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Don’t be misled by the headline, I really mean Vudu, the company that was trying to stay afloat selling overpriced boxes pre-loaded with Hollywood movies. Then they made the wise choice to ditch the boxes in favor of a website only, pay per view approach. Now that has paid off handsomely with Walmart buying them out. Walmart (Wal-Mart) plans to run their own streaming service onto the new streaming capable TVs and Blu-rays they sell.

The reasoning is okay as far as it goes, but I don’t think that is far enough.First let’s take the Blu-ray. Nobody has come up with a good reason to buy it unless you are a gamer, or you enjoy seeing movie images so sharp you can see the sweat under every actor’s arms. But people have been buying the players because it’s a cheap way to get streaming movies. The reasoning: for the price of the player, you get streaming services AND Blu-ray (if you ever choose to buy an overpriced Blu-ray disk).

But is Walmart missing something? The reason streaming devices are exciting is because everyone wants total access to the net on their TVs. Why keep a cable subscription if you can get Hulu on your 50 inch flat screen TV? Movies are a small part of it, though an important part. That’s why God invented Netflix. What we don’t need is more add-on devices giving us the ability to pay to buy and rent movies that are the same movies we can get other places (no studio allows movies to go on any of the services including Netflix, Vudu or Roxio Cinema Now before the DVDs are in the stores).

I think I would rather put a new movie in my Netflix queue and wait until it shows up in my mailbox(or streaming) like an old friend I forgot. Walmart would probably argue that their new Vudu service is not for me, it is for the less sophisticated movie watcher. Okay, if you are buying and promoting a service for the unwashed, why are you selling organic produce in your Walmart food markets? I think Mr. Organic is the same shopper that might be interested in a new TV with a streaming device. And if he reads Cnet, he’ll know your Vudu is, at least at present, way behind the curve (it can’t be used on MAC, it requires its own player to be downloaded etc).

Congratulations to the venture capitalists who just got a big pay day on Vudu. I am sure they are breathing a sigh of relief all the way to the bank.