Wal-Mart Debuts VUDU Movie Service on iPad as Web App, Shutting Down MP3 Store

[bruinsrme]

Here is where retailers are short sited on the 30% to Apple. If this had been an in app purchase, I would have tried this service out. I will not sign up for this on their site, have another credit card and password I have to manage (especially when I get identity ganked again) so instead, they will get none of my money. They are really overlooking the benefits of an already established account that is easy to access.

Wal mart has an enormous influence on retail.
The promotions they could run to get people to use their service are endless.
Everything from spend X amount of dollars get a free movie, by a game console, tv, dvd playet get X amount of movies free.
Once the person is signed up the convenience of the service is established.
How do you keep people coming back, another promo.
Perhaps they won't make a ton of money on the service, however they could easily make up for it in the amounts the consumer spends at their stores and site.

 

[rdowns]

... they are pushing it as one of their big features! Time to correct the article?

http://www.vudu.com/difference.html

.

 

[doctor-don]

Again?

Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. (NYSE: WMT), branded as Walmart since 2008 and Wal- Mart before then, ...


Ed. Note: Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. (NYSE: WMT) is the legal name of the corporation. The name "Walmart," expressed as one word and without punctuation, is a trademark of the company and is used analogously to describe the company and its stores. Use the legal name when it is necessary to identify the legal entity, such as when reporting financial results, SEC filings, litigation or governance matters.
[http://walmartstores.com/AboutUs/]

 

[h0mi]

The vudu store "app" is pretty interesting but I don't think I'll use it. I don't use Vudu on my ps3 often and doubt I'd buy any videos from them, nevermind rent.

Sad to hear about the walmart store closing, though I've not bought music from them in years. The music I bought lacked DRM and they've sold DRM-free music for some time now. I'd rather we had more, not fewer options for buying music so this news is unfortunate.

 

[wwchris]

.

Missed that. Stupid fine print Thanks.

 

[wwchris]

I really don't think most people would mind or care, and perhaps they use paypal, but you actually think losing someone like you as a potential customer (which they probably aren't since you give off the vibe of being really loyal to Apple) is worst than or even in the same level as losing 30% of their sales.

I wasn't quite able to parse that up above, but it is not about being Apple loyal, it is about wanting simplicity and consistency in my experience.I work in an industry that sells online product and I can tell you that we lose the vast (as in about 85% of potential customers) at the account creation screen.

70% of something is better than 100% of nothing. I would have potentially spent hundreds over time on a service like this if it was good.

For the guy who mentioned Wal-Mart's market influence and incentives, how did that work out for their MP3 store? Apple is a much bigger company than Wal-Mart at this point.

 

[Dahamma]

Apple provides very valuable service even in those cases: they bring the customers, with existing accounts, credit cards, and trust in the iTunes system; they handle the financial transactions, as well as customer service relating to those transactions; they build and maintain the online store where the “free” player is promoted and discovered; they host the app (storage, power, insurance, staff, bandwidth) and all future updates, including automatically pushing out app updates to all users, which is of grear value to the media company, not just the users. None of that is free for Apple to design, build, test, or operate.

Completely incorrect in almost all areas there.

Even when you handle you own customer acquisition (ie they just log in to the iPad app), customer service, or host anything other than a trivial app download on their servers (certainly not the content!), they still want 30%.

And that 30% is more of a margin than most digital VOD distribution companies even get from the transaction in the first place, making it a losing business just to offer an iOS app. But Apple doesn't care about that, because the 2 options they offer are to take the entire profit margin for the transaction, or to force it to be priced 30% higher than their own iTunes offering. Win-win - for them...

 

[rbasra]

I personally think VUDU is overpriced. Right now, the elephant in the room is definitely Netflix. However, I feel that if Apple were to acquire Hulu or another service - they have the capability of overtaking Netflix any day - the current pricing structure for Apples rentals are still fairly high and the main medium is AppleTV which hasn't really taken off. The best strategic move for apple would be to launch an iTV, which makes sense based on their product roll out timelines (iPod, iPod touch, iPhone 2007, iPad 2010) so if they were to release an iTv in 2013 with a unlimited streaming service, people will flock to it, and as we all know with Apple - they make skeptical people buy their products after they see a friend or family member using one - they find new uses for it themselves.

 

[winston1236]

every movie should come with a fat woman to ask for your receipt like at their stores

 

[ShotgunD]

is it really bad for apple?

Apple might be losing some cash, like it really needs their measly 30%, but if they are going to "circumvent" apple by moving to HTML5 web aps, doesn't that just help apple push flash out the window quicker to its eventual demise?

 

[sschwar4]

Based on the terms of service, the content purchased is really a long term rental, not purchase.

Cancellation Policy
Content purchased on VUDU is nontransferable and will be deleted from your VUDU Device(s) and your VUDU Account upon cancellation of your VUDU Account. Cancellation of your VUDU Account will also terminate your access to Content that you have purchased and/or rented.

Once your account has been closed, you will not be able to re-open your VUDU Account in the future.