Blockbuster, Movielink and Private Movie Viewing

You can read a lot into Blockbuster's decision today to buy studio-owned movie download operation Movielink. You could point to Blockbuster flailing to keep up with Netflix, or Movielink's inability to win much of an audience in the five years since it launched. Movielink needs Blockbuster's brand and marketing, and Blockbuster needs Movielink's ability to offer movie downloads to computers via the Net.

But why now? For one, it's about fidelity vs. convenience. Until recently, movie downloads to PCs had neither, which is a losing formula.

The main target for downloads has always been laptops -- because of convenience. In your home, it's more convenient -- i.e. easier -- to watch a movie on your TV using a DVD, TiVo or a cable company's movies on demand service. The only reason to watch a movie on a laptop is when you need to carry a movie with you, like on a plane, or to your cabin in the woods. Even then, it's so far been easier to bring along a DVD to play in your laptop than go through all the hoops to download a movie.

And then, the fidelity -- the quality of the experience of watching a movie -- until recently pretty much sucked on a laptop. The screens have been too small and dull, the sound tinny. Now, though, multimedia laptops offer wide bright screens and nice sound.

So movie downloads are finally moving out of the no-man's land of low fidelity and low convenience, barely nudging into decent fidelity and not-so-bad convenience. As Internet movie downloads head further in this direction, they will become a bigger business. And that's what Blockbuster sees coming.