Blockbuster Online
October 9, 2006
Gah, I should just have a category called Consumer Whore.
I like to watch movies – plain and simple. There is something about silence when I am alone at night that bothers me – so when it is late, I like to play DVD – just to have something going on in the background. It kind of started in Portland since Tom would work really late a lot and he would also go to bed really early. I would watch movies to kind of keep me company during those times.
The closest video store to me is Blockbuster. I don’t particularly like Blockbuster since their selection of movies is pretty limited – in my opinion at least. Then again my opinion is based on going to indie video stores in Tucson, (Casa Video) and Portland, (Clinton Street Video). Clinton Street video had such a large foreign section it was awesome. I could totally get my fill of Japanese gore movies there. Blockbuster is pretty blase when it comes to selection in comparison.
I did sign up for the Blockbuster rewards program though. It is $10/year, but you get 1 free movie rental coupon a month. I don’t know if the pricing structure is different in other states, but all videos- new and old – are like $4.79 to rent! Yikes! So by spending $10, I get about $60 worth of coupons. I can dig it.
They also like to push their Blockbuster online service whenever you rent something to. It’s basically Blockbuster’s version of Netflix. I have never tried Netflix, but I have wanted to, but a 2 week free trial is pretty short – expecially being in Hawaii since what are the chances that they are going to have a major distribution center here? Pretty slim I would say. Same thing with Blockbuster, but last time I went to the store, I got a trial code for 1 month free trial.
I am trying it out right now and the nice thing about Blockbuster online is that you also get a free movie rental coupon a week – which is good towards new releases as well – unlike the rewards free rental, which is only good on non new releases. The movies do take a few days to get here since most of the movies I have rented have been shipped from San Jose and so it also takes a few days to ship them back. I still have a couple more weeks of the trial and I am still debating if I should stick with it for a few months. They do have quite a few exercise DVD’s to rent – DVD’s that I have wanted to try but did not want to spend $10 or more and hope that I would like it.
I wonder if I should bring back a movie review section ala Jordan Hoffman. I knew him when I went to NYU all those years ago.
Filed under: Consumer Whore,Whatever
