7:17pm EDT, Thu Sep 2

Blockbuster Streams to Samsung Sets; Is It Too Late?

By: The Online Reporter
Publish Date: July 17, 2009

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- Rival Netflix Gets Sony Deal - The Coming Winter of Widgets Movies and TV shows have been streaming their way to the telly through a variety of devices and content providers, and now Blockbuster is finally getting in the game with a new offering that doesn’t feel so half-hearted. The video rental giant has announced a partnership to make its OnDemand service available on some Samsung HDTVs, home theater systems and Blu-ray players beginning this fall. For the Blu-ray players involved, Blockbuster OnDemand will get “preferred” positioning on interfaces as part of the deal. These Blu- ray players and other Samsung products will be featured in Blockbuster’s retail stores, something competitors like Netflix can’t do. Content will be streamed directly to these devices, and Blockbuster will also enable on-screen browsing, filtering, search, trailers and movie or episode information. Users can also manage their queue on the screen, meaning no PC required. The service is expected to price rentals from $1.99 to $3.99, which will be available for 24 hours when the viewing cycle has begun. The team-up will affect some existing Samsung customers as well. Those with certain 2009 Blu-ray players and home theaters, LCD and Plasma HDTVs Series 650 and above, and those with Samsung LED HDTVs Series 7000 and above can now install the OnDemand service for free by either performing a firmware upgrade or downloading the OnDemand widget. The Big Difference It’s a great deal for Blockbuster because the Blockbuster service is making its way onto Samsung TV sets directly. Samsung is currently the world’s largest manufacturer of flat-panel TVs and Blockbuster has secured a spot directly on those TVs, likely without the user having to download or install the widget, or really do anything besides have an account with Blockbuster. Getting on these sets directly also represents some nice real estate that Blockbuster has to itself, initially at least. The widget platform used by these TVs likely supports services like Netflix or Amazon VOD, but this could remain exclusively Blockbuster real estate for quite some time. Competition and the Catch-Up Game When it comes to streaming content, especially movies, Netflix beat just about everyone to the punch. In early 2007, Netflix introduced its streaming options for some films and came with time restrictions based on how expensive a plan the user had. It then shifted to allowing unlimited streaming for plans $8.99 and up. Since then it has found its way to every set-top box and TV it can. The company currently has deals with Microsoft, Vizio, Sony, LG, TiVo and the Roku box, to name just a few. At the end of last week, Sony announced it would offer Netflix streaming on its Internet-capable Bravia HDTVs and older models compatible with its $200 “Internet video link” module. The deal did not include Sony’s PlayStation 3, but it seems very likely that a future deal will. Unfortunately for Blockbuster, Netflix was already on the Blu-ray players from Samsung that Blockbuster just found its way onto. Blockbuster offered its digital streaming alternative toward the end of last year with its 2Wire MediaPoint player, which got a lukewarm reception from techies and a decent reception from other consumers. Then in March, it joined rival Netflix on TiVo DVRs. In terms of offering, both Netflix and Blockbuster currently stick to standard definition for their streaming. Netflix has more than 12,000 titles while Blockbuster is closer to 10,000 , but Blockbuster tends to get more new releases and get them a little sooner. The Widget Wars Both Netflix and Blockbuster — along with many, many others — can be found on the Yahoo Widgets platform, which has been picking up a lot of steam lately. This and the other existing platforms mean that most connected CE devices that will be making their way into households starting this fall will offer both if they offer one. For a good listing of what’s going to be available on TV sets with this platform, see our coverage on Vizio’s HDTV offering at: http://onlinereporter.com/article.php?article_id=15975. For Samsung, TiVo, Vizio and just about every other CE manufacturer, these services are a win-win. Exclusive deals will propel some CE makers ahead of the competition while also driving the demand for a unified platform that allows rivals to compete, and these unified platforms will then trickle down to more and more standard devices. For services like Blockbuster and Netflix it gets a little trickier as systems get unified. This could hurt Blockbuster a lot more than Netflix as things stand right now. Netflix’s streaming comes in tandem with its by-mail rentals, so there’s not much direct competition. Blockbuster will be charging per rental, which puts it up against two other big names. Amazon’s VOD system offers more than 40,000 SD titles and 500 HD titles, while VUDU offers 14,000 SD movies and 1,500 HD titles in two HD standards — both of these are currently found on some products and platforms that Blockbuster is offered on. “These products become like the kids’ Christmas toys,” Parks Associates analyst Kurt Scherf told the Los Angeles Times. “They’re fun for a couple of weeks, but because of the ability to get” VOD content from many other sources, the products and offerings “fade into the background.” The market is getting crowded very quickly, and eventually it’s going to come down to brass tacks, and for video in the living room that’s price and selection.