Follow up on Netflix

Here are two interesting pieces of news out today related to the Netflix piece:

http://newteevee.com/2008/05/27/sony-tru2way-no-more-set-top-boxes/

http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/05/28/amazon-ready-to-unbox-video-streaming-for-digital-movies/


I hope to write a little more about it later today. In brief, there are two trends that seem to continually be popping up.

1) Convergence - as the internet platform continues to emerge and develop, we will have to stop thinking of consumer devices in terms of purpose. Forget the labels that subdivide. No more TV v. set-top box v. (HD)-DVD player v. Video game console. There is hardware that can deliver the internet/software experience to you. That's it. Some are smaller. Some are bigger. Some are in your living room. Some are in the bedroom. But you can access anything digital (and offline stuff as well) from anywhere, anytime. Obviously this will happen in stages. But it is a major trend to watch.

2) Ubiquity - Content will become ubiquitous while the distributors will fall to the background. Forget the notion of websites and destinations. Think of widgets, RSS feeds, and mashups. The future is in the customized experience. You will be able to download that movie directly to your TV in seconds. The Itunes closed platform will break down. How you decide who you get your content from (Itunes, Amazon, etc) will be an interesting part of the transition? Obviously it will continue to drive the price of digital content down to it's marginal cost of $0. Advertising will continue to play a big role. But why would I go to Amazon vs. Itunes vs. etc to get a movie? What will be the differentiator if it's not price or platform lock-in?