The new service, which has reportedly already peaked interest from a number of major and independent studios to provide content, is scheduled to debut sometime in April.
Although spokeswoman Kristin Mariani said the service would launch only with streaming — not downloadable — content, previous announcements by the company dating back as far as October 2005 suggest fully downloadable deals might not be far off.
Characteristics of Amazon’s new “try before you buy” model, according to Mariani, would enable an Amazon customer to stream a film off Amazon.com for a small fee. If, upon viewing the film, the customer decided to purchase the DVD, the fee for the stream would apply to the purchase.
She also said the company was mulling over the possibility that customers who purchased a DVD off the site could stream the film while they were waiting for it to arrive in the mail.
The new VOD plans from Amazon put the company in direct competition with cable company Comcast, which launched a similar campaign more than six months ago with the hope that Comcast customers would want to download films from Comcast prior to buying the DVD version directly from the cabler.
Over the last several months, Amazon has been testing limited VOD offerings of shorter fare, such as bonus features off a DVD or outtakes from the hit television show “Seinfeld.”
No major studio has yet to license full-length movie content to an online retailer, but it’s clear that both Amazon and Comcast are attempting to use the technology as a direct companion to the DVD.
“Everything is being leveraged to sell more DVDs,” Mariani said.