Thursday, August 09, 2007
Video Download Services Need TV Connection
Blockbuster today acquired Movielink, one of the two (along with CinemaNow) most prominent video download services, and the first order of business should be a slick way to watch movies on a TV.
Research from Analyst firm The Diffusion Group reveals that download needs to be viewable on TVs for even a minority of Internet users (29%) to consider downloading movies. I'm not so sure that burning DVDs is the best way to get them onto a TV. Piracy issues (someone would eventually break any copy protection), and the time and energy waste of burning DVDs is a negative.
Michael Greeson, president of TDG says "consumers have been reluctant to purchase movie downloads because they usually require the user to watch the movie on a PC monitor, either because the PC is not networked with a TV or the digital movie file could not be burnt to a DVD and then "sneaker-netted" into the living room for TV viewing... However, given that the number of titles available for D2B (download to burn) is extremely limited in both number and quality (new releases are not included), even vendors such as CinemaNow and Movielink who offer a D2B service have found uptake to be poor."
Streaming videos in real-time won't be the best user experience, so a media server that sits by the TV (like the Apple TV) is the best idea. But there must be a wide variety of titles including first runs, they must be available for rentals at or equal to Blockbuster prices.
A Blockbuster video rental service that connects to a set-top box could be a huge winner for the company, keeping Netflix at bay and competing head on with the cable companies' video on demand services. Watch for it in 2008.
By John Gartner at 11:21 AM | Comments (0)
Subscribe to The MarketingShift Feed