Amazon’s video on demand
Posted by Jacque on July 17th, 2008
The New York Times is reporting today that Amazon is about to take on a new venture, introducing an online store of TV shows and movies called Amazon Video on Demand. The service, which will allow people to stream entertainment to their computers without long waits for file downloads, will be rolled out to a selected group first for testing, then given wider release later this summer.
Amazon customers using the new store will be able to start watching any of 40,000 movies and television programs immediately after ordering them because they stream.
“For the first time, this is drop dead simple,” said Bill Carr, Amazon’s vice president for digital media. “Our goal is to create an immersive experience where people can’t help but get caught up in how exciting it is to simply watch a movie right from Amazon.com with a click of the button.”
Amazon is also pursuing the technology and media world’s “holy grail” — an Internet pipeline to the TV. It has struck a deal with Sony Electronics to place its Internet video store on the Sony Bravia line of high-definition TVs.
In the meantime, if you want to curl up on the couch with your laptop — or watch on your big screen monitor — you will soon be able to catch a show from Amazon’s collection. It will be interesting to see how this venture competes with Netflix’s “watch instantly” movies, and its recently introduced set-top box. Currently Netflix’s collection is much smaller than what may be available from Amazon, but is available as a free addition to many subscribers.