily unavailable. 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” reads a notice posted on RealDVD.com.

Real Networks unveiled in early September its RealDVD software, which is able to make an exact copy of a copy-protected DVD and then add another DRM layer for easing industry concerns about piracy.

Subsequently, the ripped DVDs can be played back using Real's software on any computer running Microsoft Windows. Only one computer can have a copy of a specific DVD, and to transfer the ripped DVD to other computers, users have to buy additional licenses of the software, which come at a discount.

The whole idea is to give users a more convenient way of storing and playing their collection of DVDs, without having to actually carry around the physical discs. The downside is that RealDVD makes exact copies of the discs, without adding newer, more powerful compression, which means that each DVD will take at least 4GB for single layer and up to 8GB for double layer discs.

On September 30, the MPAA filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles, claiming that RealDVD violates the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. The lawsuit asks for damages and injunctive relief against its maker, RealNetworks. A temporary injunction was issued on Friday and RealNetworks stopped the sales.

Earlier this month, Greg Goeckner, executive vice president and general counsel for the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), stated that RealDVD should be called StealDVD, since it clearly both violated the law and burned some bridges between America’s moviemakers and the technology community.

The other companies that have filed the legal action against RealNetworks are Paramount Pictures, Twentieth Century Fox, Universal Studios, Warner Brothers, Columbia Pictures, the Walt Disney Company and Sony, all of which are now trying to bar sales of the copying software.

Meanwhile, RealNetworks filed its own preemptive suit against the Motion Picture Association of America Inc. (MPAA) arguing that its software was protected under the "fair use" statutes of U.S. copyright law.