Here is the letter Comcast sent the FCC after eyebrows were raised when Level 3 accused the cable company of setting up a effective tollgate to collect fees when L3 tried to deliver Netflix content to Comcast customers. [More]
movies
Comcast Charges Toll For Netflix Delivery
By 11.30.10
The largest broadband backbone provider in the world says Comcast has set up a tollbooth, charging it a fee to deliver Netflix content to Comcast customers. “This action by Comcast threatens the open Internet and is a clear abuse of the dominant control that Comcast exerts in broadband access,” said Level 3 in a statement. [More]
Coors Can To Show Up In PG-Rated Movie
By 11.30.10
Even though Coors Brewing Company didn’t pay Walt Disney Pictures to place a beer can in the PG-rated movie Tron: Legacy, the can still ended up in there somehow. Whether or not Coors masterminded the appearance, one could argue that Coors is marketing its beer to underage viewers. [More]
Why Amazon Studios Is Bad For Wannabe Screenwriters
By 11.24.10
Entering the production side of the movie industry, Amazon launched Amazon Studios, which offers writers and filmmakers a potential way to break into the industry by offering up their work to Amazon for exclusive, 18-month contracts. Once the work is the property of Amazon, it competes in contracts, is subject to rewriting and can potentially turn into a real movie one day. [More]
Your Clever Netflix Plan Vs Reality
By 11.22.10
You get on the Netflix plan thinking you’ve scored such a great deal. Unlimited movies per month! By the time I’m done plundering the cinema archives, I’ll be only paying cents a film! Take that, movie theater and rental store! But then slowly your interest wanes as the novelty wears off. Soon that early Bergman flick is collecting dust and you realize you’re paying a monthly fee for a red and white coffee coaster… [More]
What Fictional Products Do You Wish Were Real?
By 11.16.10
Re-watching the Back to the Future movies recently, I remembered how deeply the tween me once longed for a hover board like the one Michael J. Fox races around the Hill Valley of 2015. While it’s unlikely that we’ll see a real hover board on the market in the next five years, the 30-something me still wants one. [More]
Redbox Will Stream Movies Next Year
By 11.1.10
Not content to beckon to you subliminally from its kiosks planted in heavily trafficked areas, Redbox’s corporate parent Coinstar announced it will launch a streaming service next year. Teaming with an unannounced partner, the instant rental service will go head to head with the Netflixes and Hulus of the world. [More]
Netflix Now Considers Itself A Streaming Company That Happens To Also Mail DVDs
By 10.21.10
Netflix is now an online content streaming company that has a nice little side business in mailing DVDs, according to CEO Reed Hastings. [More]
Lucas Figures Out Way To Make You See Star Wars Movies In Theaters Again
By 9.29.10
People who are sick of Star Wars have new reason to hope the world will come to an end in 2012, because the Hollywood reporter says that’s the year the films will start hitting theaters in 3D. [More]
Theater Chain Fights Back Against Texting During Movies
By 9.21.10
I don’t go to the movies much these days because I’m in NYC, and I don’t want bedbugs crawling all over me like that scene in Peter Jackson’s King Kong remake. But if I did go to the movies, I wouldn’t, because the last several times I went there was always some fool texting within my line of sight. Now a theater chain based in Arizona is launching a nationwide campaign to try to get through to these self-involved types that texting in a darkened theater is wrong. [More]
Netflix Will May Let You Stream 'The Expendables' Shortly After It Hits Blu-ray/DVD
By 9.10.10
To Blockbuster and other competitors, Netflix must seem like the guy in a game of Monopoly who collects Boardwalk and Park Place early on, then proceeds to run everyone else out of business with a grin. The rental giant reached a deal with Nu Image/Millennium Group (distributors of The Expendables and Brooklyn’s Finest) to stream its films shortly after they reach home video. [More]
My Code For A Digital Copy Of District 9 Won't Work, Sony Won't Help
By 9.9.10
Realizing that rampant movie piracy has as much to do with the way consumers want to watch a film with their unwillingness to pay for it, some home video studios include codes to transfer digital copies of the films along with Blu-rays. [More]
Blockbuster Filing For Bankruptcy In September
By 8.27.10
Blockbuster told Hollywood studios that it’s planning to file for bankruptcy in mid-September. [More]
Netflix Now Streams To iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch
By 8.27.10
Adding a feature Apple junkies have been clamoring for, Netflix upgraded its App Store application to allow it to stream movies and TV shows for subscribers. [More]
Get A Movie Ticket For Only $4
By 8.26.10
Groupon is running a deal where you can get a movie ticket voucher for only $4 through Fandango. [More]
Blockbuster Charges Me For Membership I Didn't Want, Won't Refund My Money
By 8.24.10
Chris tried Blockbuster’s rent-by-mail trial period and says he was mistakenly charged for the final three DVDs, which he had returned. He didn’t notice the screw-up for months, then once he finally got Blockbuster to reverse the charges he was billed $43 for months of a membership he never used. [More]
Stripping Chatroulette Chick Morphs Into Last Exorcism Hell Spawn
By 8.20.10
It’s a given that anything real, raw or underground will eventually be coopted by advertising. Exhibit A: In a viral marketing push for new horror flick Last Exorcism, unsuspecting boys think the hot chick they are Chatrouletting with is going to take off her top, when all of a sudden her eyes roll back into her head, her face cracks, and she attacks the camera. The reactions are priceless. NSFW. [More]
Warner Bros. Batman-Blocks Apple Users From Digital Copy
By 8.16.10
Apple enthusiast David was annoyed to discover his Blu-ray of the animated film Batman: Under the Red Hood won’t allow him to use the download voucher to get a digital copy of the film that will play on his Mac or iPod. He feels misled because he had no such trouble with previous digital copy transfers, even from other Batman movies. [More]
