Netflix is having an interesting week. The company decided to shut down its contest in which outside developers try to improve its recommendation engine. It also showed off a demo of its “Watch Instantly” streaming service delivering videos directly to a mobile phone running Windows Phone 7.
The company previously awarded $1 million for its contest, but providing real customer viewing data upset many and led to an FCC inquiry. Those 12,000 titles hitting a mobile definitely make up for any recommendation snafus.
The company has been looking to reinvigorate some of its business since the mail-in side is reportedly slipping due to kiosk and on-demand competition. The new streaming app looks to be just the ticket. The new app, which uses Microsoft’s Silverlight, was only demoed recently, so it’s still unclear if it works only over Wi-Fi or if it’s 3G/4G capable. A Wi-Fi-only application isn’t going to mean a whole lot right now since the service can already work on laptops and PCs.
So far, those are the only details, but there is a lot of excitement in the air now. Netflix hasn’t announced any sort of app for the iPhone or iPad, but at the end of November 2009, Microsoft announced that it and Apple got together to allow streaming Silverlight-encoded videos to the iPhone and iPod Touch, so an app here is likely not that far behind.
It could very easily rest on AT&T’s shoulders as to when iPhone users get the app and when it works on 3G. AT&T’s network will have to be ready.