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'Game Changing' Video Download Offering From Wal-Mart Closes... No One Notices
from the nice-work,-guys dept
Back in February, Wal-Mart launched its video download service and we were among many who declared it dead on arrival, noting that it was no different than all the other failed movie download offerings: pricey, limited selection and overly restrictive DRM. It seemed pretty clear that it was going nowhere fast... and that's exactly what it did. Reuters is now reporting that Wal-Mart shut down the site. Oddly Reuters claims that when it launched unnamed experts "hailed" it as a "game changer." Who are these experts? Shouldn't they be identified (and maybe asked to defend those initial claims)?
Luckily, while Reuters chooses not to identify the analyst, it only took a quick Googling to discover that it was the rather infamous Rob Enderle who called Wal-Mart's offering a "game changer" in an old Reuters article by the same author. This raises a question that has been asked many times before. Why does the press still quote Enderle, who has a long history of being consistently and laughably wrong? Remember, he was also the analyst who declared Bluetooth dead just as it was really picking up steam. And while we're pointing out Enderle's misses, it's probably also worth pointing out his prediction that the iPhone would be a huge drag on Apple's earnings and that marketing surrounding Microsoft's Vista launch would drown out any attention towards the iPhone. Want to revise that, perhaps?
Back to the Wal-Mart "game changer" flop, what's most amusing about the failure is that, as Gizmodo points out, the site was actually shut down over a week ago... and absolutely no one noticed until Reuters came out with a report late Thursday. Wal-Mart claims it shut down the site because HP discontinued the technology that ran the store, which also seems like a strange explanation. If you're serious about opening up a video download store, you probably shouldn't be relying on someone else providing the technology -- especially if there's a half decent chance that that company will pull the plug pretty quickly as it has almost nothing to do with the company's core business. HP blamed the fact that the market didn't develop "as expected." Perhaps the problem was that the store HP/Wal-Mart set up used incredibly restrictive and totally unnecessary DRM that made the service close to worthless. But rather than actually revamping the service to make it something useful the companies have given up altogether. It makes you wonder why they even bothered in the first place.
Luckily, while Reuters chooses not to identify the analyst, it only took a quick Googling to discover that it was the rather infamous Rob Enderle who called Wal-Mart's offering a "game changer" in an old Reuters article by the same author. This raises a question that has been asked many times before. Why does the press still quote Enderle, who has a long history of being consistently and laughably wrong? Remember, he was also the analyst who declared Bluetooth dead just as it was really picking up steam. And while we're pointing out Enderle's misses, it's probably also worth pointing out his prediction that the iPhone would be a huge drag on Apple's earnings and that marketing surrounding Microsoft's Vista launch would drown out any attention towards the iPhone. Want to revise that, perhaps?
Back to the Wal-Mart "game changer" flop, what's most amusing about the failure is that, as Gizmodo points out, the site was actually shut down over a week ago... and absolutely no one noticed until Reuters came out with a report late Thursday. Wal-Mart claims it shut down the site because HP discontinued the technology that ran the store, which also seems like a strange explanation. If you're serious about opening up a video download store, you probably shouldn't be relying on someone else providing the technology -- especially if there's a half decent chance that that company will pull the plug pretty quickly as it has almost nothing to do with the company's core business. HP blamed the fact that the market didn't develop "as expected." Perhaps the problem was that the store HP/Wal-Mart set up used incredibly restrictive and totally unnecessary DRM that made the service close to worthless. But rather than actually revamping the service to make it something useful the companies have given up altogether. It makes you wonder why they even bothered in the first place.
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https://mediadownloads.walmart.com/faq.html
What the hell else do people use for a portable viewer?
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Re:
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here's another one!
http://rcrnews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071103/SUB/71103007/1017
Looks like he has a say on almost everything out there!
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Add this to the "Bandwidth crunch"
Have you ever tried to download a movie (legally or illegally) it takes a huge bandwidth pipe to bring in 4-5GBytes or 15-25GB for an HD-DVD(or BlueRay).
That takes hours of dedicated download time of your "bandwidth crunch", "ISP will now meter you connection" internet connection.
When the toll gets too expensive, people will find other ways.
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Don't Dismiss Enderle ...
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The irony here is that Wal-Mart relied on HP that relied on Microsoft and AOL relies on Amazon that relies on Microsoft which itself no longer relies on its own PlaysForSure. When a core component of a product or service depends on the rate of innovation of another party over which you have no control or influence, it's time to rethink strategy. It's also time to ask yourself, twice or thrice removed from core competency, should you really be in such a business?
Strategic design risks (1): Wal-Mart's foolhardy reliance on "partners"
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I like Rob Enderle
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Experts are...
I did a Google search on "game changer" +Enderle and it gave me a lot of results, and if you read, you can have a laugh, if you are bored and got nothing else to do.
I did it because I am doing the laundry and I am between loads, reading Techdirt, flaming this moron, the latter been the greatest reason.
Getting back to the topic, beside the "expert", I have a generic iPod, a Zune and a Zen V Plus. Maybe I was going to be able to see their videos in the Zen's 1.5" OLED Display, which is great for the home made racing videos of my 3000GT VR4 and music, but not so great for movies.
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If Enderle is as wrong as you claim (I've never read anything by him) I'm guessing the press is using him as a professional devil's advocate. Sort of like what John C. Dvorak does with Apple users. When everyone is saying "it's white," it's good business to have at at least one person talk about how "it's really black" just to get readers riled up.
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Re:
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69 out of 38 Experts agree that DRM is good for the consumer!
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game changing or maybe not
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digimon
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