We haven’t tried it yet, but according to Engadget, you can now pay to stream movies from Blockbuster on your TiVo.

Really, this isn’t a whole lot different from the Amazon Video On Demand (formerly Unbox) streaming that has been available for a few years, but it is different from Netflix streaming in three key ways: it costs money, there is a wider selection of movies, and it’s available on Series 2 units.

The latest info about this that we could find on TiVo’s site is still a signup page for info. That’s here. So maybe this is still in the early rollout phase.

We’ll post more info as we learn more about the service, but it’s great to know that TiVo is now the gateway to even more video for your living room!

TiVo has definitely done well defending their intellectual property against DISH/EchoStar – to the tune of over $100M so far – and potentially more is coming.

Now TiVo has included AT&T and Verizon in the list of companies infringing on their patents. See the press release here.

Sounds like there’s more info coming in their conference call, live now.

While we’re on the theme of what customers want but they can’t get, we should put to rest another request: the DirecTV TiVo with DVD.

Yesterday’s installment concerned the request for an HD TiVo with DVD. That one can’t work at this point and probably in the future for technical reasons.

But the idea of a DirecTV DVR with an integrated DVD burner really, really could work for technical reasons. The issue here is more about copyright, and, in general, DirecTV’s unwillingness to push the envelope with content providers.

Why is this different from a standard TiVo with DVD which does, in fact, exist? The big reason is that on the Humax models that we sell (and on the older Pioneer and Toshiba TiVo models with DVD) the recordings are made from analog inputs. That means that the quality, while very good, isn’t quite as good as the all-digital quality of recordings to DirecTV TiVos and other DVRs and the HD TiVos with CableCARDs. If you take that all-digital signal and pump it to a DVD, then you’ve basically got a digital copy that’s pretty amazing. DirecTV doesn’t want to be the gatekeeper on that.

Of course, if that’s what you really want – all digital copy to a DVD – then there is a way to do it, just not with DirecTV. You can get a standalone TiVo or HD TiVo and copy your shows over a network to your PC or Mac, then burn them there. But DirecTV won’t help you there – at least, so far. There’s a chance that the upcoming DirecTV HD TiVo will have networking features . . .

OK – so Canadians have been using TiVo since long before TiVo really supported Canadian TV guides. And then, a few years ago, TiVo really started to expand into Canada with support for cable companies and six-digit postal codes. Here at WeaKnees, we’ve been shipping units to Canada for years – anything except DirecTV equipment.

Earlier this year in the US, we stopped broadcasting analog antenna signals. So for years in advance of this, US DVRs and TVs started to drop support for analog antenna broadcasts. And Canadians lost out – they’ve been unable to find TiVo DVRs that could record these signals, short of the HD models.

But we have good stock of the Humax DVD TiVo units – the DRT400 and DRT800. These units are standard definition, they have built-in DVD burners (that’s a whole other world of goodness) and, best of all for Canadians, they have analog antenna inputs! So if you’re just watching good old-fashioned FREE antenna broadcasts and you want a TiVo, this unit is perfect!

For more good info on what works and what doesn’t in Canada see TiVo’s Canada information here. It’s a little dated about the lifetime service offer – that option is still available and is currently $399 for the first TiVo on your account, and $299 for each additional unit. Also, note that the unit on their page (which we sell also) does NOT have the antenna input necessary for reception of free analog broadcasts.

If you’re looking for an HD TiVo for Canada, our TiVo HD units will also record analog antenna as well as HD digital antenna signals. (Important note – HD TiVos cannot use CableCARDs in Canada because CableCARDs aren’t available.)

If you’d like an idea of what it will cost to have a unit shipped to Canada, please use our cart. It fully supports all Canadian postal codes and it will give you live, firm shipping prices.

The update is:

No update. Sorry. We’re still hearing 2010.

Unfortunately, despite our best efforts to get some sort of update, we just can’t get anyone to talk about the release date. But we decided to post on the blog because we get SO many inquiries about this. We think this will be a very popular product.

Of course, since our two biggest interests are TiVo and DirecTV, we may be uniquely positioned to hear from everyone who wants information. But it’s a lot of people, generating a lot of pent-up demand.

If you want the latest news (when there actually is some), we’d recommend you:

1 – Sign up on TiVo’s list for DirecTV information.

2 – Sign up on our general list for TiVo and DirecTV news.

3 – Watch this blog.

4 – Follow us on Twitter.

As soon as we have any news, we’ll likely post it to here and on Twitter, and if it’s substantial, we’ll probably send out an email.