Posts by Michael Gartenberg from May 20, 2008

Michael Gartenberg | May 20, 2008, 05:28 PM
Netflix Connects PC to the TV - First Take

Netflix has announced their first fruits for getting their streaming content from the PC to the TV. It's not a bad effort at $99 but at the moment it's more a geek toy than something with mass market appeal. The first issue is content. While Netflix offers a good selection for their disk business, their streaming content has very little in terms of new releases and very little depth. That means it's going to be a tough proposition to get consumers to pay an additional $99 for a new box. Second, there's resistance to how many boxes consumers will connect to their TV. I'm looking at some new data that we'll be publishing shortly in our digital home service that shows the limits. Traditionally, consumers have been willing to connect a TV content box (STB), a movie box (VHS, DVD, etc) and in some cases a game console. The Netflix box simply isn't good enough to replace the movie box anytime soon, lacking both content variety and HD offerings. In addition, consumers will have to deal with hassles they already face of connecting their devices to both home networks and the Internet.

This is a pretty good start for Netflix, but there's lot that will have to happen her before this goes from geek toy to mainstream consumer.