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An Early Review of Roku's Netflix-Streaming Appliance
Robert Green writes "Following and complementing the Netflix instant streaming video service for the PC, Roku has produced a Set-Top Box offering instant streaming of Netflix video to your home television set. Set to compete with Apple TV (major announcement pending), it began shipping last week and here is one of the first reviews." As has been discussed before, the device is fairly limited, but inexpensive (around $100).
The key phrase is "...you may really enjoy."
Ten thousand titles means a thousand children's movies, a thousand Rob Schneider comedies, a thousand 60's sitcom compilations, and at least 2,500 horrible thrillers starring Ashley Judd and Morgan Freeman.
So of the ten thousand there may be a hundred you really want to see... And at even 3 a week you'll get through them pretty fast.
Because of idiots like you I can't view recent movies on my Roku. The days of hacking and pirating are over and as soon as we can convince the entertainment industry that you are in the minority and most people just want to watch any movie or tv show ever made at their convenience we will have our cake and eat it to. The setup for the unit was brain-dead simple and the quality of the video was better than most dvd players. I had immediate access to my queue and found the interface and remote very easy to use. Considering that they do not charge anything additional for total access to their instant view library, I find it hard to believe that one could complain. Netflix has nailed the distribution model. Now we need to get the a*(holes in the entertainment industry on board.
I think that having subtitles in regular movies would be the deal breaker for me. While the review showed a foreign film with subtitles, does anyone know if "normal" films have subtitles as well?
Misspent youth playing in speed metal bands before turning into a hardcore geek has unfortunately robbed me of a nice chunk of my hearing. So, subtitles are a necessity.
Cheers,
imag0
The point is, based on my conversations with people who do what the GP described, is that when someone mentions a movie title they can say "I have that movie".
I think that actual watching the movie part is completely secondary. Just the having of all of them is enough.
"Sacrifice for the good of The State" - The State
The review says we need to use a computer anyway to add things to the queue.
Are people just too dumb to buy a cable for their computer to output to their HDTV? I assume there are some hidden advantages I'm missing? I didn't see anything that says the resolution is higher with the box. Is it?
Careful What You Wish For....
Judging by the review they seem to have discovered the 'Zen of GUI' - keep the interface as simple as you can - only include what is necessary to use the device.
Apple seem to understand this as well.
I think that software developers and GUI designers can learn some lessons here (me included).
There's always the people who leave a movie sitting in their house for months until they're ready to watch it.
One guy abuses a service (one which the content producers actually get a cut of.) Therefore, restrictions on legal behavior are deserved.
Once we go back to pay-per-byte internet, you might as well drive up to blockbuster, it will be cheaper.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Indeed. I've got some friends like that. I call them "Collectors."
It makes a certain amount of sense at first, but after you think about it, you realize that with Netflix as your movie library, you don't have to worry about refreshing your media when it gets obsolete, and you can watch anything you want, within a couple days of when you think about it. Or right away, depending on what you want.
If your media costs fifty cents per burn, you could conceivably be paying two or three times your netflix subscription just to be able to rewatch stuff later. That money would be much better spent on an annuity: after six or seven years, you'd have accumulated enough to pay for your netflix account on interest in perpetuity. That gives you access to all the films you've already watched, AND the films that haven't even been pressed yet.
Can you be Even More Awesome?!
1: Claim to only "delay" Bittorrent traffic while actually killing it with reset packages.
2: When called on the carpet by the FCC, claim that you were only taking "reasonable network management" approaches.
3: Pretend to appease the FCC by claiming in the future that you will "slow all net traffic equally" when managing your network.
4: Heavy users (i.e. those streaming videos to RoKu) find this 8Mbs promised and paid for bandwidth reduced to <800Kbs rendering RoKu unable to stream. And with no onboard storage, no preloading of content ahead of viewing.
5: When Comcast video services are never slowed no matter how contested the network becomes, poo poo critics as oversensitive wusses.
6: PROFIT!
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
You mean besides ergonomics and convenience?
I used to use my laptop as a dvd player. Somehow the act of plugging everything in, turning off the screensaver, rooting around for the proper cables, making sure that the remote control's software was actually working etc really took the spontaneity out of watching a movie.
Welcome to Slashdot. If something is digitally based and easily pirated, then you have a right to it. Period. No moral or ethical gray area is allowed here. If your intellectual property is easily lifted then it's your problem, not ours. You can ask for money all you want, but it's not our responsibility to give it to you. Sure, we won't bother, y'know, doing without or just not having a copy of your work that we don't value enough to pay for, but that's because you're an evil, money-grubbing corporate overlord, man! FIGHT THE POWER!