S1dd.com » Movies

Blockbuster Kiosk SD Movie Rental

Sidd — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 16:11:18 +0000

The net is abuzz with news of Blockbuster’s new kiosks with SD card movie rentals and most people just panning the idea. But I think that it is great. Here is why:

The kiosk doesn’t have physical media so it can potentially store millions of movies.
The kiosk will never run out of a particular movie
People can play the movies on their netbooks (no dvd drives but SD slots, yes) on the go or on their phones (iPhones need not apply) or cameras (if the media is playable on those) etc.
A lot of modern DVD players and TVs come with built in SD card readers, I know my Bluray player has one.
You don’t need to drive back to return the movie. Redbox = $1/night = $4 for 4 nights but this is just $1.99 because never have to return it.
SD cards go all the way upto 32GB with new 64GB cards just coming out giving you the potential to rent 10 or more movies at a time in HD if the kiosk lets you.

What’s not to like about the idea? Hopefully Blockbuster’s implementation is good to start with.

It seems Blockbuster is trying to throw everything and the kitchen sink at Netflix and Redbox. First the in-store exchanges for online rentals, then not charging extra for BluRay, Redbox style kiosks, acquiring a company for movie downloads (though they are not free like netflix), following Netflix in trying to get Blockbuster’s app on various devices like Tivo and Samsung players and now this.

Hopefully something will work out for them.

Updates from Blockbuster + New Throttling Methods Blockbuster recently updated the Queue options ending a longstanding complaint...
Blockbuster is upto it’s old tricks again Since Blockbuster started its new policy of not shipping new...
Some Good News from Blockbuster My last few posts about Blockbuster have all been complaints....

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Trailers Jan – Mar 2010 Releases

Sidd — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 15:29:28 +0000

Here are trailers of movies I want to see that come out in the first three months of 2010. I will update this post as more trailers come along.

Daybreakers

Edge of Darkness

The Spy Next Door

Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief

Shutter Island

Takers

From Paris With Love

A Couple of Dicks

Alice in Wonderland

Green Zone

How to Train Your Dragon

Upcoming Movie Trailers (rest of 2009) Here are trailers for movies coming soon that I want...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Updates from Blockbuster + New Throttling Methods

Sidd — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 15:51:45 +0000

Blockbuster recently updated the Queue options ending a longstanding complaint about the requirement to have available movies at the top of your queue.

But now their store return system is busted. I exchanged an online rental for a store rental. I returned the store rental the next day. 30 hours later the disc is still in my queue.

So I click the report button, and what I get is a notification to call the store.

So I call the store and their system says I returned the movie yesterday and also have a 1$ credit for returning it in one day.

Anyway I sent in a complaint to Blockbuster both on twitter and via their Customer service contact.

I’ll update this post when I get a response. But I’m sure this is a throttling method where they don’t want you to get discs very fast. I was hoping to test that that the “Speed” option really works and I run into this. I would switch to Netflix in a heartbeat if they didn’t charge extra for Bluray and I would stop hearing complaints about new movies not shipping to heavy users. At least Netflix doesn’t lie about throttling. They are intentionally vague but at least they admit it. Unlike BB, which just comes up with lame excuses.

Update: Blockbuster online customer service already responded (in less than two hours) that they have cleared the movie from my queue and I got the usual free rental coupon that I get every time I complain about Blockbuster screw-ups. An interesting thing in the email that the rep sent me is this

For consistent and prompt shipments, please keep 15 or more “available” titles at the top of your queue.

That totally sucks

Update: (Sat Oct 24) The Speed option is bogus. To test the speed option I put some future and long wait releases in the top 15 in my queue. That still didn’t cause anything to ship on Friday (previous movie returned to store Wednesday, system glitch caused it to be marked as returned on Thurdsay after complaining). And if the limited shipments on Monday is true, I’ll have to wait at least 2, maybe three business days for the next movie to ship.

Update: Somehow my update to this post got lost? I got a call from BB customer service on Oct 26/27 after complaining about this problem on Twitter. It seems that the speed issue is now fixed. Since then I’ve seen my movies ship on time until now. So if you see no more updates to this BB has fixed the issue.

Some Good News from Blockbuster My last few posts about Blockbuster have all been complaints....
Blockbuster is upto it’s old tricks again Since Blockbuster started its new policy of not shipping new...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Upcoming Movie Trailers (rest of 2009)

Sidd — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 19:31:06 +0000

Here are trailers for movies coming soon that I want to see. I’ll wait for them to come on DVD/BluRay but for moviegoers, here are a lot of trailers in one place.

The Box

The Fourth Kind

The Men Who Stare at Goats

2012

Planet 51

Twilight: New Moon

Fantastic Mr. Fox

Old Dogs

Transylmania

Avatar (Teaser Trailer)

The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus

Sherlock Holmes

I’ll keep making more posts with more trailers as the weeks go by. Until then enjoy

Trailers Jan – Mar 2010 Releases Here are trailers of movies I want to see that...
Blockbuster Kiosk SD Movie Rental The net is abuzz with news of Blockbuster’s new kiosks...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Transformers Blu Ray Review, Where are the cars GM?

Sidd — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 15:08:05 +0000

I only watch the movie. I don’t watch bonus features, commentaries etc. at all so my reviews will not contain anything about those.

The disc directly went to the movie menu, didn’t force any trailers on me. The special features were on a second disc.

The movie was very good but not as good as the first one. It was exactly what you expect lots of robots, explosions, action etc. The CGI is great and looks fantastic on Blu-Ray. There is always so much happening on the screen that even if there were any CGI flaws you wouldn’t notice them.

The movie was 2 hours 26 minutes approx which was a bit much. They could have skipped or at the minimum skimped on the romance. Don’t go looking for plot holes, great acting or some such. That’s not what the movie is about. Just enjoy the action and the great effects. I really liked the effects during the little slow motion action thrown in. A transformer taking human form was a bad idea.

I rented the disc from Blockbuster and it included an ad for GM cars, but it contained none of the Transformers cars except the Camaro. Which is a shame. GM took a really long time to launch the Camaro after the first transformers movie and it seems will not be launching the Trax. The Spark comes in 2011 to America. The Trax and The Spark are the autobot twins. The Corvette Stingray that looks so much better than the current corvette will also probably never hit the market. GM, what is wrong with you? Maybe next time you can have the cars at the dealer lots the day the next Transformers comes out and handout fliers at the theater along with tickets to go check out the cars.

Anyway, the countdown to Transformers 3, which comes out July, 2011 is now on.

Click here to watch in 1080P (requires Quicktime)

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Some Good News from Blockbuster

Sidd — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 16:18:47 +0000

My last few posts about Blockbuster have all been complaints. I’ve often reached a point where I wanted to just cancel and move to NetFlix because of stupid policies at Blockbuster such as delays in shipping of as much as 4 days if you don’t have 15 available movies at the top of your queue and excuses about distribution center problems etc.

But I just heard from BlockbusterCC on twitter that sometime this month, BB will give us the option of speed vs priority. Here is the exact quote

BlockbusterCC Thanks for the inqry. We are rolling out new options sometime 10/2009. U will have the option to ship by q order or by speed

What keeps me away from Netflix is no in-store exchanges/coupons etc. and they charge an extra 4$ for Blu-Ray on their three at a time plan. Also there are as many people complaining about Netflix throttling, which I will definitely face as a heavy user. It seems Netflix throttling is much worse than BB.

Blockbuster is upto it’s old tricks again Since Blockbuster started its new policy of not shipping new...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Blockbuster is upto it’s old tricks again

Sidd — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 00:33:44 +0000

Since Blockbuster started its new policy of not shipping new movies until you return your in store rentals, things have been much better. Movies shipped as soon as I dropped my discs back in the mail. But this week blockbuster is back to it’s usual tricks of not shipping. Generally when I returned all my movies together, Blockbuster would ship at least one movie instantly. But this time not a single movie shipped for two days.

As usual I have complained and as usual they will probably reply back with some lame excuse about keeping lots of “Available” movies at the top of the queue. I have more than 500 movies in my queue and many of the top ones are alwyas available.

Update on Aug 29: No movies have shipped yet. That is 4 days of no shipments!! Here is what Blockbuster has to say about it:

I sincerely apologize that we have yet to ship the next available titles from your queue.

We are aware that some customers who receive DVDs from our Richmond distribution center have recently experienced a slow-down with their check-ins and shipments. This is in line with the system enhancement that is in place to better provide quality service to our customers such as you. We are addressing this situation and it will be corrected as quickly as possible.

I also see that some of the movies at the top of your queue are on a “Short Wait” and “DVD Releases” status. We want to send you the movies that are most important to you as reflected by the priority you’ve set in your queue. If your top selections do not show an “Available” status and you have fewer than 15 “Available” movies in queue, a shipment may be skipped.

I would recommend keeping more than 15 “Available” titles at the top of your queue at all times. Once you take a few moments to do so, I’m certain you’ll see something shipped by the end of the next business day.

Since we value you as our customer, I would like to offer you 2 extra e-coupons good for free movie/discounted game rentals. Just click the link and print them which you may redeem at any participating Blockbuster store. You can expect a separate e-mail within 24-48 hours. We recommend to please check your spam or junk folder as well.

We appreciate your patience and understanding.

Should you have further questions, please let me know.

So I emailed back saying that it is ridiculous that I’m expected to constantly monitor my queue and their stupid system can’t just send me the first available movie form my queue. Here is what I got back:

I understand your concern about the movies availability and managing your queue. I also understand your inquiry about your e-coupons.

In line with our system enhancement that is currently on going, we really recommend that you keep more available titles on top and consistently monitor your queue. Once we are done with our upgrade, we will ship whatever “Available” titles eventhough it is not at the top of your selections.

In the meantime, we appreciate your patience and understanding while we work towards serving you better.

Your e-coupon was sent thru a separate e-mail. I suggest that you also check your spam or bulk folders. Some e-mail providers will not allow e-mails to your inbox unless you previously approve and set it up.

Should there be anything else, please let me know.

So now I have to keep on checking that the titles at the top of my queue are available or not and never get new releases from Blockbuster the day they release.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Blockbuster and Bollywood

Sidd — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 15:20:32 +0000

One thing that attracts me to Netflix (I’m currently with Blockbuster) is their collection of Hindi movies. This morning I logged into my blockbuster account and I was surprised to see a Hindi movie as the first thing that came up! Hopefully this is a sign of Blockbuster improving it’s Bollywood collection and not just an automated system that randomly picks new releases.

Quotes from Blockbuster Customer Service I have more than 100 “Available” movies in my queue...
Some Good News from Blockbuster My last few posts about Blockbuster have all been complaints....
Blockbuster Kiosk SD Movie Rental The net is abuzz with news of Blockbuster’s new kiosks...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

2008 Movie Release Dates

Sidd — Wed, 05 Sep 2007 00:07:00 +0000

I couldn’t find an online source that would give me a 2008 movie release calendar on one page or conveniently organized so I created my own here:
2008 Movie Release Calendar

I’ve also created a 2009 Movie Release Calendar and will update it as and when I have more information.

Feel free to email me corrections/updates at contact@ibookdb.net

Blockbuster Kiosk SD Movie Rental The net is abuzz with news of Blockbuster’s new kiosks...
Updates from Blockbuster + New Throttling Methods Blockbuster recently updated the Queue options ending a longstanding complaint...
Upcoming Movie Trailers (rest of 2009) Here are trailers for movies coming soon that I want...

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.

Blockbuster Pulls a Fast One

Sidd — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 15:01:44 +0000

I got an email at 9:42pm yesterday from Blockbuster informing me of changes in my plan:

We hope you’re enjoying BLOCKBUSTER Total Access™!

There are some changes to our subscription plan lineup that introduce a new pricing structure and new plans which limit the number of in-store exchanges.

As a result, your current plan will no be longer be available at the current price.

(Unlimited Online DVDs up to 3 at a time plus unlimited in-store exchanges each month for $17.99)

We’d like to extend you a new plan that includes Unlimited Online DVDs 3 at a time plus up to 5 free* in-store exchanges for $17.99.

In addition, exclusively for BLOCKBUSTER Total Access customers, we have introduced in-store movie rentals for $1.99* per movie should you need more than the in-store exchanges included in your plan.

Your new plan will go into effect on your regular monthly billing date following August 31, 2007. If we don’t hear from you by August 31, 2007, we will automatically move you to the new BLOCKBUSTER Total Access plan referenced below as “Your New Plan”.

So they did hear from me. I emailed than that I was disappointed and can’t trust Blockbuster anymore if they reduce benefits on the best option they had so far and I would like to keep my plan at the same price as an existing customer. This is bullcrap, emailing people on Friday night, probably when they are most likely to miss the email. More discussion on this at fatwallet. When they announced the new pricing, they did seem to say that existing customers would get to keep their plans

Missing Blockbuster Stores I go on vacation and return to find all...
Blockbuster is upto it’s old tricks again Since Blockbuster started its new policy of not shipping new...
Some Good News from Blockbuster My last few posts about Blockbuster have all been complaints....

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.