September 7th, 2006
Amazon.com Launches “Unbox” Video Download Service
By Michael Santo
Executive Editor, RealTechNews
We wrote about it earlier, and it’s here. Amazon.com’s video download service is called Unbox, and you can reach it at http://www.unbox.com or through the front page of Amazon’s site. And hey, if you go to this page, you’ll see the screenshots from the earlier article are right on (except for missing “Unbox”, basically). And yes, there is a special video player that you have to download. And of course, as it says from their FAQ page, “However, any DVDs that you burn with Amazon Unbox files will not be readable by a DVD player.”
The service, called Amazon Unbox, will offer content from six major Hollywood studios, including 20th Century Fox and Warner Bros., as well as TV networks such as CBS and Fox, and cable channels like Comedy Central and E! Entertainment, the company said in a statement. Source: Yahoo! News
We Say: Prices will be between $7.99 and $14.99 with television shows at $1.99 per episode. Movies can also be rented (!) for $3.99. No Mac support. Watch out, Netflix.
Alice Adds: Paging Steve Jobs…..there is still some ground to be had if you let us watch downloads on our TVs.
Eric N. says:
9/12, Apple better have something BIG to announce.
September 7th, 2006 at 3:30 pm
Alice says:
See this: http://www.realtechnews.com/posts/3467
September 7th, 2006 at 3:35 pm
David Johnston says:
I’d like to add that some of the movies are cheaper than the $3.99 rental price. The original Matrix movie is only $1.99 to rent. After checking, the terms of renting are that your license to play the file expires 24 hours after you first begin to play it. To me, that actually sounds like a really good deal. I don’t think the purchasing conditions are so great, especially if you reformat your computer frequently as the files are licensed only to “the computer you purchase them with” or something like that, so transferring ownership may be difficult. Anyway, I’ll definitely be checking out the rental functionality as the movie rental kiosk at my school charges $4.19 (tax included) for 2-day rentals and there aren’t any other options close enough for me to use.
September 7th, 2006 at 7:38 pm
Bill M says:
The prices are not enough lower than a purchased physical DVD, where I also get “extras”, a case, and some professionally done cover art. I won’t use any service that bars me from making a portable copy that I can play anywhere.
September 8th, 2006 at 4:47 am
Stephen says:
What ever would make anone think that renting a download for $1.99 or $3.99 is a good deal if your license expires in 24 hours? I guess before you download you had better be sure nothing better comes along that you’d rather do. Also, how much of a market is there of people that would like nothing better than watch a movie on their computer monitor?
September 8th, 2006 at 6:36 am
Timothy McAdams says:
This is a rip off. Who is going to want to pay that price for a crappy movie or show that you have to watch on your pc. I understand plenty of people have nice size monitors but still sitting at my desk watching a movie doesn’t sound like a good time. http://www.angelfire.com/theforce/indermsbut
September 8th, 2006 at 6:51 am
Alice Hill says:
Personally, I think time-based renting is really only useful if you travel a lot. For example, I download a few movies from MovieLink and keep them on my laptop’s hard drive. If I am bored one night in my hotel, I fire up a movie and watch it, or I watch one on the plane when the in-flight selections are awful. The good thing is that the movies can just sit there for a year if you don’t get to them on a partuicular trip, but once you do, you do have the 24 hour clock ticking. It’s like a cross between Netflix (no late fee) and traditional renting (24 hour return).
September 8th, 2006 at 7:22 am
David Johnston says:
I’m with Alice. This is also great for people like me who don’t have televisions (most of the time anyway) and watch movies on their computers anyway. I wouldn’t think of “buying” (in quotes because it’s so restricted) any of these, but the renting functionality is actually a good deal from my perspective.
September 8th, 2006 at 10:46 am
Lockergnome's Tech News Watch says:
Amazon.com Launches “Unbox” Video Download Service
Michael Santo of RealTechNews writes: We wrote about it earlier, and it’s here. Amazon.com’s video download service is called Unbox, and you can reach it here or through the front page of Amazon’s site. And hey, if you go to this page, you’ll see t…
September 12th, 2006 at 6:25 am
Alice Hill’s Real Tech News - Independent Tech» Blog Archive » Wal-Mart Joins the Video Download Gang says:
[…] It wasn’t that long ago that Amazon.com launched their “Unbox” video download service, and now another biggie joins the mix: Wal-Mart. […]
November 28th, 2006 at 12:49 pm
Wal-Mart Joins the Video Download Gang | Etixet Tag Cloud Archive 10.000 Web Site Feed says:
[…] It wasn’t that long ago that Amazon.com launched their “Unbox” video download service, and now another biggie joins the mix: Wal-Mart. […]
January 7th, 2008 at 1:26 pm