Amazon Unbox Reviewed
I read about Amazon's new service called Unbox that allows you to rent movies and have them download to your TiVo. Hmmm... a service that makes watch moves require even less effort than i make now... sign me up! Gave the service a try this weekend. If you sign up, they give you $15 in credits, so it didn't cost me a cent. A couple of observations:
1 - The library of movies for rent at Amazon is WEAK. Best guess is that Apple has the rights to most major titles in preparation to release their own movie rental service AKA "NEXT MOVE IN TOTAL WORLD DOMINATION".
2 - Check out was confusing. You really had to look for the fine print about how it would download to your TiVo, how many credits you had (they didn't really confirm that you had free credits until you posted checkout). Basically, the Amazon check out process is completely overcluttered. They should make this whole transaction much cleaner and AJAXY. It seems a perfect candidate to give their order interface a makeover.
3 - The movie started downloading withing 15 minutes. Took about 3 to 4 hours to download, but the quality was great. Not bad. Pretty nifty even.
4 - The rental expiration date is only 24 hours from time of starting the movie. THIS BLOWS. I mean, if I had rented this same flick from NetFlix or BlockBuster, I could have watched it a couple of times, or let my girlfriend watch it when she wanted etc. Why put a 24 hour limit on a digital rental? Talk about a service weakness.
Overall, this service isn't ready for primetime. It's relatively convenient, but considering the weak movie catalog and the ludicrous 24 hours right-to-watch policy, paying $2.99 for a movie rental seems a high price. I could have rented the same movie for less around the corner and the video shop, watched it, put it on the dresser and then stare at it resentlyfully for five days until I finally <