Blockbuster Renting Movies Via SD Cards

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lashabane

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...that's the road fledging movie rental outlet Blockbuster is now taking...

Blockbuster is far from being considered by many to be "fledgling". They've been around a lot longer than Netflix or Redbox.

It's a unique idea but I don't see it doing very well for a couple reasons.
1) People are wanting to go out less and less, especially just to pick up a movie. More and more people are turning to streaming media as their source of entertainment.
2) SD cards. The majority of people are tech illiterate, they are not going to know what a SD card is, much less what to do with it.

And yeah, about that DRM...
 
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Yeahh. I hate blockbuster. Those @s$holes cut my credit card because it expired and cancelled my account. I am glad they are going under.
 

gbismack

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Why not offer a refund of some amount for returned SD cards? I would have no use for 25 SD cards, after renting 25 different movies.
 

enzo matrix

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Interesting idea. I would choose it as opposed to dvds or blu-ray rentals (provided they have HD movies).
What does the DRM matter if it's a rental and all it does it prevent you from viewing the file after a certain amount of time?
 

Darkk

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Using SD cards is completely worthless. Look how many of these things will end up in the trash after it's been viewed. Better business model is stream the videos to the customers which is something others been doing for awhile. Ya well DRM is a deal breaker for some but there have to be some kind of control over their content otherwise nobody would be making any money.
 

outacontrolpimp

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uhh, dont people rent movies to watch on their tv? i don't know a tv, blue ray player, dvd player that has a SD slot :O
otherwise there's lots of free things to watch online, i don't see this going very far.

and i agree there should be a refund for returned cards.
 
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why don't they just have a multi-card reader/wrier and people bring along their own card/USB stick and download the movie/s they want to watch? Similar to the photo-printing booths by the likes of Kodak.
 

JonathanDeane

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[citation][nom]hotlazydae[/nom]why don't they just have a multi-card reader/wrier and people bring along their own card/USB stick and download the movie/s they want to watch? Similar to the photo-printing booths by the likes of Kodak.[/citation]

Originally when I read this story thats what I thought they where doing...
A kiosk with a DVD burner and multiple slots so you could just put the movies on what ever media you have laying around, hmmm of course this is kind of what my computer does now and if I wanted to for free... Of course who has time for movies these days.
 

skora

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I would hope they will allow the reuse of the SD chips or bring your own and load it on there. Multiple media types would be nice, like USB too. If they really want to get this out there, they can figure a way to play these on game systems too.
 

skora

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The other place this will have an advantage over Redbox/netflix is at airports. No worries if your destination has a kiosk waiting for you, just buy and go. Can't stream on aircraft (yet) and its cheaper than the $5 to buy headphones for a movie you don't really want to watch anyway.
 

razor512

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DRM means you will need a special STB to play the video, which means a lot of money on a device that may become dropped by the company in a year and become just like those $500 HD DVD players only more useless.
 

WheelsOfConfusion

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[citation][nom]Razor512[/nom]DRM means you will need a special STB to play the video...[/citation]
Haven't seen anything to indicate that, either here or in the Fast Company article.
 

ira176

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I was hesitant to use Netflix, after renting from Family Video and Blockbuster the traditional way, but now having tried Netflix, I am very happy. I hope that Netflix can get more movies onto streaming as well, as it's pretty convenient to just turn on my netflix player and watch a movie. I don't think I will be going back to Blockbuster again since the rental fee for one movie is half of my monthly subscription to Netflix. Movies on SD card is a novel idea, but I think it's doomed.
 
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