Unbox Too Restricted and Too Expensive?

abb_road writes "Businessweek takes a first look at Amazon's new video service and walks away unimpressed. Between the high cost of downloads, the sometimes-poor video quality and the restrictions required by movie studios, they're not predicting a huge hit. From the article: 'Amazon finally launched its long-awaited online video service on Sept. 7. But it's no sure thing that it will catch on with the masses. The service, called Amazon Unbox, offers downloads of movies and television shows, as well as digital movie rentals. But like all its rivals, it's shackled by a raft of viewing limitations imposed by movie studios.'"

Comments

Bears repeating...

[Prometheus Bob]

More expensive than other legal methods (just buying the dvd used), with more limitations (can't backup, can't play in normal dvd players). I can't understand why it won't do well!?

MPAA

[x-kaos]

We knew this was the case, to much drm and not worth the money. What I fear is MPAA spin saying "Oh, well we tried to sell downloadable movies, but no one wanted them. People would rather pirate instead." I think they could work, just not this way.

Re:MPAA

[pla]

What I fear is MPAA spin saying "Oh, well we tried to sell downloadable movies, but no one wanted them. People would rather pirate instead."

Why? They've already bought draconian anti-fair-use laws that make the fines for "copyright violation" high enough to bankrupt most upper middle-class families, along with punishments for breaking DRM comparable to murder. Even if they go whining to the government, what more do you fear they'll get?

They really can't get any more, with current technology. We have effectively "lost" as badly as we can, with only a few freedom fighters such as DVD Jon as the last holdouts. And the media cartels have only our growing hatred to show for it.

Re:MPAA

[Anonymous Coward]

I can seem to think of plenty that they might want:

• Broadcast Flag
• Analog Hole legislation
• Broadcaster's copyright
• Remote key revocation
• ???

Re:MPAA

[CastrTroy]

It's really hard to compare the price of DVDs and CDs. On one hand, I listen to at least 1 song from each of my cd's at least once a week, some albums I listen to every week. So I get a lot out of them. DVDs on the other hand, I may watch once a month (for movies anyway), and often only once or twice a year. Some movies i've bought and only watched once or twice, but since it's cheaper than renting it 3 times, I've decided to buy it. So, although music is much cheaper for them to produce, it's worth a lot more to me, and yet they still charge less than DVDs. DVDs aren't really that expensive considering how much you pay for a theatre ticket, or how much you pay to rent them.

Re:MPAA

[stunt_penguin]

The funny thing about it is that you can be fined a (manageable enough) couple of hundred bucks for endangering ( or at least increasing the risk to ) lives by driving too fast, but endanger a massive corporation's profit margins, and you get fined tens of thousands of dollars- it just doesn't make any sense..... but then I'm preaching to the converted here.

Unbox needs to reboxed and sent back...

[__aaclcg7560]

Not Mac compatible. No good. I'll wait for Apple. It'll be a more elegant solution anyway.

So I can buy a movie...

[Overzeetop]

...but I can't watch it on my TV.

I get to watch it on my monitor, which is fairly small.
In my office, where there's room for one, maybe two people.
On an uncomfortable chair instead of my couch.
And I get to pay more than an excellent condition DVD off of ebay, often as much or more than the DVD from Amazon, and probably more than the WalMart B&M down the road.

In return I get to avoid waiting the 2 days for shipping (which I get "free" from Amazon Prime), or driving the 4 miles to a local store.

I'm sorry, was there something I was supposed to enjoy about this transaction?

Re:So I can buy a movie...

[truthsearch]

That's about right. I think they also want you to buy a more comfortable office chair.

No Subtitles?

[methangel]

I'm surprised nobody mentioned this. As a hearing impaired person, I rely on subtitles extensively. Basically, you don't even get the basic "features" of the DVD, or even regular cable show.

I'll stick with my Tivo and Giganews subscription, thank you very much.

Why does Amazon copy failure instead of success?

[dpbsmith]

I don't get at all. Why are companies so bent on copying failure instead of success?

DIVX disks played on ordinary DVD players, were time-limited, and cost less than straight DVDs. And failed.

FlexPlay disks played on ordinary DVD players, were time-limited, cost less than straight DVDs, and failed.

Amazon Unbox WON'T play on ordinary DVD player, won't play on my almost-spiffy almost-new Mac Mini, won't play on my wife's PC (Windows 98), wouldn't have played on the Hewlett-Packard PC my daughter's family uses (WIndows 2000 Home Edition) before it crapped out a few months ago, won't play on the spiffy new Mac Mini she replaced it with, apparently won't play on any portable video device... ...is time-limited, and costs about the same as straight DVDs.

And up to now I thought Jeff Bezos was a smart guy.

Re:Unbox Link

[truthsearch]

That URL is so obvious and easy to remember there was little need to post it.

Re:Have you guys even checked it out?

[dpbsmith]

How can I try it?

It won't work on my computer (Mac Mini), my wife's computer (Windows 98), my son's computer (Windows XP... over dialup), my daughter's old computer (WIndows 2000 Home Edition), or my daughter's new computer (Mac Mini).

Will Amazon also give me a free trial of a brand-new PC (with 2.4 gigahertz processor, and a gig of RAM, and a "DirectX 9.0 complaint Video" [sic]?

Re:And...?

[iamhassi]

"If they had an itunes-like client I already used which could download at bittorrent or even segmented multi-part speeds. I would be all over it"

Exactly. This sounds like iTunes all over again. For years there were sketchy mp3 downloading services charging outrageous prices for songs or free p2p programs battling with MPAA.

Then Apple came along and changed everything. They found a way to sell mp3s at a price people were willing to pay and with the power of the iPod became the 800-lbs gorilla of the whole internet music provider service.

I predict Apple will do the same thing again. It'd take very little effort for them to come out with a iTunes enabled DVD media player with hard drive for ~$199 that connects directly to your TV and has built-in wifi to connect to your existing broadband router that enables the downloading of full movies for a few bucks, or at least less than what Netflix and competitors charge (cheapest plan = $5.99/mo, 1 dvd at a time, limit of 2 a month). You can also transfer them to your iPod and watch them on the go.

Might even be DVR capable, or that could be the $299 model ;) and recorded TV or movies could be torrented to other such players so you could download shows from other iTunes DVRs saving Apple bandwidth.

This would be huge and carry Apple far beyond just a music provider, now they'd be in control of viewable media too, a new content provider, and with a direct broadband connection they could insert their own commericals at the beginning before playing movies, etc.

Apple would be unstoppable.