Home video rental giant Blockbuster is reportedly planning to offer a set-top device that can delivery video from the Internet directly to a television. This would put Blockbuster in direct competition with products such as the Apple TV device, which has gained less-than-perfect sales since its launch, despite on-going hype. The development would also get Blockbuster ready for tougher competition ... [ read the full article ]
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The one and only thing that will get this off the ground is the brand name. Every other internet streaming box that I've come across bombed out or was lightly successful. If Blockbuster [BB] can pull this off, it may, and I stress may, catch on. Problen is, 75% on all the people I know have a 1.5 Mbps broadband connection which pretty much sucks at streaming video. Hopefully BB will find a hardware company that uses an efficient codec to accommodate these type of customers, small a customer base though it may be.
interesting thing about their greed is that through all this trauma for their company (blockbuster) they still will not get competitive with small rental outlets who will already rent you a new relase dvd for 4 bucks and less in some instances. They instead go to a no late fee policy. While that is all well and good for some advertising, it gets the movies and games out of the store for an undetermined period of time , usually up to one month, just before they charge you for the disc. smart move?
The best thing this thing will do is bomb (which it will, like ALL BB marketing ploys have) and further cut into BB's already weak market share, and hopfully put them out of business faster. The sooner the better I say.
BB is putting itself out of business with it's prices. BB stores are up to $5+ for DVD rental, while almost any new gas station convenience stores are $1.
