I was cruising the free rentals on Amazon Unbox earlier this morning and noticed that BBC shows are starting to get the right idea. I have written before how there is no way that I can make sense of the current "play it once within 24 hours"policy on digital rentals. And I do not see any family with children going this way. As long as hard disc rentals are infinitely more flexible and cheaper, Netflix will continue to be my best friend.
However, I am willing to play with the free rentals available on Amazon Unbox every week- especially the great Shakespeare productions that the BBC is releasing right now. Interestingly enough, when I downloaded The Tempest this morning( quick, go grab it- it is free until March 2), the notice read this:
" Your videos will be available to play on XXXXX for 30 days. Once you have pressed play for the first time, you will have 168 hours to watch that video."
It is still a "play once only" situation, but at least the window to complete a playback has been stretched to a week- significantly more reasonable. I checked another non-BBC rental on Amazon, and it was still a 24 hour playback window, so this is apparently not an Amazon policy, but a studio policy.
I am starting to have faith that if I just wait long enough, the studios might actually get a clue, get digital rentals right and my Netflix account will go away.
What will it take for you to move to digital rentals??
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