Ars Technica reports that the Blockbuster-Movielink deal was likely in the $20 million range, meaning that Movielink burned through $100 million in capital without much to show for it.

"Movielink's lack of success has made Warner Brothers, MGM, Paramount, Universal, and Sony anxious to unload it; Movielink had been on the market for well over a year before today's announcement," said Eric Bangeman in the article.

Ars Technica thinks that Movielink is unlikely to cure what ails Blockbuster. "The service has proven to be thoroughly unpopular with the movie-viewing public, due in no small part to draconian DRM restrictions and the inability to burn movies to DVD," said the story. "Last year, the service announced the availability of a download-and-burn service, but actual burnable content has been a long time coming, due to internal squabbles between the five studios that owned Movielink. In contrast, Netflix's service has been more favorably received, although the studios have to be alarmed by this week's news that the DRM on its movie downloads has been cracked."

If these services take off, it will be a relatively simple matter to transfer the movies and watch them on portable MP3 players and cell phones, the way Vongo has been doing it for well over a year now. But these services seem to be having a tougher go than originally anticipated.

Is action better than inaction? Blockbuster buys Movielink for a song [Ars Technica]