Slashdot Mirror
Leaked Screenshots Show Netflix Downloads
Mike1024 writes "US DVDs-by-post company Netflix appears to be planning a service that will let users download movies over the internet. Hackingnetflix.com has some accidentally-revealed screenshots, and the Netflix jobs page includes a product manager position, saying "The Electronic Delivery Service (EDS) will augment Netflix's current DVD delivery model with high quality movies delivered to consumers' home TVs through the Internet, on a subscription basis". Apple's iTunes demonstrated many people are willing to live with some DRM and hardware/vendor lock-in."
As long as it's better than http://www.cinemanow.com/ Nothing worse than watching bad movies AND having to buffer every 5 minutes.
It's a screenshot of a login box. Exciting stuff.
This really shouldn't come as much of a surprise to anyone, since it was announced last fall that Tivo and Netflix had worked out some sort of agreement for downloadable movies...
I'll turn into a supernova and burn up everything. Well I'll turn into a black little hole and you'll turn into string.
The problem with efforts like this is that they tend to be overzealous with the copyright efforts to make sure nothing is copied. Ultimately their efforts sabotage the product and no one buys.
What is interesting is that they are claiming internet downloads to be watched on TV - which is quite different than internet downloads to be watched on a computer.
SearchIRC - Now with live chat directory!
Downloading movies seems like a lot of bits to push over the average consumer's pipe. Tie in a pre-constructed box for it (and who exactly wants to buy yet another home appliance when the computer will do?) and it sounds like an infrastructure mess.
I wonder if consumers will be happy waiting for hours while their movie is delivered? Especially if the Blockbuster is just around the corner. Of course, it beats going out, but at what price? Something about the business model just doesn't add up to me.
Night Of The Living Parrots
Apple's iTunes demonstrated many people are willing to live with some DRM and hardware/vendor lock-in.
People don't mind this as long as the DRM allows the consumer to do what they want with the media. As long as I can listen to my music when and where I want it's no problem. When the DRM is used to limit where and when I use what I purchased, that's when people get upset.
It will be interesting if netflix learned this. If I pay a fee and can only watch the movies when, where, and on what netflix decides, they won't get my money. We'll see.
http://economist.com/people/displayStory.cfm?story _id=4149765
DRM isn't something that a lot of consumers care about too much. Interesting as a lot of slashdotters seem to feel the opposite.
DRM also isn't something most people understand at all, unlike most slashdotters. When someone tries to put a song they bought from the itunes music store onto their Sony brand mp3 player and can't get it to work, 9 times out of 10 they will blame the sony player. When a song bought from Napster 2 can't be transferred to an ipod, customers often blame the ipod. They don't understand that the behavior is intentional and if you explain to them that it is most people think it should illegal. Once someone understands DRM they dislike it, but very few people ever get to that point because it is a hard concept to grasp and as most americans know... thinking is hard.
If Netflix and TiVO work this out correctly, this is going to jam a sharp stick in the eye of pay-per-view AND Blockbuster. It may not seem convenient to you at a quick glance, but I'm guessing you haven't re-organized your TV usage through a Tivo or Netflix subscription. I'm not criticizing you, but pointing out that this makes sense to people who have.
Sure, downloading a movie is annoying to satisfy an immediate whim craving for a film. That's where the local video store cannot be beat. The TiVO-Netflix partnership trounces the local video store in new releases, however. Blockbuster may carry 100 copies of Batman when it's eventually released on DVD and make a big promise about availability. But Blockbuster doesn't do this for the smaller movies that you and every other film nerd in your neighborhood want to see. It'll stock two copies that'll be perpetually checked out.
Online Netflix means that you'll be able to create wish lists prior to the release of movies on DVD so that you'll be assured of getting them the day of their release. When you turn on your TiVO, you'll be greeted with a list of movies that have already downloaded, so it's not some deal where you have to actively select an online movie and wait for it to be transmitted. Besides, with Fiber-to-the-home looming in the future as well as IP-over-electric lines, our bandwidth future will speed up the download process for that scenario.
Seth
$5 / month hosted VPS on linux = awesome!
DRM only becomes a problem when it inhibits the actual use of the product. ITunes and the IPod have been wildly successful because the average person is almost totally unaware that there's DRM involved. They download music, it plays on their computer and it plays on their IPod so what do they care.
The most recent effort I saw for this was a service where you could download a movie file for a fee but could only play it within 30 days and once played it would only remain playable for like 24 hours. That's problematic. In this case though, I should think the downloads would be consistent with the NetFlix style of movie watching where you can have so many movies available at a time but for an unlimited time. If that's the case it will be far more viable.
My ideal would be if I could take a netflix downloaded rental and play it on my TiVo. If I have to hook up a computer to my TV, it's a bit more of a hassle. I haven't been a NetFlix member for a while now because I got tired of discs piling up that I never got around to watching, but if I can download a movie in a few hours I may resubscribe.
This sig has been temporarily disconnected or is no longer in service