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Netflix, Warner Agree to Delay Rentals by Four Weeks After DVD Release

Pulkit Chandna — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 18:56:21 -0600

Warner Bros. had made it clear last August that it was not going to let movie rental services eat into its revenues by hurting DVD and Blu-ray sales. Now, it has concluded negotiations with Netflix, the largest movie rental service, and got its way. Netflix will only be allowed to rent out the film studio's DVD titles 28 days after they go on sale. As for the studio's end of the bargain, it has agreed to charge a reduced fee besides pledging more of its films to Netflix for its streaming service. Other studios are also expected to reach a similar understanding with Netflix.

The four-week delay is not without precedent. Universal, 20th Century Fox and Warner Brothers had imposed exactly the same rider on the sale of DVDs to Redbox, prompting a lawsuit from the movie rental company against the three studios. “The 28-day window allows us to continue making our most popular films available to Netflix subscribers while supporting our sell-through product,” Warner Home Video president Ron Sanders said in a statement.

Image Credit: SlipperyBrick

Blockbuster to Rent Movies on SD Cards at New Kiosks

Pulkit Chandna — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 18:03:16 -0600

Blockbuster will soon begin renting movies on SD cards. You will need to visit your nearest Blockbuster Express Digital kiosk to rent your favorite movies. There, users will be able to transfer DRM-protected movies to their own SD cards. According to a Fast Company report, the rentals will cost $1.99.

All said, hardware incompatibility may prove to be a major issue as not all phones, TV sets and notebooks feature a full-size SD cardslot. The kiosks will be built and managed by NCR Corporation, the very company that manages Blockbuster’s DVD-rental kiosks.

Image Credit: Fast Company

mSpot Streams Movies to your iPhone, Blackberry, or Palm Pre

Pulkit Chandna — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 20:18:23 -0500

If the idea of watching your favorite movie on a mobile phone titillates you, mSpot’s new streaming movie rental service is right up your alley. The Palo Alto-based mobile entertainment company will begin providing streaming rentals of a particular flick a few weeks after its DVD release. The service can be accessed from 30 different phone models, including the iPhone, Palm Pre, Blackberry Tour and Storm. mSpot plans to charge $5 for every movie rental.

Each title will remain available for viewing for anywhere between 24 hours and 5 days after it is rented. Film buffs can also opt for one of the monthly subscription plans. “With so many people watching TV episodes and movies on their iPhones, mobile phones are now viewed as an entertainment device,” said Daren Tsui, mSpot’s CEO. Its film catalogue currently features 350 titles from Paramount Studios, Universal Pictures and the Weinstein Company.

Image Credit: MacRumors

Netflix Denies Throttling Rumors, Passes Buck to ISPs

Pulkit Chandna — Mon, 23 Mar 2009 20:05:51 -0500

Some users of Netflix’s streaming service have groused about dwindling performance in recent times. The dip in performance has not only nettled users but also engendered speculation as to its cause. The most plausible conjecture is that video streams are being deliberately throttled by Netflix.

But Netflix’s chief product officer Neil Hunt has dismissed such misgivings and passed the buck to the ISPs. He even claimed, on the company’s official blog, Netflix can’t resort to throttling even if it wants to because it relies on third-party Content Delivery Network (CDN) services.

“Also, routing to different ISPs in the same region may be quite different, thus performance may also be quite different, even for neighbors, if they are connected to different ISPs. Moreover, congesting points can rise and fall with ISP configuration changes and other conditions,” Hunt wrote.

Netflix's $1 Surcharge for Blu-Ray Renters is So Uncool

Paul Lilly — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 13:55:58 -0500

It was exactly one week ago that I professed my undying love for Netflix with the same affection often heard from those harboring a grade school crush. At the time, which now seems like so long ago, I thought we had worked through most of our issues, but now I find myself needing to vent.

Today I wake up and find out that should I jump on the Blu-ray bandwagon, it's going to cost me an extra $1 per month. Jessie Teitz, Netflix's VP of marketing, says the surcharge is to cover the "significant cost difference" between Blu-ray and standard DVDs and calls the price hike "pretty modest." And while it may seem silly to begrudge a single George Washington to the one I love, that still works out to a near 6 percent price hike for the 3-DVD plan. And for those of you on the 2-DVD plan for $4.99, the increase works out to a 20 percent jump.

Maybe I shouldn't have let Netflix know how wrapped around its finger I am and only have myself to blame. Or maybe I'm overreacting. After all, I won't be charged anything extra to stream Netflix downloads to my Xbox 360 this fall, nor has the recent Starz catalog caused the subscription rate to rise. I know I'll work through this, I'm just not happy about it at the moment.

Do you feel the same way? Hit the jump and offer up some insight.

Netflix Listens to Customers, Keeps Profiles Feature

Paul Lilly — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 17:54:40 -0500

Stable and affordable subscription plans; unlimited streaming downloads; large DVD catalog; optional living room set-top player. With all Netflix has going for it, the announcement that it would disable user Profiles came as a curious one. In between carpooling to class and eating Ramen noodles, college roommates would suddenly have to share a queue, and parents would no longer be able to configure a separate profile with parental controls for the kids. The surprise announcement sparked an outrage from hundreds of angry subscribers who left comments on Netflix's blog, and while not quite on par with the backlash inflicted upon Creative over Daniel_K and his now infamous modified soundcard drivers, one had to wonder why Netflix would risk agitating a content customer base. After some reflection of their own, and undoubtedly a few angry letters, Netflix sent out a letter to subscribers today reversing its decision to kill user Profiles:

"You spoke, and we listened. We are keeping user Profiles. Thank you for all the calls and emails telling us how important Profiles are." - Netflix

Whether you care about Profiles or not, isn't it nice knowing the customer can sometimes still be right?

Netflix Prize Anonymous Dataset Broken

Erin Simon — Sun, 02 Dec 2007 23:40:48 -0600

Arvind Narayanan and Vitaly Shmatikov, two computer scientists at the University of Texas, have just broken the Netflix Prize dataset. The dataset, which contains over 100 million film ratings by 500,000 Netflix customers, is the basis of a contest to see if developers can improve on Netflix's recommendation engine. Netflix removed all personally identifiable information from the data before releasing it, of course, but (just like last year's AOL dataset) the data itself contained enough information to be traced back to individuals. Narayanan and Shmatikov simply compared ratings in the Netflix dataset to publicly accessible ratings on the Internet Movie Database – and could frequently match a Netflix anonymized ID with an IMDB user. While this might seem minor, movie ratings can reveal political affiliations, religious beliefs, or sexual orientation. Perhaps especially sexual orientations.

In fact, just that kind of sensitivity motivated Congress to pass the Video Privacy Protection Act in 1988, after Supreme Court nominee Robert Bork's video rental history was published in a newspaper. The Act refers to “prerecorded video cassette tapes or similar audio visual materials,” which would appear to include DVDs (though I'm not aware of any judicial decision so construing the statute), but it only prevents disclosure of “information which identifies a person as having requested or obtained specific video materials or services,” which seems limited to rental and sale history, not ratings information. So while this release of data may not have been unlawful, it points to a serious problem in how our legal system treats sensitive information. What you rate may tell more about you than what you view, but only the latter is protected by federal law, and that's only because Congress didn't want their own porn rental history disclosed. Privacy protections are patchy and piecemeal, enacted after some glaring event frightens the public and the legislature, and they can be quickly outstripped by technological developments. Some analysts are calling for companies to stop releasing datasets at all, given how easily they have been de-anonymized, while others bemoan the lack of such valuable data for research purposes. I say be wary of what information you give out, or you'll learn that lesson the hard way.