
Blockbuster's Bankruptcy Could Be the Beginning of the End for DVDs - duck
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/blockbusters_bankruptcy_could_be_the_beginning_of.php
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patio11
My father, who worked in real estate, predicted the demise of Blockbuster when
I was a little kid. In his opinion, they habitually overpaid for property
which did not advance their interests. "You have to understand, large chains
are real estate investment firms which run a side business in movies, burgers,
banking, etc."

The opposite is Walgreens and Starbucks, incidentally.

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tjr
In St. Louis, I've seen Walgreens shut down one store and open another one
literally across the street, at a _slightly_ better location (easier to get
into, easier to see coming from both directions on the street).

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patio11
They have very, very sharp operators who can tell you the difference in
expected value of three different ways to cut the egress from a particular
road, which is something you have to debate with government traffic planners.

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nanairo
I hated Blockbuster, their expensive deals and their poor selection... but
gosh, I kind of feel sad that they will exist no more. I feel like it's the
end of an era. :)

What next? Sony? Microsoft?

I feel so old... :)

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kmfrk
It sounds like a non-prediction with all the "could be the beginning".

Some people would also do well to remember that there's a world outside
America where Netflix, Hulu, etc. don't exist at all.

I stopped using Blockbuster, because there selection of movies and TV was
awful - as were their prices[^1] - but YMMV.

[1]: I could buy a discounted movie for the same price of renting it with
bargain bins and sites like Play.com

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kmfrk
*"Their" - ungh.

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kiba
I heard Netflix is named netflix not DVDFlix because the founder of netflix
forseen the death of the DVD mail delivery business.

Blockbuster seem to don't think of the future much. Netflix seem to be like
two steps ahead of everybody.

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MartinCron
Also, DVDFlix is a terrible, terrible name.

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mansilla
This reminds me of the demise of the brick and mortar chain Egghead Software,
which was coincidentally adjacent to the Blockbuster in the town where I grew
up. I realize it's not exactly the same because it's not like
broadband/streaming/Netflix killed Egghead; however, Egghead and its
contemporaries were the only way, at one point, to really see (and salivate
over) the latest and greatest software titles. How many standalone software
stores do you see these days?

Definitely, the days of the blue-chip brick and mortar movie rental operations
are over. Blockbuster has attempted to enter the RedBox kiosk market.. but
IMHO, it's too little, too late. Even that market has a very limited life
expectancy.

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muhfuhkuh
I just saw a line of 7-8 in front of a redbox at the grocery store by my
house, and _right next to it_ the blockbuster bluebox was sitting idle. The
people have spoken.

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pstuart
The fact that redbox was not a blockbuster development is final proof of why
blockbuster _should_ die.

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Kilimanjaro
You rent betamax tapes, the market changes, you adapt.

Now you rent vhs tapes, the market changes, you adapt.

Now you rent dvds, the market changes, you don't adapt.

You fail...

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DerKommissar
You're right of course, but that last jump is quite a bit larger than the
others.

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jacquesm
Is anybody actually surprised about this? If you are go read that 'old'
classic 'being digital' by Nicholas Negroponte.

This was exactly on schedule, really.

Anything that can be digitized is at risk, and will eventually go the way of
the Dodo. Including books, even though the sentimental and practical aspects
there are very strong.

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ghshephard
The following graph (and future version), provides some predictions on the
likely commercial success of Blockbuster (and RedBox, to some degree) over
time:

[http://tctechcrunch.files.wordpress.com/2010/08/pewbroadband...](http://tctechcrunch.files.wordpress.com/2010/08/pewbroadband.png)

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ShabbyDoo
So, how long until BestBuy goes down in a similar way? Unlike clothing, few of
their products require a consumer's hands-on examination before purchase. Why
would someone bother walking into one of their stores when Amazon has the item
for mess? There's considerable evidence that BestBuy understands this and is
hedging with a services model (GeekSquad and some acquisition I can't recall).
But, a services model doesn't require their current realestate portfolio.

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invisible
Best Buy caters to getting people in the store to touch products, once people
are the staff tries to encourage "getting it now." Sure, they could wait a
week and get that digital camera for $100 less, but most people want to touch
the thing they are buying and get it instantly (in America, at least).

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mattew
I think the author chose a poor title for the article. The continuing
shrinkage of Blockbuster is just a continuing reinforcement of the fact that
DVD sales and rentals will decrease as digital downloads and streaming
continue their growth. If anything this is confirmation that the end is a lot
closer than the begining.

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ghshephard
From the article:

"DVDs are going away. This already happened with music. One day that vast
majority of us will no longer buy physical copies of movies and keep them on a
shelf. Netflix realizes this - which is exactly why they want to get out of
the expensive rent-by-mail business and completely focus their efforts online
with streaming content."

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ShabbyDoo
I perceive NetFlix's DVD-by-mail strategy as an ingenious hack to get market
penetration into a market which required eventual movement by large entities
-- (1) the telcoms to provide sufficient bandwidth to consumers and (2) the
studios to allow their content to be streamed. It was obvious that #1 and #2
would have to happen eventually, but only a fool would have built a business
whose success was contingent on the timing of these changes. Brilliant.

