A lovely piece of information popped up in my inbox today in regards to my beloved Roku Box:
First, you can now watch, in high definition (HD), the hundreds of movies and TV episodes offered in HD instantly by Netflix. Second, an incredible 40,000 movies and TV shows from Amazon Video On Demand will soon be available to choose from on your Roku player.
Why is this important? Beyond the foreshadowing that my credit card bill will skyrocket with microtransactions from Amazon the same way it currently does with Beatport and Apple, this news puts another nail in the coffin of the “why would I want to buy an Blue-Ray player” argument. Let’s face it, with the exception of the printed word (sorry Kindle, I’m still holding out), there is no experience at this point – beyond nostalgia – from physical media that digital media does not trump in cost effectiveness and ease of delivery. I’d rather download an album instantly for $10 than wait for the weekend, go to the store and buy one for $20. And now I can rent/buy an Amazon movie in HD for $15 rather than spend $20 for the physical version. In our age of instant-satisfaction, there’s really no competition. But the best part – beyond satisfying our inner Veruca Salt – are the capabilities of the video once we release it from a physical, hard coded format. Look out this year for the rise of and – of course – experimental “buy it now” features. Needless to say, things are not looking so up and up for the good people at Blockbuster either.
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