Avatar Blu-ray Snafu Opens Doors to Service Plans

You probably have heard about the problems with the new Avatar Blu-ray, which has been gumming up playback, thanks to new DRM features implemented by Fox.

The problem can be solved with firmware updates, but most consumers who were psyched to play their shiny new disk wouldn’t know that.

Steven Cheung of Vidabox, which makes media servers, reminds us that this experience provides a perfect opportunity to sell service plans.

For its part, Vidabox offers and optional “Proactive” service plan, according to Cheung:

Any Blu-ray updates are automatically pushed out, making it super easy to keep up to date with the latest. There's really nothing the customer needs to do, and the dealer can apply the updates remotely, from the comfort of their office or even at home.

Since a number of Blu-ray players (and other CE devices) allow remote firmware upgrades, this value-added service can be applied (for a fee) to an entire equipment rack.