The Past and the Future of TV - Now on DVD By Darryl Wilkinson July 20, 2006 — Late last week, CustomFlix Labs, Inc., a wholly-owned subsidiary of Amazon.com, announced that CBS News had selected CustomFlix and Amazon.com to distribute thousands of hours of prime-time and classic news content. The treasure trove of past CBS News content includes broadcasts from "60 Minutes", "CBS Evening News", and a variety of long-form documentaries produced by CBS News Productions over the past 10 years.

News junkies will be able to order complete programs of daily or weekly news broadcasts and pre-selected compilations on Amazon.com, or they can search through thousands of new segments and assemble their own compilations using the CustomFlix Create Your Own DVD service. The personally created DVDs will have customized artwork, arrive professionally packaged with full-color DVD faces and covers in overwrapped amaray-style cases, and can contain up to 10 news segments or 90 minutes of video.

You can purchase CBS News content at www.amazon.com/60minutes or www.CustomFlix.com/60minutes.

Yesterday, NBC and Netflix announced a partnership to offer Netflix's nearly five million subscribers an advanced look at the premiere episodes of two of NBC's new drama series, "Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip" and "Kidnapped". The shows will be available in their entirety six weeks before their broadcast premieres. Beginning August 5, Netflix subscribers who have added the preview DVD to their personal queues will receive a DVD containing the two episodes. Netflix says the preview DVD will arrive in the same traditional red-envelope mailer and be treated like any other rental.

Netflix subscribers can add the shows to their queues immediately. The promotion will end September 17.