I went to the movie store Tuesday to rent Inglorious Bastards and was bummed when all copies were out. I ended up having to buy it so I could watch the movie. Blockbuster has announced a new service called Direct Access that will help you find a film you want to see even if it is out of stock.

When you go into a store and the film you want isn’t available the store employees can access the distribution center catalog and have the film shipped directly to your door, assuming it is in stock at the distribution center.

This should make a lot of people happy. After a bit of a wait, I present the first Netflix set-top-box. Previously, Instant Viewing was available only to Windows PC users through the IE browser. But now, thanks to Roku, users can finally tap into at least a chunk of the Netflix library without having to wait for those damn discs in your mailbox for just $99.99.

The Netflix Player can even use a wireless signal to stream, but performance may differ here and there. It’s got HDMI, component, composite, Ethernet, S-Video and a Toslink optical audio jack as far as ports go. No HD support, but things look quite positive so far.