Recently, both Vudu and Amazon provided instant gratification for people buying DVDs or Blu-ray discs. These announcements are likely to bring digital lockers into primetime. Vudu announced that it will delivery physical and digital copies together with Toy Story 3, allowing the instant gratification of Video on Demand, coupled with a physical disc which can be picked up at Walmart (Vudu’s parent). This strategy will give customers a chance to become familiar with the Vudu platform with little risk, provide instant gratification for the impulse purchase, and drive traffic to Walmart stores among video customers. No word on other titles to be included in this program.
Amazon’s similar “Disc+ On Demand” announcement was more far-reaching, covering 10,000 titles! This will include previous purchases of eligible titles. Unfortunately, none of the three items recently purchased for me as a gift by Mom – Cars, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, or March of the Penguins was available. Even if they were, I would need to log into my mom’s account! Hopefully, they will work out a way to gift a digital copy as the service becomes more popular.
Assuming Vudu does expand its offerings – which one should you choose? It depends on what brand of internet TV you use, as shown on HD guru. If you use an internet adaptor, Roku and Google TV both support Amazon VoD but not Vudu. Boxee supports Vudu both not Amazon VoD. Apple TV doesn’t support either!
