Apple today announced the immediate ability to purchase movies through iTunes the same day that they are released to DVD. This takes away another hurdle that Apple needed to get over to increase the number of online movie rentals through iTunes, and comes only months after the initial launch of the ability to purchase movies at all through the online service.

Apple says they will be providing new releases for sale from 20th Century Fox, The Walt Disney Studios, Warner Bros., Paramount Pictures, Universal Studios Home Entertainment, Sony Pictures Entertainment and Lionsgate, among a couple others. The new release purchases are priced at $14.99 each and can be viewed on a Mac, PC or any iPod with video and require iTunes version 7.6.2 which is available now as a free download.

Blockbuster has been rumored to have been secretly working on some new technology in the works that would allow streaming video content from an online rental service direct to consumers televisions, and could be available as soon as the next few weeks. No information has been given on the exact technology or price but the service could again bring the home video renting giant back up to par and possibly ahead in technology, compared to other rival video renting services from Netflix and Apple.

Netflix would be directly affected by this new service by Blockbuster and has recently upgraded their service to provide unlimited streaming to some subscribers, however it streams to their computer and not necessarily to the living room of most consumers. In order to work their way into more entertainment centers, Netflix is also looking into providing streaming video rentals through Microsoft’s Xbox 360 game console.