Earlier this year, Google launched YouTube Movies in the US as a NetFlix competitior for on-demand streaming video rentals. The company announced today that they will be entering the Canadian market opposite Netflix, offering their services to Canadians. Movie rentals will be available for $3.99 to $4.99, with the rental good for 30 days from the date ordered. The subscriber will have 48 hours to finish the video once they have begun watching.

Given the restrictions put in place by the CRTC regulating a certain amount of Canadian content that must be made available, the new service is said to be offering significantly more of it than their US counterpart, and has allegedly partnered with Alliance films, for one, to ensure that they don’t draw any unnecessary heat from the CRTC over their content.

With Netflix offering unlimited rentals for a flat monthly fee of $8, it’s hard to see how Google’s pricing structure will compete, but given the issues experienced by Canadian Netflix users regarding a lavck of available content, if Google can provide a solid catalogue, they might be able to sway users.

Note to Google, full episodes of “Due South”, while conforming with Canadian content regulations, will not win you supporters. That would be more likely to have you on the losing side of a game of Beer Hunter with Netflix. (For those reading this in the US, Beer Hunter is like russian roulette, but much more Canadian)

[via: tech vibes]