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You're mistaken. No offense, but I think maybe you haven't been out and about much, or (reasonably!) haven't been paying attention to little local details when

You're mistaken. No offense, but I think maybe you haven't been out and about much, or (reasonably!) haven't been paying attention to little local details when you have been. Like coin exchangers and lottery scratcher machines, Redbox kiosks exist pretty much wherever the bulk of a community buys stuff for their fridge: supermarket, dollar store, convenience store, etc. They're extremely well distributed. And until Starlink, which is new and expensive and unfamiliar, many more (North American) communities than you think did not offer home broadband that was suitable for reliable streaming. Service was still traditional satellite, weak DSL, and maybe 3G in many places. Plus, what made Redbox appealing to many was that you could spend a few dollars for a familiar, popular film when you had a few dollars to spare instead of committing to a whole bunch of recurring subscriptions just to hope that the title you want would eventually come up. Certainy, the business model as a whole is becoming increasingly strained, but it continues to serve consumer needs that still aren't serviced vert well by anybody else. It's a sort of crossover point, but if the company collapses instead of restructures, it's going to disappoint and frustrate quite a lot of people.

hn_throwaway_99 2y ago
I think you may have misunderstood my comment. I was not at all saying that people and places without high speed Internet don't exist. I was saying that the people and places that only have poor Internet services (poor people and rural areas) are also the people and places for which building a profitable Redbox distribution channel is most difficult, if not impossible given this bankruptcy news.
TylerE 2y ago
You mean existed. 90%+ of the locations in my area have vanished (and not especially recently)
tstrimple 2y ago
It's funny you go into details about how used these things are in response to an article about the company going bankrupt. Clearly you have something figured out that they don't. Maybe there's an opportunity for you.
- swatcoder 2y ago
  Huh? A busines becoming unsustainable or unprofitable is completely different than its products having been entirely unused. My comment even noted that they seem to be at or beyond some crossover point in viability. They had as many as 42,000 kiosks. Tens of thousanda remain. They are used every day. Yet the future of the company looks bleak and the finances are in crisis. All those things can be true at once.

hn_throwaway_99 2y ago

I think you may have misunderstood my comment. I was not at all saying that people and places without high speed Internet don't exist. I was saying that the people and places that only have poor Internet services (poor people and rural areas) are also the people and places for which building a profitable Redbox distribution channel is most difficult, if not impossible given this bankruptcy news.

TylerE 2y ago

You mean existed. 90%+ of the locations in my area have vanished (and not especially recently)

tstrimple 2y ago

It's funny you go into details about how used these things are in response to an article about the company going bankrupt. Clearly you have something figured out that they don't. Maybe there's an opportunity for you.

swatcoder 2y ago
Huh? A busines becoming unsustainable or unprofitable is completely different than its products having been entirely unused. My comment even noted that they seem to be at or beyond some crossover point in viability. They had as many as 42,000 kiosks. Tens of thousanda remain. They are used every day. Yet the future of the company looks bleak and the finances are in crisis. All those things can be true at once.