Supporting the Kaleidescape Store

[cinelife]

While I'm not looking to upset anyone here with these comments, I feel it's important enough a subject to voice it in the Forum. This is not a one-way blog, your comments matter as well, and being among other things a lawyer, I recognize that reasonable minds may differ.

I'll say it plainly. IMO, if you own a Kaleidescape system, and in particular the Encore line, you should be supporting the Store as much as possible. Some of us take that support seriously, even to the point that we sometimes purchase the disc form, AND the Store version. I realize that not everyone has the means to purchase movies (or anything really) without giving any thought to the cost. I acknowledge that, and I respect that, and in no way am I aiming at anyone, I have certainly been there in the past myself. I know there are titles that must be purchased elsewhere because they are not available in the Store, and some digital titles provided by the studios lack content that's on the disc, or available from other vendors, it happens.

I acknowledge that much of my thinking is affected by years of being involved with Kaleidescape. There is also an emotional component with me, acquired by buying into Kaleidescape during the very early years of the company's existence, and getting to know the company and its incredible employees as they grew. Many of us that did get in early, formed a kind of familial bond with the company and its people. I'm not sure what the psychology is behind that feeling, but it is real for many of us, and this was evident in the reaction of folks during a restructuring that occurred a few years back. During that period I received dozens of calls from owners and friends, and while some were concerned about their systems, most folks were personally saddened by the events that unfolded that weekend, and concerned for the employees. I'd never seen that before in business, nor have I seen it since.

Kaleidescape is more than just a business to many of us, we have developed a personal connection to the company, its employees, and its user experience. On some level, this was heartfelt at Kaleidescape as well, as evidenced by the incredible effort put forth by so many, both in and around the company, to find a way to move the company forward and support its customers. The leader during that period, the person that said to me personally, "I don't care what happens to me, I really don't, I care only about my customers and my employees," continues the leadership of Kaleidescape today, and I'm personally grateful that he is in that position.

Why discuss history? It's because I don't want to see it repeated. Although Kaleidescape is doing very well, and the Store continues to grow its sales, it is still a business, and like all business must continue to produce and grow going forward.

We should be doing what we can to support that effort (within our personal financial ability), and at a minimum not hurt that effort. I personally don't think shopping other sites to get a cheaper digital copy that is then used to download the Kaleidescape version is very supportive. I understand that's your right, and you may argue "that's the competitive nature of business," but I would suggest owners consider all of the functionality associated with the Kaleidescape experience before evaluating the difference in value between the competing vendors. They are not equal, IMO.

Thanks folks!

Jim

 

[cmcgehee]

I'm going to have to second what Jim has to say here. I took the leap to buy into the Kaleidescape ecosystem and I could not be happier. Whenever I have the option, I just buy straight from the store. I am aware that there are some drawbacks. There is no Movies Anywhere support yet, we don't always get digital copy, etc. Even given those limitations, I still choose to buy from the store when I can. I know that when I buy from the store, I don't have to wonder if digital rights will transfer. I don't have to worry about whether things will work on my system. They always just do. I plead guilty to having bought some discs from Best Buy that were much much cheaper than from the K store. When the price delta is $20 or so, I have bought the disc, but I felt a little guilty when I did it. I know that I have also given Disney their pound of flesh over the years. I have had to buy the movies from the K store and then I have turned around and bought the discs so that they could be played on the DVD player in the car on long trips. I just think that it is worth it to support Kaleidescape. The system has been such a blessing for our family, especially with our special needs son who uses it every day. If I spend a little bit more for the movies, I just think of it as part of my investment in the Kaleidescape system. For me personally, it would never amount to more than $100-200 per year and that is absolutely palatable to me. I would hope it is to others as well.

I look forward to years to come with their system and have high hopes that we see some new and exciting products down the pipeline. I know that my viewpoint won't fit every user and that is fine. We all have different ideas of how things should be done. I just wanted to make sure that Jim got to hear opinions of people that agree with him, not just the disagreements.

If I was a little more clever, I would figure out how to hookup a Strato or Alto to my car and use that for viewing movies on long trips.

 

[cinelife]

After receiving two phone calls (not from Kaleidescape), I'm adding the following:

1. As already mentioned above, and I mean it, the comment is NOT aimed at anyone, and although it was client/friend generated based on a discussion we had, it was not aimed at him either, and he knows that, it is simply my opinion regarding support of the Store.

2. The comment is also a result of discussions I've had with others that shared their pride in being good shoppers, that's fine, and being able to "download 50+ titles" from the store for for less than $400 because of special pricing and digital rights acquired elsewhere, and that was one person.

3. Yes, I know that K willingly, and happily joined these services so they could provide the same benefits to their customers, and these mutual downloads are to be expected. That's fine as well, but understanding where we are in the evolution of the Store, I think it's fair to point out that although K is building the Store's volume, they are still not at the same level as these other vendors (which likely affects other things as well). I'm only suggesting that when possible we support that effort.

4. I'm not suggesting owners have to buy every title from the Store, that's not possible anyway, but I am asking those folks that research ways to buy elsewhere at a lower price with the intent to then go to the Store to get the copy they really want, with K's bookmarking installed, for free, to reevaluate that thinking. It may or may not matter to them, it might only be about that short-term gain, I get it, that's their right.

5. These are my comments alone, no one at Kaleidescape has said anything to me about this subject, if they are bothered by these purchasing strategies, they have not shared that with me, and certainly never asked me to post a comment. Frankly, they may not care, I don't know, but my opinion will not change, we should be supporting the Store for as many of our purchases as possible. It helps it grow, it will increase Store volume to a point that perhaps contract terms improve, maybe pricing comes down, etc..

Jim

 

[Ahmad78]

Well say jim I am not old in K but my order was in the bad time when K shutdown for a bit and i remember how i was looking to any update that say K is back and I was have a confidence that K will make it and that what happen even my dealer told me if i want my money back I said wait they will come back this company should always stand and yes support K is a must for me and I will support and even try to bring many of my friend to K world

Thx jim


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[RAV]

I switched over to purchasing all of our movies from Kaleidescape about a year ago and have never looked back. It's become a Friday routine - we usually purchase several new releases each Friday. I also enjoy looking at what is new in the store and love the fact that they added trailers.

I agree - if it is in your financial means...support the movie store and the ecosystem!

 

[cinelife]

Thanks guys, again, certainly not wanting to insult anyone. Someone else asked what I thought of someone that already had a good sized collection elsewhere and then bought into Kaleidescape and downloaded available digital titles to their new system. Obviously, that's fine, absolutely nothing wrong with adding their collection to the K System, in fact it's expected they would.

I just want people to remember that "free" to them doesn't mean "free" from cost for Kaleidescape, there are costs involved with sending those movies, not to mention the IP that goes into making what we end up with in our systems better than standard content (recognizing of course that many digital titles are limited by the Studios compared with the disc version).


Jim

 

[SJHT]

Great posts Jim. Completely agree with you. Seeing K at CEDIA last year with all the traffic was a great site. Was able to finally meet Chenna in person as well as other employees. They obviously love what they do and are excited about the future! SJ

 

[Ahmad78]

After K add the yacht service i wish they look more about the subtitle such Arabic,Chinese,Indian,Spanish,etc one of the thing i face when i spoke about K experience in my region is about the missing subtitle so I hope K provide this and expand there market they have now the upper hand in the ecosystem with the bit by bit so it’s time to lead as trinnov dose until the moment


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[carajo]

And browsing the store content right on our TV just as if we are browsing our own content makes for a great experience. No lags or delays while browsing the store since our servers get the small store meta file

 

[jbm007]

I regularly purchase $500 worth of movies every month.

I never buy disc anymore.

I just wish there was more consistency between what is on a disc and what is available for K users to download.

Especially when it comes to audio.

I want K experience to be the ultimate in HT

Dint't spend 500K on my setup just to stream movies.

Thats what watching sports is for.

K wants us to trade in our old Premier systems. Great, give me upgrade path for my 1000 dvds I have.

JMTW

 

[cinelife]

That last one on your list is echoed a lot.....I'm sure you've heard the same from many of your clients.....I have. I've only had a few people bite the bullet and walk away from their DVD's.....not easy when you still have the number you have in your collection.

Another area that is causing many of my friends to ignore the component upgrades is the personal family content they've stored in their systems....

Jim

 

[jbm007]

Can't they send those files to K and get them index so they would show up on a Strato system?

 

[cinelife]

Great idea, if it could be done. Might help the "migration" process, I'll ask.

(I do however wonder how many of the owners would be comfortable sharing their personal family videos outside of their homes.) (Unless Youtube is any indication.)


Jim

 

[SJHT]

Unless they have changed recently and maybe not the best solution, but the Strato plays DVDs directly from a DV700, just not blurays.... It is slower as it has to load the appropriate disc and only one zone can access at a time. SJ

 

[cinelife]

True, and that is the currently the only solution, but unfortunately the history of playback from carousel type units (think Sony and others) isn't very good long term, too many moving parts, and loading issues as rollers and discs age. Of course if playback using that method is kept to a minimum, it should be fine for awhile.


Jim

 

[Montucky]

Great post, Jim! I agree wholeheartedly, and I am NOT a man of means. Well not anymore at least. When K was in limbo a couple years back, my own personal business was also struggling and ultimately went down, so I felt their company's pain on a very personal level. My family and I are still trying to get back on our feet, but even still I refuse to be a cheap skate and price shop all over the place to save just a couple bucks. I hope and pray that K succeeds, so I make a conscientious effort to purchase from the store whenever that's an option. Now there are going to be the obvious omissions like I've mentioned in my "Anime" thread in the store subforum: http://www.kscapeowners.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2996
But when they address that, I'll happily be all over many of those titles too.

It is tough to swallow is when certain studios want like $37 for every title (Looking at you, Warner Bros.), but thankfully many of the OTHER studios seem to want more down to earth prices. Been some superb sales events over the years too. I still sucked it up with Ready Player One though and ponied up just to have it on my system as I refused to buy it from Best Buy or Amazon. When it comes to pricey WB titles, I'm just MUCH more selective and it has to be a title I really, really want. But these days, unless it's an obscure title we'll likely never see on there or it's from a studio they'll never get on board, it's either going to be from the K store or nothing.

Especially now that they've integrated the store with the Encore interface as well as improved the iOS app immensely, it is just a blast to shop with my wife on a Friday afternoon. We have so much fun browsing the store on our iPad or computer in the kitchen while we make popcorn and drinks. It is as close as we can get to the "good old days" of going to the local rental shop and perusing the aisles to load up for the weekend, except now without leaving the house! Sweet they ramped up the download speeds big time too, so we can actually watch it that same evening. Haha.

After far too many busted nights in the past when Netflix was down or the movie we were looking forward to had magically disappeared from our queue thanks to expired licenses, we've come to really depend on Kaleidescape for the perfect family movie system. Thanks for creating this thread, cinelife. It really did need to be said. Support the store, folks!

 

[HCS]

I will continue to support the k store post ultraviolet closure, however I do think k need to change their strategy with online purchases.
I would love to see the introduction of kaleidescape in-store credit vouchers that can be purchased on-line, would make a great present to k owners.
A big want is purchases via PayPal for ease of buying movies (I know this has been mentioned in past threads)
Savings on movie box sets - Star Wars / matrix etc.

 

[Mntneer]

I will continue to support the k store post ultraviolet closure, however I do think k need to change their strategy with online purchases.
I would love to see the introduction of kaleidescape in-store credit vouchers that can be purchased on-line, would make a great present to k owners.
A big want is purchases via PayPal for ease of buying movies (I know this has been mentioned in past threads)
Savings on movie box sets - Star Wars / matrix etc.

As the product progresses, it's going to be vital to be able to tell customers that collections that they have acquired over the years and have in digital lockers, will be accessible on K Systems, and won't have to be re-purchased a second time.

 

[cinelife]

In that regard, any content purchased directly thru the K Store will obviously remain available, and the current understanding is that UV content that migrated into the owner's Store account should also remain available. That said, K can only provide access to content made available to them, and that may or may not include digital content controlled by other entities. My apology if I misunderstood your post.


Jim

 

[iansilv]

Jim,

I cannot agree with your post more. I love Kaleidescape, and for me this is one of my most loved "luxury items." Call it OCD, call it whatever, but the idea that I do not have to stream a movie, and the movie I am watching is the highest quality picture with the best sound simply means that when I buy a movie from the store I feel secure about my ownership.

I understand a lot of people "value-shop" for digital movies from other sources. Personally, I don't understand the need to save 20 bucks over the convenience and time-saving act of simply buying a movie through the Kaleidescape store and not having to "dick-around" with anything else- I know I now own the movie, it will download, if my system is full I can delete something and it will download later, etc. etc... No third- party UV rights to worry about, nothing else to deal with.

Kaleidescape is a pretty unique company- I think there are very, very few companies that are as loved by their enthusiast customers as much as K is. Porsche? Rolex? We are a fanatical and passionate group. So it is from that spirit that the following opinion comes, in case anyone is offended:

Don't be cheap. Seriously- saving five bucks on a digital download?? Really?? K customers should have better things to do. The cost of a movie should largely be a throw-away cost. It's a meal at Chili's- it's the cost of a new phone case. I have wondered for a long time why K allows the download of movies people have not paid for. Unless I am wrong, they could allow the purchase of a title to be included in a customer's UV account but withhold the ability to download it if it was not purchased on the store, but they have chosen not to do that (again I may be wrong.) I buy all of my movies on the K store. I held off on the BBC nature shows on Blu-ray because I was waiting for them to appear on K. The loss of UV doesn't mean anything to me. And I think a lot of the people who complain about the lack of movies anywhere are people who do not actually own a K system...

In terms of buying movies through the K store to support K- this to me is a no-brainer. K is a niche product, it is incomprehensibly-expensive for most people, and therefore K as a company really relies on its customers' support to invent the market. There are no products that compete with K- there are streaming devices, there are ways someone can produce a product that may come close to doing what K does without the interface, convenience or quality, but K has created and exists as the sole occupant of the luxury high-end media server market.

We need to support it any way we can. We should be buying our movies from the K store, not complaining about movie prices. If you cannot afford it... go build a plex server or use an Apple TV. Don't complain here.

Just my 2 cents...