So Pogue wrote a little something about the new Roku Netflix box. The ten second summary: Netflix now has a set top box that allows you to stream movies from Netflix using their streaming movie service. No additional charge (other than the hardware cost) and you can take more than 24 hours to watch it. Pogue admits that there are other services - expressly naming Amazon (Unbox) and TiVo - but says that each of these "is fatally flawed." Not so the Netflix/Roku player.
This all sounds great, but frankly I think Pogue and everyone else is making a mountain out of molehill and not crediting Amazon/TiVo the props they deserve.
The fatal flaw that Pogue mentions? Well, it's either that you have to download it and watch it on your computer, or you only get (horrors!) 24 hours to watch the movie.
The first flaw is a problem - as he says, not many people want to watch Lord of the Rings in a desk chair; we want to watch it on TV. The Unbox/TiVo solution is excellent, though. While you have to shell out more money for your Roku or Vudu or AppleTV box, you've probably already got the TiVo to do what TiVo's do - digitally record your tv programs. This is just an added feature, one that makes the TiVo set a multitasker - and a hell of a one at that!
But the second is something of a red herring, in my opinion. The Roku box doesn't have better technology than the TiVo/Unbox combo; in fact it's more primitive: it's simply a dedicated streaming video player - there's no storage that I can tell, it just hooks itself up to Netflix's servers and streams the data into the (most likely) flash-based player in the box - similar to the way your MS browser on your computer grabs it. There is nothing in the technology that necessarily inhibits the Unbox/TiVo from doing more than a 24 hour rental. The fact that practically everyone is susceptible to this 24 hour rental model suggests it is the corporate lawyers and the other industry players decreeing a 24 hour limit - it's DRM, not an issue with the player or service.
There is nothing that technologically allows the Roku box to get around this DRM issue. What the Roku/Netflix box has going for it is that, since it's an extension of NetFlix and these are streaming media, it's subsumed in your subscription (not actually free). That doesn't mean that NetFlix has really gotten around the 24 hour limit - they've just nullified its effect. How?
First, as Pogue points out, these aren't cutting edge movies - they are older titles and a lot of crap that have progressed through the industry's various "windows." You know when you would go to Blockbuster and you could take out the really old titles for a week at a time? Why? Nobody cared - there was no demand, they had been on tv for years, and income from renting them was seen as gravy. But try to take a hot, "new" title (an appellation that would still pertain like 2 years after its release) - and you had ... 24 hours (later expanded to 2 days, as I recall).
Second, it's streaming video. It's not being stored on your hard drives, so again no one cares. But because of that, quality and ease of use (see Pogue's description of "tv" quality video on a 2.2M cable connection and the rewind/fast forward concessions) suffer. Not to mention - what happens when you're network isn't quite up to snuff - or is getting hammered because all of your neighbors are also using the service. (Have I mentioned lately that I hate Comcast?)
Third, to the extent that anyone does care - it doesn't matter; it's free! Watch half an hour of this old title, stop the feed, get back two days later and restream the feed, skipping through the parts you've seen. You're not paying any more for the service, and Netflix is beaming the same amount of this uncared for schlock as if you were watching something new.
And again, I'm not saying this Netflix/Roku box isn't good. I like Netflix, and this is a very nice addition (even if I have to pay $99), and we might very well end up getting one for us and for our families. What I'm saying is someone ought to recognize what the TiVo/Unbox service brings, instead of bashing it as "fatally flawed."
The Unbox stuff is really quite cool.... Pogue even thought so, too. I can select the videos on the TiVo AND on the computer; on the computer I can select for watching on computer or on the TiVo. (It appears that you have to get on your computer and set up your Netflix instant view queue in order to see it on your Roku box.) If I buy a movie, it keeps it on the Unbox server, so I can delete the movie from my TiVo to save space, and then redownload it when I want to watch it again. I think I can even start to watch the movie before it finishes downloading. I can start a download from Unbox at work to my TiVo, and then it's available on TiVo when I get home. It takes a little while to download, but the video quality is better and I get better control of the movie. In fact, the Unbox is really tightly interwoven into TiVo - it operates just like a TiVo video, and TiVo's swivel search will find Unbox titles.
But most upsetting to me is that everyone is making a big deal out of this 1 day rental thing. I don't get it.
First, Unbox allows you to download the movie, wait up to a month, and then start watching it. My wife's response to this complaint was logical - I think the issue is sometimes you get a movie, and then something comes up, and you don't get to it right away. And I can see that; been there myself. But Unbox's 30 day "rental period" followed by a 24 hour "viewing period" gets around this problem rather elegantly.
Second, especially if you just get the movie and none of the extra material, how many people take more than a day to watch a movie, and how often do they do that? When I finally get a chance to sit down and watch a movie, the chances are very good I am going to watch that whole movie in one sitting. While a lot of people squawk about it, I have some serious questions about how many people take multiple sittings to watch a movie once they start. Yes, I can imagine situations in which it might take a couple of sittings to watch a movie; my roommate used to watch half an hour of a movie every morning while getting ready for work. But we're talking an 80-20 solution here. As Pogue himself points out, Netflix doesn't even see this thing as your exclusive movie service. The whole thing is premised upon the fact that when you want to see the latest movie (about 80% of the time), you'll get it from the mail service; when you want to see a movie now (the other 20%), you'll use the instant view service. I really believe the splits are something similar for this 24 hour thing: 80% of the people 80% of the time will watch a movie within 1 day (especially if they have to). It's not going to work for me the 20% of the time I want to watch a movie in more than one sitting (when I will likely use my Netflix subscription), or the 20% of the people who habitually watch their movies serially; but is that something that Unbox/TiVo needs to worry about? Is that something that they deserve to be knocked on? Especially when Netflix/Roku doesn't worry about it for their 80-20 solution, and doesn't get knocked for it?
And again - this isn't even Unbox/TiVo's fault. The 24 hour limit is a DRM issue, created by Hollywood lawyers. If you can convince Hollywood that their best interests rest in allowing an expansion of that time limit - it's a relatively easy to execute. What's the best amount of time? Again, an 80-20 solution I think would come close to something like 36 hours. Say I start to watch a movie at 6pm and watch it for 30 minutes. The next morning, while eating breakfast, I watch 15 minutes. I have a dinner I'm going to that night, so I don't get back to start watching the last 45 minutes or so until 10pm, and I still have plenty of time.
Whew - as always, a lot of words. But here's the quick and dirty.
| Issue | Unbox/TiVo | Netflix/Roku |
| 1. Download | You can use your PC or the TiVo box to select movies to rent or own | You must maintain your queue with your PC |
| 2. Speed | Takes longer to get a big enough chunk to start watching, but you can start remotely. | 20 seconds to start watching |
| 3. Cost | $4 for rental of most titles, $16 to buy | $99 initial outlay, cost subsumed in Netflix subscription |
| 4. DRM | 24 hour | N/A |
| 5. Quality | "Very good"; DVD-like | "TV-like" with a fast cable connection |
| 6. Library | Old and new | Not new/garbage |
If Unbox/TiVo is fatally flawed, so, too is Netflix/Roku. Will Unbox/TiVo beat out Netflix/Roku? Probably not, given the fact that Netflix/Roku is "free" and is supported by Netflix. Will it survive? Maybe not, if Netflix can catch on here in a big way. But I think Unbox/TiVo does a really good job, and if it fails, it won't be because it wasn't as good a product.
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Noel Schively
Noel Schively
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