Netflix has had a lot on its hands recently, especially since it’s PR department has absolutely botched the handling of both the price increases and spinning off it’s DVD-by-mail service.

Both changes make sense, but were explained horribly. Therefore customers are pissed.

Now Dish Network is unveiling a revitalization of Blockbuster’s online movie rental service. It’s dubbed Blockbuster Movie Pass and it sounds pretty good.

The service is $10 a month for both streaming and DVD-by-mail, which is a godsend for people who were turned off by Netflix’s price hike for that same service. The service starts October 1, but there is a huge catch: Dish Network subscribers are the only ones who can sign up. New customers who sign up for the Dish America’s Top 200 package for $40 a month will have access to the service for a year.

Blockbuster will have 3,000 titles available to stream to TVs and 4,000 to your computer, which isn’t as much as Netflix’s 20,000 or Amazon Prime’s 5,000 (which is growing).

As for the DVD part, you can still return your DVDs to a store, but you won’t be able to walk out with a new title, unfortunately.

This is a great option for Dish Network subscribers, but not for anyone else. $10 a month for a quarter of Netflix’s content? This service has some growing to do if it wants to take the fight to Netflix. And as we have all learned, it’s not easy obtaining streaming rights.

On top of this, it’s for subscribers only. One they open up to non-Dish Network subscribers I have a hard time seeing the $10 a month price sticking for long, but it’s definitely a leg up on Netflix’s price.

This can go either way: push more people to Netflix or push Netflix to be better. I hope its the latter. [CNet, TechCrunch]

blockbuster, netflix