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Amazon To Launch New Streaming Video Service
The New York Times reports that Amazon has begun a limited testing of its new Video on Demand service, which will replace its Unbox store. The significant difference between the two is that the new service will stream movies through your browser rather than requiring you to download them and use Amazon's video player. Users will also retain access to movies and shows they're previously purchased. The service is not expected to be particularly profitable; Amazon is most likely looking to the future.
so if you watch in the browser, but can't download, then that means proprietary player & format. No thanks. I'll keep net flux & Rip the DVDs to Divx for my media center
I've used it and it is so much better than the old version. There is no buggy client to install and it works on Windows or Mac. When you view a detail page, the video starts playing automatically, which is a little annoying, but it is nice to get a preview of the show you are considering watching. If you decided to buy it, just click purchase in the viewer and the video extends seamlessly, it doesn't pause at all.
The new video library is way better than the old client. All the videos show up in a tiled view. You click the show you want and it flips around to reveal the options. Click play and the show starts in the current window, and is very fast to start.
The video quality seems to be lower than the download versions of the same shows. While the downloaded movies were approximately DVD quality, I can really see the artifacts in the streaming version.
I have dial-up, you insensitive clod!
Is this service going to open to the world market? Or just the US? There's a huge disconnect with the purported ideology of business, that is, globalisation and the free-market, not to mention the WORLD wide web, but pretty much every service (like iTunes and Steam) charge one price for Americans and another price for everyone else. This is noticeable here in Australia. Our dollar is almost at parity with the US dollar, so it's obviously to our benefit to purchase things from the US or from companies based in the US. But tracks on iTunes cost literally twice as much and we're forced to buy games from the "Australian Steam brochure" which are again, up to twice as much.
So while I see this as a good move, I hope Amazon will buck the current trend, and as a company that's based purely in the online realm, will understand that arbitrarily forcing different prices because they come from different countries is stupid when we're talking about the WORLD wide web.
Hmmm, the article doesn't mention the impact this will have on Tivo users who use Amazon Unbox. I quickly perused the Tivo Community Forums and saw no mention or concern there. I wonder if Unbox be grandfathered in until a solution is ready for Tivo?
One of these days, those big evil media companies will figure out that embracing the Internet and technology will actually improve their business. This is one tiny step in that direction. Kudos to Amazon.
McCain/Palin '08. Now THAT's hope and change!
But can I watch them on my Xbox 360?
Mmm hm, that's what I thought.
Thankfully my Netflix subscription will give me that at no extra cost.
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When I bought my first Linux-preinstalled laptop last year, I felt like I was really discovering how great computing can be again, especially for people who are interested in computers. So it saddened me to find that the Netflix in-browser service requires a Windows machine. I still use it on occasion with an older computer, but I hope that this technology will soon be truly cross-platform like many other modern web services have become.
We bought the Netflix Roku player and have been very happy with it; we've got 135 films in our instant queue and we're glad we don't have to watch normal college-freshman-level TV (i.e. crass humor, actually aimed at 12-year olds) or hang out at our local seedy video store with the nasty carpet smell for the same old catalog.
Also, occasionally I'll blurt out something terribly nerdy about how the Roku player runs Linux and my wife will totally ignore it. This always helps bring me back down to earth for a moment.
How about a service that creates mashups between Xbox games and streaming movies? Like Seven / Manhunt (track down and kill those committing the seven deadly sins), or GTA IV / Bullit (chase down Steve McQueen and carjack his Mustang), or even Madden 2008 / The Longest Yard (Madden: "BOOM! I think he broke his freaking neck!").
Now THERE is a service I'd be willing to pay for.
" Users will also retain access to movies and shows they're previously purchased. " This is incorrect. It should be 'access to movies and shows they've/they have purchased'.
Is it a closed beta or does anyone have a link to the new Amazon Video On Demand service?
Can anyone tell the reason why a person can buy DVD from a foreign country but not allowed to stream it?
I wonder instead of MPAA/RIAA conspiracy, there is a UPS/DHL conspiracy around? You know, they sell DVD for $20 but the shipping costs $30?
In 2008's Internet, with advance of trusted technologies like Bittorrent (check the .com), it feels like... "no coloured people" or something. Apologies to say it. Needless to remind that even P2P based paid services like Vuze, Bittorrent discriminates too. They will offer free content but NOT paid content. Almost like a comedy.
Release stuff open source or not at all!
I only rent though, I don't buy.
I guess I can live with DRM on a rental, but not on a purchase.
If you had super powers, would you use them for good, or for awesome?
> The service is not expected to be particularly profitable; Amazon is most likely looking to the future.
It won't be particularly profitable because it won't be particularly successful. 'Streaming' is just a variation of DRM. Even if you 'retain ownership' of the movie, Streaming is a pain in the ass. Every time you watch it, deduct x Mb of your bandwidth, lag days, can't watch while not connected and one day they'll kill the servers just like Microsoft did with their DRM music. Take Lynda.com: a great idea but stuck in the we-stream-it-we-own-it mindset. If they got off their streaming high-horse, they'd sell more.
So now, instead of paying to download a video that you have to play with their buggy, proprietary, could-disappear-someday player...
You pay to stream the video from their could-disappear-someday web site, with no ability to keep a local copy at all?
Next time try the search function.
There is a thread about exactly that topic http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=399594
The short of it is (as the NYT article also explained), Unbox is "being replaced" only in the same sense that Apple's "dot Mac" service was recently "replaced" -- i.e. new services are being added while the old ones remain available but under a new brand name.
That thread has a more interesting reference tohttp://www.tvweek.com/news/2008/05/not_boxed_in_jim_denney.php/ where a TiVo VP of Product Marketing is reported to have said that Amazon Unbox will announce HD capabilities "in the not too distant future". Personally I don't find the quotes supplied in that article very convincing (they're awfully indirect and incomplete) as they feel like they may have been strung together to imply a context that wasn't present but it is a tantalizing prospect.
It uses flash 9 as player for the streaming video, so desktop Linux users will finally have a way to enjoy online video renting.