Filed under: Home Entertainment, Portable Video

The New York Post came out hard yesterday with a piece about how Wal-Mart is threatening movie studios over the iTunes Movie Store, to which the retail giant quickly responded with a statement denying the claims. The NYP claims that Wal-Mart is telling studios that they’ll start ordering fewer DVD movies if the studios jump aboard the iTMS bandwagon, similar to their temporary reaction when TV shows started being sold by Apple. Wal-Mart quickly disputed the claims, saying “While we recognize there are various current and potential providers of this service, we are not dissuading studios from conducting business with other providers.” According to Reuters, a source “familiar with the situation” says that while Wal-Mart “freaked out” over TV show sales, the online sales haven’t impacted their own, and they’re not too concerned over iTunes movie sales. None of this really confirms or denies rumours of Wal-Mart prepping their own download store, but we’re definitely not giving up hope of a price-slasher moving to the online space.

[Via Slashdot]

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Read - Reuters (isn’t)

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Filed under: Home Entertainment, Portable Video

We’ve heard rumblings for a while — and Wal-Mart’s purported intense opposition to the iTunes Movie Store might’ve had something to do with it as well — but now the rumors are coming hot and heavy in regards to a movie download store from the retail giant. First off, we have a new job listing from Wal-Mart in regards to a business manager for a digital video division who can sort out “pricing strategies to maximize market share.” And then there’s a report by CNN Money citing “sources” that say Wal-Mart is hoping to launch in the coming months, and is currently debating pricing structures. (If only they had a business manager who could sort out “pricing strategies to maximize market share.”) Wal-Mart is also supposedly considering in-store kiosks, and a deal to allow for a free digital version of a movie with the purchase of a physical DVD, or at least for a few dollars more. Wal-Mart of course wouldn’t confirm or deny these report, but dropped some big juicy hints such as: “Our customers want to watch movies and they want to be able to make the choice when and how they want to view them.” Right now it looks like a natural move for Wal-Mart, and we sure wouldn’t complain if they manage to drive prices down — as seems to be their way — but we’ll let them and that business manager figure things out for now while we head over to iTunes for a bit of The Princess Diaries.

[Via Techcrunch]

Read - Wal-Mart sets stage for digital action
Read - Wal-Mart moves on digital movie downloads

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SPONSORED BY: BOLD MOVES: THE FUTURE OF FORD A new documentary series. Be part of the transformation as it happens in real-time.

Filed under: Home Entertainment

Ok, so in addition the new iMacs Steve is expected to announce on the event-that-may-or-may-not-happen on September 12th, and the updated Nano, the official announcement of movies on iTMS, we can also expect to see a standalone dedicated movie streaming device running an “updated version” of iTunes (not Front Row). Speculated to be a new movie-enhanced version of the Airport Express (or some like device). Kind of reminds us of the iHome rumor, or the Apple HDTVs rumor, but this one somehow seems a little more subtle and plausible. We’ve doubted their entrance into unexpected types of consumer electronics before (see: Hi-Fi), so who knows, maybe you’ll watch iTunes-downloaded movies on your video iPod (or iPod with video) as well as your TV, and without the need for a Mac mini cum media PC we’ve all been pining after, too.

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