patrick.net

Seems like there is a lot of room for them to run with, but might take awhile for them to build up further. They've gotten to a critical mass, and now they're working on more streaming, which is a painful process of trying to negotiate with every studio and they're useless. It takes so much patience dealing with those guys.

They’ve gotten to a critical mass, and now they’re working on more streaming, which is a painful process of trying to negotiate with every studio and they’re useless.
Yeah, I have to admit I am a bit skeptical of the "all you eat" streaming smorgasbord model. I got my parents a Roku box for Xmas. Pretty amazing what you can do for less than $100. I'm inclined to think that Amazon's 'rental' model will be more successful over that long haul (as it gives more $$ to the studios -- well, at $4.99 per HD movie, it better!) It still feels like we are in the dark ages compared to physical media; no subtitles on Amazon streamed English language movies (which, ya know, old people need). Interesting customer service, though. With the first movie we streamed, we lost audio halfway through. After beating our heads against the wall (and figuring out the problem was with the stream) we reconnected to Amazon at a lower bit rate and we watched the rest of the movie. Definitely left a bad taste in our mouth until I checking email when we got back from vacation. Low and behold, Amazon noticed a problem while we were streaming and refunded our money. Much better than arguing with the video store clerk over a scratched disk.

I'm not really sure about the cash/equity issues, but streaming startup costs would be horrendous, but would flat line quickly after that, or should. Even with substantial growth, they should remain fairly flat. We should see that in the new few quarters if that is where the money is going, and if they've built out a proper data center.

I haven't looked at the insider selling, but is it across the board, or are high level management selling out as well?

I could see a lot of employees selling out now, if I was there 5 years ago, and saw the stock go from 20-200, and saw all my friends cashing out big, I might do the same thing. I know a lot of people would do it, regardless of what the company outlook was, cash in hand to many is too irresistible.

Yeah I love Amazon. They don't have a lot of DRM's on their digital content, music comes in mp3 format, unlike Apple. Although if an internet tax law passes they're screwed.