Box Office Express comes to Greensboro, NC

This is hometown news to me. The University of North Carolina at Greensboro, my alma mater, has just installed a couple of Box Office Express machines in the student center and cafeteria, from which students can rent latest movie and game releases on DVD with the swipe of a credit card. Up 'til now, I've heard of these kiosks being available only in airports and Times Square, but now my city has them. They won't carry a very wide selection, so Netflix has nothing to fear :).

Netflix Official Site Crashes

I felt a great disturbance in the Force, as if millions of voices cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced.

Netflix Opens Three New Shipping Centers

Netflix Brings Faster Delivery to More Than Five Million Households With Three New Shipping Centers
LOS GATOS, Calif., Sept. 21 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ --

Netflix (Nasdaq: NFLX - News), the world's largest online movie rental service, today announced the opening of three new shipping centers. New facilities in Pittsburgh, PA, Baton Rouge, LA and Columbia, SC now serve more than five million households in Pennsylvania, Louisiana, South Carolina and Mississippi.

Netflix has said it expects five percent of all U.S. households to become Netflix members by 2006, resulting in five million members and generating approximately $1 billion in revenue.

Netflix can reach more than 85 percent of its subscribers with generally one business-day delivery.

More reasons to rent, NOT buy

There is a battle afoot among the video industry regarding which format of high definition will prevail. They are trying to make you upgrade your equipment to HD, including your DVDs. Going from VHS to DVD was a big enough step, but going from ordinary DVD to HD-DVD, is it worth it?

Sony has its own version of HD, called Blu-Ray. The New York Post reports that the reason Sony acquired the MGM movie library, was so that they could flood the market with their Blu-Ray formatted titles, essentially forcing everyone else to adopt their HD standard. They want you to replace your entire library of DVDs with Sony-formatted versions of the same thing, only "high definition".

"Most people are not eager to upgrade all over again", says Bill Hunt, editor of The Digital Bits newsletter.

Duh. Rent, don't buy. Don't let them milk you.

Netflix Official Site

Have you noticed that the Netflix ads on Google say "Netflix (r) Official Site"? It's because of all those pesky fan blogs masquerading as the Netflix site, that Netflix is afraid poor Googlers haven't been able to tell the difference! Or, it could be their affiliates' sites have been leading too many poor Googlers astray from the real site. Alas.

Star Wars is on DVD

By the way, Netflix doesn't list Star Wars as being a new release, but it's available on DVD now. If you wanted it to ship to you tomorrow, they should have received your latest returned disc today.

I wouldn't buy it, because George Lucas has fiddled with it too much, but I might rent it some day, just for laughs.

New trivia

Since I've known about Netflix for nine months now, I feel like an "expert", so I'm continually astonished at the online newspaper articles that report on Netflix like it's a brand-new phenomenon, like this one, from Minneapolis-St Paul, Minnesota.

Not alot of news here, but there are a couple of bits of new trivia to be found:

"We're in every state, in 3,000 cities," says Shannon Clouston, senior manager of corporate communications for Netflix

and

Last month...an astonishing 15 percent of Netflix shipments included the title "The Whale Rider."

and

95% of all online DVD rentals come from Netflix.

Motion to be filed in Securities Action against Netflix, Inc. on September 20, 2004

Scott Scott, LLC, Announce That It Intends to File Lead Plaintiff/s Motion in Securities Action against Netflix, Inc. on September 20, 2004

I think this is a silly lawsuit, but I must alert you anyway, because there is the potential that one of my readers is a member of the class.

European squatter

Here's an Austrian German-language (correct me if I'm wrong--I don't speak German) Netflix imitator who appears to be trading on the Netflix brand. Naughty, naughty.

The Cult Brand

Ryan Saghir, in his article Building the Cult Brand, discusses how Netflix can market their business using us rabid fan-bloggers:

Mass Customization is key to connecting the consumer with the brand. We're not talking about Cookie-writing techniques for "the page you built", but instead consumer outreach efforts for fan sites, community sites and blogs. These sites are tenticles of communication from the company directly to the consumer. Companies can simply wind up the people behind these sites and let them go; creating unpaid workers who put more effort behind the product than employees do (think the "unofficial guy" from Wendy's). As companies nuture these sites with information, support, and especially empowerment, they gain hoards of cultlike masses following (and purchasing) their every move.

Sound like anyone you know? He goes on to ask

Why is there no cult for Blockbuster, yet one for Netflix? Because the Blockbuster experience is plain old horrible.

If you're interested in marketing, it's a fascinating article.

Netflix's collection grows

I have removed the following movies:
Mean Streets (1973),
Freaks (1932) ,
The Sentinel (1977) , and
Shaolin Soccer (2001) from my Greencine queue, because they are "available now" via Netflix .

One Month Trial is back up!! ***UPDATED

I don't get paid by Netflix to do this, but if you email me, I can get you a ONE MONTH FREE TRIAL with Netflix. If you click on the link in my sidebar, or here, or any of the underlined Netflixes, you will get just a TWO WEEK TRIAL. You must be aware that you will be billed when your trial ends, if you fail to cancel before your anniversary date comes around again.

***THIS OFFER WAS DISCONTINUED 30 SEPTEMBER 2004.

The Internet at 35

Netflix is one of several good things about the Internet we can enjoy today. Did you know the Internet turned 35 this month?

Failed experiment

Y'all know I was on vacation last week. Well, I wanted my nephew to see The Black Pirate while I was out of town, so I changed my delivery address to his address, before Netflix sent it. I thought it would be a simple matter for Netflix to mail it to him rather than to me. Wrong! They still mailed it to my address. I think it's because I failed to change my billing address, too. They require your billing address and shipping address to be in the same zip code. Perhaps I could have gotten away with it, eh? If you try this experiment, let me know the results.

I can gloat, can't I?

Astute observer Anonymous, who said "Man, you had this idea long before it was announced", points out that I proposed the idea (now a rumor in Newsweek) of a partnership between Tivo and Netflix back in June. I hope all the hype doesn't jinx it. I think it's a great idea (if I do say so myself).

11 Things to Do With Your Netflix Account

Thanks to Luke for the tip: Screenwriting.ugo.com has a nice list of suggestions for your Netflix queue, in case you've run out of ideas.

Hacking NetFlix : Netflix Launches RSS Feeds

Mad props to Hacking NetFlix for staying on top of things while I was incommunicado. RSS feeds are something for which we Web-heads have been clamoring, so praise be to Netflix for making it happen! Y'all subscribe, now, y'hear?

P.S. If you're wondering where I was, I went to Dragon*Con Labor Day weekend, then Boston, the following few days, for the Lord of the Rings exhibit at the Museum of Science. I was a total geek for a week.

Misguided Affections: Hooray for Netflix

Another Netflix fan expresses her joy at discovering this great service.

Shanafelt Sector Reviews Peerflix & Number Slate

Thanks to HackingNetflix for this link.

Mike over at the Shanafelt Sector, he does a great job reviewing Peerflix and Number Slate. Mike takes an extremely in-depth look at two smaller Netlfix alternatives and he shares his experiences with us.

They both work by relying on users to mail the discs to each other, rather than using a centralized shipping warehouse.

If you're thinking about cheating on Netflix, er, trying out an alternative, I suggest you check out Mike's review first.

Self-serve videos in NYC

From the New York Times (registration required):

The store will resemble a bank lobby full of vending machines that renters can use to select a movie or video game.

Besides convenience and a large selection, Mr. de Laforcade is betting that customers will be attracted to the self-service store by the price. Movies will cost 99 cents for six hours or $2.50 for 24 hours with a free membership card. Users can also reserve a movie in advance on the company's Web site, www.moviebankusa.com, and the video will be blocked from other customers at the store for three hours. In addition, customers can sign up online to get an instant message or an e-mail when a movie that is not available is returned to the store's inventory.