Netflix/Qwikster change and split

[LexiaFira]

Not so much angry at it as to a thoughtful hmmmmm

yahoo news article

Business Insider

Basically dislike the price hike, but I believe its due to Starz or several other companies not renewing their licensing or raising the cost of it for streaming and/or dvd's thus to keep up with the cost, the price hike to "rent" dvd's is higher.
HOWEVER, IMO the split seems odd, bad timing, too soon after the price change but a possibly good idea as maybe some people just want to keep one or the other.
Still going to cost more but now you can get video games with Qwikster and this means GameFly is no longer the expensive monopoly.
Still bad as blockbuster, hollywood video and many others are having to keep up with it or go out of business but...this is more of a thoughtful look.

Yes please, your two cents, debates, yea's nays and what have you. Be cause I don't use the streaming much save for to let my daughter watch shows that she cannot otherwise see due to her schedule (ie early morning on tv or playing during her naptime or when she will eventually be in school) I'm not a majority user of streaming however I do watch at least four movies in a month from it....the times they are a changing.

[Andara Bledin]

The price change is due to the split. It's all part of the same event.

Netflix has, as the name suggests, always been intended to be a streaming service. They've been doing the mailers to build up capital and establish a presence for when the time came when there would be enough broadband service deployed to make he streaming service able to hold it's own financially.

I'm hoping that once they've split the services fully, that the streaming side will get a whole lot more stuff up and available to stream.

I haven't really perused the full changes, but I did read the email letter apologizing for the way that the changes were presented that showed up in my inbox the other day.

^-.-^

[bainsidhe]

I still like Netflix, but will be reducing the DVD portion, which is of course what Netflix wants. They handled the whole price increase/split poorly and I'm glad people have left Netflix in droves. And as for the CEO's disingenuous apology, puh-leave. It was basically: "Oops, my bad, but I still won't change anything." Based on history, Netflix will raise their prices again in 6 months, then 6 months after that, etc etc...

To me they're putting the cart before the horse. Trying to get people over to just streaming (which is more profitable), without making more content available. Correction, more popular or recent content. I can't get new seasons of popular shows on streaming. I can't even get most popular movies unless they've done the DVD run for well over a year. And although Hulu is a money-hungry ghost of what it once was, many shows streamed on Netflix are available there for free. I just like the ease of use of Netflix and lack of commercials. I've recently heard that Netflix may be losing Starz (per an article I read as of 2 weeks ago, anyway) because of licensing issues/royalties. So really, what's the benefit of my huge price increase?

[LexiaFira]

bainsidhe
ah, sad that the streaming will go up like i believe gamefly did with their prices. I recall gamefly first came out it was almost 11 bucks a month then kept dropping down to almost 8 or 9 a month for one game at a time, now its up to 15 a month for one? wow. The final price is based on what my sister in law has said
we may eventually just drop the streaming and go back to the internet or the red box )or walmart's version the blue box which is literally the Red Box thing in blue) heh oh boy

Andara
yeah hubs got the email too, didn't watch the video but laughed at the email. the ceo apologizing? I thought yeah right this has got to be spam or something but it wasn't

[smileyeagle1021]

I've dropped to streaming only... I think though that if it goes up past $10 a month I'm dropping it and going to use Hulu and other free services (well, also Amazon, but I already have Prime membership, so it's not as if I'm paying extra).

[Kaylyn]

I originally started with Netflix streaming + 3 dvds about a year ago. Then the first price hike, I dropped to 1 dvd as I really wasn't going through the dvds that fast. Then the most recent price hike and split, I decided to just go to streaming as we got far more use out of it than the dvds.

I felt that the recent email was really a lot of backpedaling and excuse-offering. I don't feel that Netflix is truly listening to the outcry that happened with their price hikes and the split. If their streaming selection was more filled out (which I'm hoping happens), I wouldn't really care so much. But I'm sick of looking up a movie or show to watch, only to find it's dvd-only.

I can understand, sorta, why they want to separate the services. I just hate feeling like I have to choose between the services. Before, I was paying $10 for one dvd and streaming. Now I would have to pay $16. Now that the shock of the hike/split has worn off, I'm considering adding the dvd back. But I can't understand why they can't just offer a single, lower-priced plan for those that just want the single dvd option so they can have access to the entire Netflix catalog.

I may wait until they start offering games and see how that affects everything. I definitely think it would be worth the added price to be able to rent games. I'd been considering a Gamefly account for the longest time but didn't want to be paying for yet another service. So if their game selection is decent and the price doesn't jump again, there's a very good chance I'll be back for the games.