Amazon's Digital Video sneak peek: "Amazon Unbox"
It seems Amazon might soon be launching their digital video download store, called "
Amazon Unbox Video". According to what I can find, it'll have purchase and rental capability, as well as support for devices other than your PC (Your TV and Creative Zen Vision at least). They also have a standalone video player, somewhat like iTunes (Windows XP and Windows NT only it seems)
Here are screenshots of the pages and the player. Click pic to see it large.
Main page:
Player download page:
20th Century Fox content page:
Sci-Fi page:
Amazon Unbox Player Screens (I was able to install, but not log in with the player, so these are how it appears offline)
Player (initial screen)
Player (details shown - prod info/pics/imdb info)
Player ("player" tab)
Player ("devices" tab)
Note that the main Unbox Video page is still a 404 (http://amazon.com/b/?node=16261631), and that many images are broken, and video detail pages do not work. Here are the pages on Amazon where I found these screens above (they aren't linked from anywhere in Amazon that I can find)
Main pageDownload page20th Century Fox pageSci-Fi pageI discovered this by first reading a post over on
HackingNetflix.com, about the digital video. I looked at
this cached Google page, and noticed the browse node for Digital Video was "16261631". Then I Googled for "amazon" and "16261631", and found
these results for browsenodes.com - an automated way for Amazon Webservices folks to find and use browse node IDs. They even have nice links straight into Amazon, which is how I found all of this.
One disclaimer: yes I did used to work for Amazon (over 2 years ago), and still know quite a few folks there - but - I know nothing about this video launch, and discovered it all as I explain above. It seems quite close to done, I wonder how long until launch? (Or if this is already in some sort of Beta test)
21 Comments +
http://www.UnboxVideo.com/
When you downloaded the video player:
1) Was there a burn to DVD option?
2) Did Sonic Solutions develop the player?
In going through the links on that browsenodes.com site, I managed to add one of the videos to my Amazon shopping cart (Office Space, good movie!). Tried to do a checkout, but I couldn't get past the "enter your credit card number" page on Amazon.
alan,
you certainly gave everyone a 'heads-up', especially Amazon Associates - thanks!
-nick
Good story...
Also, see new service from Amazon: http://www.technologymadness.com/?p=193
Hopefully it uses Play For Sure, you'll be able to transfer the videos to hundreds of portable devices and it will work with Viiv and Live.
Even at $9.98 per download, I'll still hit the Walmart bargain bin and get the real deal, enjoy it on my 42" plasma w/ Dolby Digital 7.1, rather than sit at my desk looking at my 21" LCD w/ stereo speakers. Am I missing something?
who cares
I might be wrong but looks to me like yet another online service that a) isn't that cheap and b) doesn't let you watch the content on a TV. Sign me up!
Hmmm.. a 404? Better file a ticket on that.. ;)
They seem to have removed most of the traces. But failed :)
http://www.amazon.com/b/?ie=UTF8
And not on a Macintosh? No way to put videos on an ipod?
Also: ugly! What did they do, slap the Windows Media player inside some five-minute Photoshop bevel-n-dropshadow job?
i'm sure they would support the ipod if they could but jobs doesn't let the other little kids play on his playground... though the french may come the the rescue and allow others with better selection and pricing (like amazon here) to user the ipod as a platform.
It plain doesn't work. I keep getting prompted to DL the Unbox when I try to get a video. It charged me everytime. Now I'm charged for five videos that never downloaded.
Pure junk - total rip off. Downloads do not work and you'll be charged anyway.
good story
good luck to them...i think the business model is flawed. i hope it did not cost them a lot to develop.
The design of the player is awesome. Good luck for them
nice blog...congrats for being note a blog
good blog
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