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Netflix To Offer Streaming-Only Service Plans
MojoKid writes "Debates are raging as to what the future of movie distribution will look like.
There are those who claim that physical discs, like DVDs, Blu-ray, and whatever format will eventually supplant Blu-ray, will always deliver a superior viewing experience versus anything that will be available via streaming. Pundits on the other side of the debate say that as broadband's footprint continues to expand, quality is improving.
Interestingly, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings is siding firmly with the latter camp, and it would even appear that Netflix is gearing up to move all of its eggs
from the mail-distribution basket to the online streaming basket. Hastings indicated that perhaps as soon as later this year or sometime in 2010, Netflix might start offering online-streaming-only subscription plans beyond just its current Starz
plan."
I think that's a great idea but they need to get a much larger part of their DVD library avilable on the streaming side before that will become popular.
"There are four boxes to be used in defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, and ammo. Please use in that order." -Ed H
Offering a streaming-only option IN ADDITION TO their regular mail+streaming option isn't putting all their eggs in one basket. In fact, it's the opposite. They're offering their customers more diverse options.
I've used the Netflix service and I'd have to say the quality is OK but not nearly good enough to replace DVDs. It's especially poor at the beginning of films. And while they have a lot of titles, there are still notable absences.
In my experience, Fox TV's service is far better w/r/t quality. It frequently looks as good as DVDs.
If your only tool is a hammer, every problem becomes a nail.
With Hulu letting us watch on our Linux boxes, will Netflix move towards this as well if this is going to be their new distrubution model?
I hope so.
Playon does not help us.
Between the video quality and the quality of the selection, "watch instantly" is just about unwatchable.
The visual quality doesn't even begin to compare to DVD. There's a huge gap to make up to even consider comparing it with Bluray.
The question is, does a significant portion of the movie watching population care? It will be interesting to see how it plays out.
-Peter
The real challenge is how do you give users the flexibility to watch multiple movies at the same time or watch without an active internet connection?
BB advantage is that not only do you get videos by mail but you can return at stores for an instore rental plus 2x month I get free game/video rental coupons. As a result, BB is a better deal since I get about 2x the DVDs at a time, plus a large mail back catalog of stuff not in the store. As a result, I get the latest releases from the B&M and the older stuff by mail. BB has so far leveraged the online/ B&M model quite well with something NetFlix can't match. So for only a few bucks more than NetFlix I get a better deal.
The challenge I see for NetFlix is dealing with the moves towards bandwidth caps - a movie a night is likely to rapidly push people to the cap; and they are likely to be mad at NetFlix, not their ISP. As a result, I see pressure form larger ISPs, at least, to pressure NetFlix in paying for bandwidth or working out a revenue split where NetFlix is bundled with the service.
Of course, once WalMart buys NetFlix and RedBox all bets are off for BB. You read it here first.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
There are those who claim that physical discs like DVDs, Blu-ray, and whatever format will eventually supplant Blu-ray will always deliver a superior viewing experience versus anything that will be available via streaming
While this is the argument that gets bandied about a lot, I don't believe it's actually the crux of the matter. But I think it's more accurate of the situation to frame it this way: For the majority of people, is the (overall) streaming experience good enough? Because for a lot of folks, convenience may be more important than a small uptick in quality.
For a somewhat analogous situation, I look to my teenage daughter's friends and their music buying habits. They almost exclusively buy their music from iTunes, even though no one can really argue that an iTunes or iTunes Plus encoding is as good as a CD, and the costs are more or less equivalent. But the quality difference is quite small (subjectively speaking, of course), and the convenience factor is huge.
There will always be some people for whom absolute quality trumps all else. The REAL question is, is this group large enough to sustain an ongoing market of manufacturing and selling physical media?
#DeleteChrome
Don't get me wrong, it would be nice if Netflix streamed all movies ever known to mankind... but I humbly disagree. To me, the main competitors to Netflix streaming are pay-per-view, HBO, Showtime, etc. A limited selection of movies that can be played on demand for ~$8/month beats the hell out of (and is cheaper than) premium cable channels and pay-per-view.
The Institute of Incomplete Research has determined that 9 of out 10