Consumers Respond to Amazon Deal of the Day With Confusion

Amazon’s Deal of the Day Wednesday, featuring a discount on select HD movies purchased and downloaded from Amazon Instant Video service, revealed how complicated and confusing the concept of cloud-based ownership is for consumers. Amazon’s deal, to own 22 HD movies from Amazon Instant Video for under $5 each, or $4 for the standard-def version, included The Wizard of Oz, The Dark Knight, The Goonies, Phantom of the Opera, Sherlock Holmes, Gone With the Wind, Willie Wonka & The Chocolate Factory, The Blind Side, The Shining, 300, Batman Begins, The Shawshank Redemption, The Matrix, Happy Feat, Casablanca, Singin’ in the Rain, National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, The Departed, The Town, The Hangover, 2001: A Space Odyssey and Amadeus Director’s Cut.

By comparison, cloud-based HD versions of Rango and Hugo for purchase from Amazon Instant Video were $9.99 and $11.99 Wednesday. Amazon Prime members could stream for free Wednesday The King’s Speech, a featurette from Salt, a Harry Potter featurette and The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, we found. The latter was available for purchase for Prime members at $7.99 and for rent to non-Prime members for $2.99.

According to the deal site, purchased videos will be stored in customers’ video libraries where they can access them “whenever you want” for viewing on a PC, Kindle Fire, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360 or more than 300 HDTVs, Blu-ray players, and set-top devices, it read. At noon EST Wednesday, the promo read that it was good for 15 more hours “or until they're all gone."

Amazon customers were divided -- and many confused -- about the deal and how the cloud-based service worked, as noted in comments on the Amazon website. “Michael Hornback” thought it was a good deal and he looked forward to checking out the titles. “C. Oliver” advised others to check the fine print because buyers don’t “own” anything. “John Doe” said he'd prefer not to have the video “chomping up space” on his hard drive so “give me a disc instead,” evidently not understanding the concept of content ownership in the cloud-based world. “Closer” responded to those concerned about not owning the movie with: “I have owned numerous videos purchased from Amazon for years, and they do me the favor of keeping it for me, in the cloud, so I don’t have to store it anywhere.” Closer said he can watch videos any time he wants “just as much as I own the money I have in my bank account.” While Closer can’t hold a movie in his hands, “it’s still mine to use as a I please. Seems like ownership to me."

"T. Lack” said “you can only watch standard-def videos on your PC.” “MW” responded that it is possible to watch Blu-ray movies on PC with a Blu-ray player and “the right software.” “George Marquise Jr.” commented on Amazon’s “until they're all gone” caveat, noting sardonically, “like you're getting something tangible. … In this stored format, they're never all gone. … They can allow millions to access.” “Samantha” was disappointed in the content offered, calling the titles “bogus” and “not worth the money."

Several customers commented on the advantage of not having disc clutter to deal with when storing owned content in the cloud. But “Connie HP” lamented that you can’t loan cloud content to a friend the way you can with a disc. “Ellen Ripley” was interested in owning National Lampoon Christmas Vacation but as an Amazon Prime member that title has been available to her for a limited time for free as a streamed title so she'd hate to pay for something already available for free. As someone who usually prefers to own disc-based media, “Demetrio Amog” was “extremely tempted” by the offer except that the Amazon Instant Video app on Wii U is “so horrendously slow just to navigate to a movie” that for even $5, “it’s not really worth it."

Amazon showed the Blu-ray package cover of each title with the Blu-ray Disc logo replaced by the letters HD in the blue strip where the Blu-ray Disc logo would typically appear on packaged content. A trademark notice on the Blu-ray Disc Association’s website noted that Blu-ray Disc, Blu-ray, Blu-ray 3D, BD-Live, Bonusview, BDXL, Avcrec “and the logos are trademarks of Blu-ray Disc Association.” We queried the licensing arm of the BDA about whether the use of the HD designation in the blue stripe typically reserved for the Blu-ray logo violated any BDA trademarks but didn’t receive a response by our deadline. Queries to Amazon about details of the promotion also weren’t answered by our deadline.

Meanwhile, Amazon said Wednesday that the 2012 holiday season broke a record for businesses selling on Amazon, with unit growth from U.S. sellers in the U.S. rising by more than 40 percent year-over-year. Worldwide, sellers on Amazon sold “hundreds of millions of units worth tens of billions of dollars,” the company said. Amazon claims an active customer base of 188 million worldwide. The e-tailer’s Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) service enables sellers to have Amazon ship products directly to customers and offer their customers Amazon Prime benefits, free shipping, exporting to international customers and product return service, the company said. Other services available to third-party sellers in 2012 included the Amazon Webstore platform to run shopping sites, Amazon’s payment method and product ad clicks to drive traffic to stores, it said.