Redbox Raises Rental Prices

via MarketingTrendsNews on YouTube

NerdBoyTV NOTE: Boy, I'm not sure this is such GREAT timing for a price increase, especially after that horrible backlash from the Netflix pricing snafu! Well, we shall see...

Redbox's DVD rental kiosks have grown in popularity lately, attracting customers fed up with Netflix's video subscription service.

Now Redbox is risking its own customer backlash by raising prices, the same move that triggered Netflix's recent loss of 800,000 U.S. subscribers.

Yesterday, Redbox announced a 20 percent price increase, making the rental rate $1.20 per day, instead of the current $1 daily rate.

Redbox prices will remained unchanged for Blu-ray discs at $1.50 per day and video games at $2 per day.

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Redbox gives in, agrees to 28-day window for new Warner Brothers DVDs

By Ben Patterson : Yahoo! Tech: "It looks like Redbox's crusade to stock its kiosks with the very latest movies has come to an end, with the buck-a-night kiosk company agreeing to a 28-day delay before renting new-release DVDs and Blu-rays from Warner Brothers.

In addition to inking a 'multi-year' deal with Warners, Redbox is also dropping its lawsuit against the Hollywood studio, which had refused to sell wholesale copies of its new releases to Redbox until 28 days after its latest discs had hit retail shelves.

In exchange for agreeing to the 28-day window, Redbox will be able to buy DVDs and Blu-rays from Warner Brothers (the studio behind 'The Blind Side,' 'Sherlock Holmes,' and the 'Harry Potter' and 'Batman' movies) 'at a reduced product cost, preserving value for our customers and increasing customer access to Warners titles at Redbox locations nationwide,' Redbox president Mitch Lowe said in a statement Tuesday afternoon.

The news comes about a month after Netflix stuck a similar deal with Warner Brothers, and I wouldn't be surprised if Redbox signs more deals with the likes of Universal and Fox, the two other studios that Redbox sued after they instructed their distributors not to sell brand-new reduced-priced discs to the kiosk company."

Amazon's latest DVD offer: Buy a disc, stream it instantly

By Ben Patterson : Yahoo! Tech (CLICK to read more)

"The giant online retailer is clearly looking to boost sagging DVD sales with its new 'Disc+ On Demand' program, which lets you instantly watch selected purchased movies over Amazon's Video on Demand service. It's a tempting offer for movie lovers like me, but as usual, there's a catch (or two).

So here's the scoop (courtesy of NewTeeVee): If you buy a movie (and/or TV show) from this list of 300-odd titles, Amazon will immediate add the Video on Demand version of the movie to your Amazon digital locker for instant viewing over the Web, TiVo, or any other TV set-top box that supports Amazon Video on Demand.

The titles include both DVD and Blu-ray discs, ranging from new fare such as 'Land of the Lost,' 'Funny People,' and 'Bruno' (sorry, no 'Star Trek' or 'Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince') to old favorites like 'Goodfellas,' 'Cool Hand Luke,' '2001,' and 'North by Northwest.'

That's kind of a cool deal; indeed, I'd been meaning to pick up the Blu-ray of 'Silence of the Lambs' to replace my old, non-anamorphic DVD from Criterion, and hey ... $9.99 for the 'Lambs' Blu-ray, plus a streaming copy in my Amazon digital locker? I was seriously considering it this morning.

But, as I said, there are a couple of catches involved."

Netflix boss says DVD has two years left

By Christopher Null / Yahoo! Tech

"The days of building your precious DVD collection may be coming to an end sooner than you think. If Netflix CEO Reed Hastings' comments are any guide, the DVD era may be set to come to a rather abrupt halt.

Specifically, Hastings said in an interview with The Motley Fool website (digested here) that DVD will only be the 'primary delivery format' at the company for the next two years, though he did add that it would stick around in some fashion for the next decade or two. That's a huge pull back from Hastings' previous prognostication; the Netflix boss had formerly predicted DVD would remain the company's primary format until as late as 2018.

Strangely, Hastings didn't note what would supplant DVD as the company's major movie format, but considering that Blu-ray remains a niche product, with 10 percent penetration or lower among most consumers, he's probably talking about streaming.

Netflix has embraced video streaming in a major way in recent years, and its $99 set-top box remains the method I use to watch more streaming content than any other, outside of the occasional YouTube clip, anyway. (And yes, I know the Xbox-Netflix combo is undoubtedly popular with a huge number of people, too, at least those who don't futilely shun and fear video game consoles.)

Netflix continues to expand its streaming options -- about 20 percent of my queue is now available for streaming, up from roughly 8 percent a year ago -- but Hollywood keeps resisting, much as Big Media did in the early days of digital music downloads. Is Netflix hinting that more studios are climbing aboard the digital bandwagon? And at what point does streaming hit enough of a critical mass to become the dominant movie delivery method? 50 percent of titles available to stream? 80 percent? It's hard to see those kinds of numbers panning out in a mere two years... but maybe Hastings has tricks up his sleeve that we're only just now starting to hear about."

Big screen evolves to compete with small

By Yahoo! News (CLICK to read more)

"Today, young movie-watchers look increasingly like Molly O'Connor. A junior at the University of Dallas, she still goes to the cinema occasionally, but is often just as happy to hunker down on a bed or a couch with friends to watch a downloaded movie on a laptop that's perched on a nearby desk or a chair.

'Sometimes, it's nice to have a wider screen, but I don't think I gain that much by going to a movie theater anymore,' the 20-year-old student says. 'Now, it's more about convenience.'

Or as 26-year-old Michael Brody puts it: 'I watch movies the way many people listen to music — anytime, anywhere, any way.' A freelance writer in New York who blogs about film, he used to go to the movie theater every week. Now he's there once or twice a month, partly to save money and also because he doesn't think most movies are worth the effort.

Sounds like bad news for movie theaters. But we're talking about an industry that not only survived, but ended up thriving amid the arrival of television in the 1950s, videotapes in the 1980s, and DVDs in the '90s. The reason? An ability to continually remake themselves and find new ways to generate revenue, by introducing everything from the multiplex and more elaborate concessions to lengthy pre-show advertising."

DVD sales plummet, Blu-ray unable to save the day

DVD sales plummet, Blu-ray unable to save the day : Christopher Null : Yahoo! Tech: "The numbers for 2008 are in and they don't look good: DVD sales are now showing the first signs that they're about to go into free-fall, just like sales of CDs did a few years ago.

For the second year running, DVD sales have slipped. After hitting a high of $24.1 billion in 2006, the total sales volume hit $21.6 billion in 2008, an overall decline of about 10 percent off the 2006 high.

DVD's purported savior -- Blu-ray -- has been unable to rise to the rescue so far. Blu-ray (and leftover HD DVD) disc sales hit just $750 million last year, which doesn't nearly make up for the loss in sales of DVD media. Since Blu-ray discs are more expensive than DVDs, the overall unit sales decline is even more worrisome for Hollywood -- and some studios are seeing income plummet accordingly. For example, Fox operating income dropped 72 percent last year after seeing DVD sales fall just 15 percent."

Netflix hits 10 million subscribers

Netflix hits 10 million subscribers : Christopher Null : Yahoo! Tech: "DVD sales may be falling through the floor, but DVD rentals look like they're actually headed in the opposite direction. Online DVD rental outfit Netflix announced this week that it had surpassed the 10 million subscriber milestone, adding a whopping 600,000 new customers since January 1 alone.

The company added that it could hit 11.3 million subscribers by the end of the year."