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Netflix Users Experience Paradox of Abundance
prostoalex writes "The deal seems to be rather simple — you pay a monthly fee, receive a certain number of DVDs, and as soon as you watch them, and send them back, there's more coming. This simple model made Netflix into a $1.4 bln company, but now, Wall Street Journal reports, some Netflix users are experiencing the abundance paradox — the movies arrive, collect dust on the customer's desks, and then are sent back for the new set of movies to face the same fortune. From the article: "'It's a paradox of abundance,' said Siva Vaidhyanathan, a professor of culture and communication at New York University. If people aren't pressured to see a movie in a specific time frame, he said, viewers tend to put it lower on their priority list. 'When you have every choice in front of you, you have less urgency about any particular choice.'"
But I'm not a Netflix subscriber. Just not big into movies.
But the bigger and more complicated a decision, the easier it is for me to decide. Choosing a college: Simple. I went, I looked, and by the time I needed to apply, I'd already decided. Only applied to 1 school. (Graduated 3 + years ago, picked up a dual Engr. degree, and had a blast). Buying a car? Simple. I knew what I wanted. Buying a house? Simple. (Going on 2 years now, still satisfied).
But man... you put me in front of a vending machine and I cannot make up my friggin mind. I'm not kidding. I can't decide. I'll stand there staring at it. Speaking of which.
"No fair, you changed the outcome by measuring it!" - Professor Hubert J. Farnsworth
On impulse I'll suddenly whip out and buy an Etta James collection, because I like some tune she sang back in the days of yor or I'll buzz down to the Bijou and check out Superman Returns From Wherever He Buggered Off To
Ah, so you are the one funding the MPAA's and RIAA's lawyers?! And a Slashdot user too?! I'm a bit shocked and ashamed.
I'll probably be modded down for this...
My job has been very busy lately, and Elder Scrolls IV wandered into my life, so I simply cut back my Netflix account to two out at a time down from four. I can just about slip in two movies a week. If I can't do that, I'll cut back to one. There's also the "rip to hard drive" option to backlog films.
Feeling "pressure" to watch a movie? What would these "paradox of abundance" sufferers do if they had to go out and hunt a wooly mammoth for dinner? Cripes, take a Paxil or something.
I had a further point to make, but I think I'll just say wooly some more. Wooly. Wooly. Wooly wooly wooly.
And you've just admitted to being a completely retard sheeple.
Nice one.
It's called the Gold's Gym model.
Prof. Farnsworth - "Oh a lesson in not changing history from Mr I'm-My-Own-Grandpa!"
online, so much I can't even imagine being without, however that has never stopped me from spanking a load out 2 times a day to the available stuff that I so enjoy. I think the logic of this argument is flawed, proven by my huge consumption of handy wipes.
If you stopped before you got to "The Glass House", I suggest you add that one. She looks hot in a wet nightie.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
...that all Netflix users had burners, or at the very least, knew out to rip to divx!
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
Have you considered dating?
Or if they start reading
Information wants a fueled airplane waiting at the hangar and no one gets hurt.
But I actually buy the DVDs and fail to watch them. Sounds like I need a Netflix account.
The technique that always worked with me was to die three to four months after getting my 10 albums for 10 cents.
A nice weepy letter from a mom about the death of her son Mike Hunt in a tragic weedeater incident. Another semester, a new mailing address and IP Freely would be recieving his 10 albums, his life to end abruptly in a boiler explosion.
Your mom's snatch got into a weedeater incident?
--
WHO ATE MY BREAKFAST PANTS?
"Are you sure about that? that they're actually throttling people?"
I can attest that Netflix throttles people. I have a friend two doors up who kept churning his three-movie queue, copying DVDs so he could view them whenever he actually had time to view them, and would report a DVD missing so Netflix would send a movie before the one he returned was received.
Then one day, three Netflix "technicians" showed up---two had baseball bats. The two beat my friend severely, then the third guy grabbed him by the throat and throttled him until he promised to play nice. He'll be out of the hospital next week.
What those who want activist courts fear is rule by the people.
You can't survive a 2 hour movie without eating?