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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.'"
We hav Zip.ca up here in Canada. It's kind of interesting to hear about this because I have a different approach to how I do things, and Zip's somewhat *ahem* silly queing system does have an option to make it useful: Park.
What I do is arrange on my active "Can send" list (Normal priority in Zip speak) the stuff I know I would watch, and then use ASAP priority to move up things I definitely will watch if I receive it. Anything else I feel I wouldn't watch, I send to the Parking lot (Park priotiy).
Arbitrarily ranking the queue (which I understand Netflix allows) is handy if you know you're going to watch things, but maybe they need to ask the user: I REALLY want to watch this, I wouldn't mind watching this, and "Eh, a friend told me i should watch it".
The bitter lessons of a veteran coder: http://bitterprogrammer.blogspot.com
As a netflix users, yes, I can attest to the throttling. My wife and I had a feeling that was happening before I read the stories on /. We rent TV series on DVD and we easily go through 10 disks in a two weeks, thereby hitting the limit quickly. They slow down service by not acknowleging returned disks (it takes 2 business days in the beginning of the month and over 4 busniess days in the latter part--all being returned to the same local address.
Oh, and for the official gobbeldy-gook, go here http://www.netflix.com/TermsOfUse?hnjr=8#how and scroll down to Allocation. They don't make throttling a secret. The result of giving priority to low renters is slowing down top renters. Nevermind that top renters tend to go through DVD fast thereby keeping a scarce resource in circulation.
Oh, what I would give for an on-demand digital medium. I would gladly use it, DRM be damned.