Blockbuster Just Doesn't Get It

Oh Blockbuster. I remember walking into your store with my brother in the late 90's in awe of your awesome catalog of movies and videogames. I remember roaming the aisles, unsure of what movies to rent, while my mother anxiously waited to leave as we wasted time at your store. What Happened? I guess you never saw the technology train that hit you coming, and you continue to stumble trying to board this train. A fantastic example of your misguided approach to getting back on top is the failed attempt this past summer to move onto the Motorola Droid X.

As Blockbuster failed to see the war for movie rental supremacy moving from retail stores onto TV's and PC's, they have attempted to win the war as it moves onto mobile phones. The Droid X is one of the most incredible technological feats ever produced, with some of the most advanced video and internet capabilities for a phone ever, and it has seen rave reviews from critics and big sales. Blockbuster comes along with the droid as a free app, all you need to pay for is Blockbuster On Demand. When you find of the 125,000 movies in Blockbuster's catalog you desire to watch, you download it onto your phone, and you can watch it in HD on Droid's great video player. Putting Blockbuster on this pocket wizard would seem to be a big hit, however they fail to deliver based on their approach in combining with the Droid X.

The whole attempt to move to cell phone devices fails, even with all the advantages that the Droid X presents. For one, the HDMI plug in, which allows the Droid to project the videos on it onto an HDTV, is unable to project movies downloaded from Blockbuster, due to stupid copyright infringements. What is quite comical about this is that illegally downloaded movies work just fine. Another problem with the app is that when you rent or buy a movie, you must download it onto your phone, rather than stream it as you would with the Netflix iPhone app. This is a nuisance because a regular downloaded movie takes about 2 hours before it can be played, which kind of defeats the whole purpose of "On-Demand." The 2 hour download period is not so different from the old ordeal of going to the video store. And with the need for a WiFi connection throughout the downloading and that the 2 hour download will certainly kill your battery, the phone probably will need to stay still in a charger for the duration of the download. Kind of defeats the purpose of a "mobile" phone.

Before witnessing this futile attempt to join the mobile phone party, I thought that blockbuster just was unlucky in their foresight of where the business was headed, and that technology just outran the company. However, now I think that the company suffers from a greater problem, one of customer neglect. Blockbuster just doesn't take the hints that maybe people don't want to pay four dollars to rent a movie, when they can get it for free just as easily. Maybe people don't want to wait for 2 hours while a movie download kills their phone battery. Sure company's like Netflix and RedBox aren't perfect, but they try to make it as easy for their customer's to rent movies as possible. Blockbuster doesn't. Trying to get in with the Droid X was the right idea, however their lack of understanding of the consumer today defeated their purpose. As their revenue continues to slip (falling 15.6% each year), maybe they should remember that the customer always comes first.

http://skattertech.com/2010/07/blockbuster-android-app-for-droid-x-fails/

http://www.businessweek.com/the_thread/techbeat/archives/2010/06/blockbuster_moves_onto_droid_x.html

http://androidheadlines.com/2010/06/blockbuster-rolls-out-android-app-with-droid-x.html