That may well have been the case, but they don’t seem to have done much good, because Blockbuster filed for bankruptcy today, beaten into submission by nearly $1 billion in debt, growing competition from Netflix, Amazon and Apple, and consumers’ developing affinity for streaming and on-demand video services.

Blockbuster CEO Jim Keyes said the move will allow Blockbuster to “continue to transform our business model to meet the evolving preferences of our customers.”

Which presumably means further retail store closures as the company reduces its nearly $1 billion debt to about $100 million.

Hardly a surprise–particularly since the company alerted the six major movie studios of its plans to enter a “pre-planned” bankruptcy in mid-September.

Incidentally, the companies that have been instrumental in landing Blockbuster in the dire straits in which it finds itself are all doing quite well on the stock market today. At $162.13, Netflix (NFLX) is up 3.31 percent; at $155.20 Amazon (AMZN) is up 2.19 percent; and at $291.80 Apple (AAPL) is up 1.39 percent.

I suppose when your financial statements look like Blockbuster’s, I suppose you cling to life however you can (Blockbuster shares have fallen about 80 percent over the last 12 months). And so, beginning in the second half of 2009, the company will make its Blockbuster On Demand service available to TiVo subscribers. The agreement also calls for Blockbuster’s brick-and-mortar stores to sell TiVo DVRs. “We are excited to be teaming with TiVo, the company that created the DVR, to make Blockbuster’s entertainment content readily available to their millions of subscribers,” said Blockbuster CEO Jim Keyes. “Ultimately, our vision is to work with TiVo so that their subscribers can access movies not only through our On Demand service but also from our stores and through our by-mail service as well.”

For Blockbuster (BBI), the deal is a means of capitalizing on the rising popularity of on-demand video. But to really do that effectively, the company needs alliances with more electronics manufacturers than just TiVo (TIVO). After all, the DVR pioneer isn’t in the greatest of health these days. And Netflix (NLFX) already delivers online video to TiVo and PCs, Macs, Xbox 360s, and selected LG and Samsung Blu-ray players as well. Clearly, Blockbuster is as late to on-demand as it was to DVD-by-mail.