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Netflix Announces Streaming Only Plans and Higher Prices for DVDs
micsaund writes "While Netflix has continued to drop fees and still maintain a good services, today, they take three steps in the other direction by doubling the cost of the plan you probably already have: 'So for instance, our current $9.99 a month membership for unlimited streaming and unlimited DVDs will be split into 2 distinct plans ... Unlimited Streaming (no DVDs) for $7.99 a month ... Unlimited DVDs, 1 out at-a-time (no streaming), for $7.99 a month. ... The price for getting both of these plans will be $15.98 a month ($7.99 + $7.99).' Now, if they could get everything available on streaming, this would be fine, but how many times have you needed to get a physical disc for that oddball movie, or had a movie in your instant queue that magically disappears due to some behind-the-scenes contract expiration or whatever?"
Well I'm not to sure how I feel about this. I currently have the streaming + 1 dvd. I only watch a dvd every few months but the option was still nice to have. There is no way I would pay 8 bucks a month for the few dvds I would watch. But on the other hand the streaming selection is pretty poor so paying 8 bucks a month for just streaming doesn't seem like that great of a deal. I think they've shot themselves in the foot but without a great alternative they will probably get away with it.
For $7.99, I can pass on the DVDs....and use the money saved to rent the oddball other titles from another service. Up until now Netflix had complete vendor lock-in for my wallet. Now I'll learn more about iTunes/Amazon. Encouraging users to learn about the competition can't be a good idea.
For $9 a month I can get HBO/Showtime from my cable company
My cable company won't even let me subscribe to HBO or Showtime until I already subscribe to a $80/mo bundle of other channels that I don't watch.
If there is no long-term commitment, then subscribe to DVDs and streaming in alternate months, and watch those works that aren't available on streaming during each DVD month.
Now I do not have to pay for streaming that I could not use anyway because I do not user Windows or OSX.
I just switched from 2 DVDs out + unlimited streaming for $15 per mo to 2 DVDs out and no streaming for $12 per month. Same service, lower price.
Thank you Netflix!
Go green: turn off your refrigerator.
The estimate is that in 2012, Netflix's license fees will go from $180 million in 2010 to $1.98 billion in 2012, according to this.
Its going to be very hard for anyone to become the legal clearinghouse for media at a price point most consumers see as reasonable because the studios won't allow it.
What?
Basically, this will drive people to use Redbox for disc-based movies and NetFlix for screaming.
The two rules for success are:
1) Never tell them everything you know.
The only Blockbuster left in a 10 mile radius of my house is an unmanned kiosk which is broken half the time. If I can't get everything via streaming, then Netflix has become far less useful to me. I was under the impression this was a semi-sustainable business; if I had known that they were just doing it long enough to kill the competition then jack up prices, I probably would have stuck with old faithful.
The CB App. What's your 20?
Doesn't Hulu require watching commercials, or has that changed? I just can't endure commercials anymore.
"Who is the Journal of Quantum Physics going to believe?" --Stephen Hawking
It's only a few dozen titles, but the iTunes Store does have some movies to rent for 99 cents each. There's a few removed and a few added every tuesday.
Sounds like the content providers are starting to work as an oligopoly and extracting the maximum cash out of Netflix, either that or Netfix is starting to cash in on the growing customer base.
Another thought just popped into my head, and that might be that Netflix is trying to actively fracture their customer base to beat on their chest to the content providers that streaming or on demand content is the only means people will access media, or it could be that they are going to sell off the DVD distribution side and focus on the lower costs associated without having to warehouse, sort, ship, receive, and resort DVDs.
Crap! I just kissed my karma good-bye.
This is why I've been sending back 3 DVDs in one mailer. I now have several hundred empty envelopes which I will promptly insert a slice of balogna into each and drop them into the mailbox. Statement made.
postmodernsideshow.com
Do you have any idea how much a month's worth of Desperate Housewives episodes costs in book format?
"Who is the Journal of Quantum Physics going to believe?" --Stephen Hawking
This should have been seen as inevitable, since it's been made clear that the content owners have been floored by the success of Netflix and are trying to negotiate much better terms for themselves now.
I'm delighted at how little my own costs are going up (less than 8% I think).
I'm also a little frustrated that so many people are reacting so strongly to this -- the content owners would all rather force us into "Hulu+" (with subscription plus advertising), or to "Zune Marketplace" or "iTunes" (per-episode purchase or rentals), or back to cable operators, and all the folks who are dropping their Netflix subscriptions are helping that happen. Ah well.
I'm not going back. You'll have to live with some fraction of the cut you got for cable/satellite service, whether via Netflix or some other distributor. Streaming is the a la carte that should have been available 20 years ago. I will not pay for a package full of dreck. Pull whatever you want. I'll live with whatever is left over. You're not getting back to $70/month. Deal with it.
You need to adopt this attitude as well. These people need to take a few pay cuts.
Maw! Fire up the karma burner!
This is why I've been sending back 3 DVDs in one mailer. I now have several hundred empty envelopes which I will promptly insert a slice of balogna into each and drop them into the mailbox. Statement made.
If you are giving away free bologna send some my way.
This is why I've been sending back 3 DVDs in one mailer. I now have several hundred empty envelopes which I will promptly insert a slice of balogna into each and drop them into the mailbox. Statement made.
I love it! You could provide a whole deli-by-mail service -- a slice of bologna in one, cheese in another, mayo in a third, and perhaps a slice apiece of nice garlicky bread in a couple more.
Mm, mm! I'm'a have me some of that! Especially after going through all that US Postal Service machinery. Yum!
"What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
"A four-foot prune."
my life sucks
i have to wait 2 days to get a dvd mailed to my porch
my wrists are itchy, pass the knife.
slashdot: where everyone yells sarcastic metaphors to themselves to understand the issue
It's not Netflix's fault, that's solely the fault of the content providers that insist on having their content only time limited. So, I've found that I want to watch a movie and then when I get to it a couple days later it's no longer available. I'm sure that Netflix would love to have content stay permanently.
It's basically just more evidence that content providers don't really care about piracy.
First, I'd pay way more than $8/mo for what I'm getting on streaming right now. Second, the DVD part of the service obviously has much more overhead involved and therefore would likely cost more. Especially if they want to try and eventually price people out of choosing that service and going with just streaming.
My only complaints about streaming is the selection and the fact that so much stuff is only there shortly. I find about 20% of my queue just vanishing about every month. Worse, even when you do watch some stuff, parts are missing. I was going to watch Quantum Leap, but when I started scrolling through the episodes, I found that 20% of them were unavailable. Why in the hell would you make an entire TV show series from 20 years ago be available, but then remove like a fifth of it? Especially if you're going to remove things like the first episode and the last episode?
So you prices doubled as well?
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Netflix did this because their costs went up. If you haven't been paying attention, studios have become more ambitious with asking for more money for less content. Unfortunately this meant an inevitable price increase. To be honest I'm surprised that Netflix held out this long. While data costs may be going down, content prices have skyrocketed for Netflix, thus our prices went up. Blame the studios for your higher prices. Not Netflix. If anyone knows how to fuck up a good thing in search for a profit, its the studios.
Oh sure - I post this comment in the two articles that don't make the front page. Well, here it is anyway:
This is a harsh jump, especially for this long time subscriber. I remember when they went from $9.99 to $7.99 for single disk renters. They threw on the streaming for free. Only recently they jumped back up to $9.99. These are nice easy steps. For reference, I don't like paying over $13 for an MMO monthly registration (Everquest, World of Warcraft) and this Netflix cost jump is not insignificant - it's a 60% increase in cost!
I imagine their disk mailers will be virtually non-existent. I know I will be dropping that service. My kids are enjoying the streaming videos too much that I would not get away from dropping that service. They watch an untold number of hours watching the children's shows (educational types and other fun stuff). But I appreciated having the disks of movies that hadn't quite made it to the streaming list.
Perhaps they are trying to send a message to the MPAA studios? Are the studios trying to twist Netflix' arm? What is going on in the industry? I know who is going to get hurt from this: The US Postal Service! I would say it is also the subscribers, but the extra features are stripped from rental DVDs now - so there is very little difference between the streaming and a physical disk.
Question for Netflix: What is the rental rate on BluRay disks? How bad is it for BD? I don't own a BD system and likely never will. If I did own BluRay, that would be my only reason for hanging on to the mailer.
$8/month streaming only - great for hopping around when I don't know what to watch.
$1/DVD rental at the video store at the end of my block for DVDs.
You did exactly what they wanted you to: stuck with them. Now you are paying the same amount as before but they're providing you less.
"We can categorically state we have not released man-eating badgers into the area." - UK military spokesman, July 2007
Umm, I have netflix on every TV in my house, my laptop, my desktop, my phone, my iPad, and soon my 3DS. My wife and I simultaneously watch content in different rooms all the time. Also, sure, you get 100s of shows, but you only get 1 show per channel at a time, and unless you record it, it's gone. With Netflix I can watch thousands of titles at any moment I want. Sure you do get slightly faster access with TV, but a lot of shows update on Netflix the next day. Also Netflix has tons of great features like party watching on Xbox 360. I watch movies with my best friend who lives 1,000 miles away all the time. I don't see cable having significant benefits over netflix unless there is a particular show you watch that they don't host or you HAVE to watch it the moment it airs. Personally, I've got the patience to wait.
Check out redbox for your individual/specific movie rental needs. Yeah, it's not quite as convenient as having stuff magically show you up at your door, but you get immediate gratification of picking out the movie you feel like seeing on that particular day and it's only $1. IMHO Netflix has the streaming right and Redbox has the physical media right.
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Been working at Netflix for the last two years. In that time, I've seen costs for "hardware" (in quotes because all that stuff is now at Amazon and CDNs) go through the roof. That's the easiest money to spend, and the only beancounters involved are the ones we work with to try to predict how much we'll spend, not constrain spending.
(Seriously, one of the things I love working at Netflix is the ability of an engineer to launch 1000 instances in the cloud, or, when we were in the DC, buy $100K worth of hardware, without any approval process)
(Seriously, one of the things I love working at Netflix is the ability of an engineer to launch 1000 instances in the cloud, or, when we were in the DC, buy $100K worth of hardware, without any approval process)
I guess now we know why prices are going up! :D
You're not paying more because netflix just decided to charge more. You're paying more because studios have increased their price and because of a weakening dollar. Netflix is just trying to stay in business.
Whatever the reason, I see an increase in cost for a decrease in service provided. And more to the meat of your post, if the move were solely the fault of the studios, Netflix could certainly have done more to point this out in their blog post announcing the change. As it is, I see a lot of blather about in-house pricing decisions, but nothing about studio licensing costs -- which makes the whole affair look more like it's all about Netflix's bottom line.
(NB: I'm not saying that a company can afford to be purely charitable -- but raising prices without noticeably increasing or improving your offering, while at the same time claiming that they are "offering our lowest prices ever", sounds precious close to corporate babble and bald-faced lying. There're happy lies ["you look mahvelous in those trousers!"] and unhappy lies ["lower prices!" when they're really higher], and this one is unhappy.)
Cheers,
"What in the name of Fats Waller is that?"
"A four-foot prune."
Congratulations! I will be canceling my account at the end of this month and switching entirely to Bittorrent. Thanks for making it even harder to do things the "legitimate" way. You killed the golden goose. You had a service that was actually easier and more convenient to me than downloading DVD rips from bittorrent; the price was right, the selection was adequate (but only just), and it was worth it to me to pay for it. Not anymore, I'll just take what I want for free from the superior service known as P2P filesharing. I suggest everyone else do the same.
If you build it, nerds will come. Soylentnews.org
With netflix, at $16 you get 2 channels. One slow(mail) and one Now. With cable you get hundreds. They can be shown to multiple TVs, and you can DVR them.
Yawn. Wake me when cable has a "pause" and a "rewind" button. No, DVR doesn't cut it because you have to choose to record the show beforehand. With Netflix, I just pick something I want to watch, and it comes on NOW, not during some time-slot when I don't feel like watching TV. If I need to pause it to take a shit, I can. If I need to rewind to hear some dialog I missed, it's easy.
If you want to stick with the mid-20th-century technology that is cable TV, and pay exorbitant prices for the privilege, feel free. The rest of us have moved on, just as we've moved on from landlines, newspapers, CompuServe, BBSs, Commodore 64s, and dot-matrix printers. Cable TV is obsolete.
It's not what they are doing, I understand they are about to get ass rammed by the content companies soon. I get that they need to charge more to stay in business, I really do.
My problem is with how they are going about it.
From my email:
"Dear RoTide,
We are separating unlimited DVDs by mail and unlimited streaming into two separate plans to better reflect the costs of each. Now our members have a choice: a streaming only plan, a DVD only plan, or both.
Your current $9.99 a month membership for unlimited streaming and unlimited DVDs will be split into 2 distinct plans:
Plan 1: Unlimited Streaming (no DVDs) for $7.99 a month
Plan 2: Unlimited DVDs, 1 out at-a-time (no streaming) for $7.99 a month
Your price for getting both of these plans will be $15.98 a month ($7.99 + $7.99). You don't need to do anything to continue your memberships for both unlimited streaming and unlimited DVDs.
These prices will start for charges on or after September 1, 2011."
Essentially, hey, we are ending your plan, and oh look at that, the comparable plan is $15.98 and we're going to start billing you at that rate if you do nothing. In other words, almost a bait and switch. "Hey, we see you have a single plan for less than $10. Now we're going to end your plan and charge you for TWO plans at a 60% hike just to give you what you had!" And if I hadn't noticed the email? Or read tech blogs?
I just called their 800 number to formally state my displeasure with the situation, but it auto-hangs up on you due to call volume. You're not even put on hold, just straight up "click".
If they didn't try to charge me more, just told me the truth, and forced me to choose a new plan because the old one would put them out of business? I wouldn't be ecstatic about it, but I'd probably not be trying to call them for the first time ever. This is going to end up with a lot of bad PR.
Look on the bright side, they're openeing the door for competition.
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