Netflix: Disgruntled customers rejoining service
news.cnet.com
news.cnet.com
Seriously though, in my search for cheap/free movies what pushed me off the fence about rejoining Netflix was that they were offering the first month free, even though I'm not a new customer. All the details of my account were saved, and all I had to do what update the security code and expiration date on my card. Pretty damn good UX through the re-signup process.
The annoyance factor came when I tried to watch a movie. I got an error message with an obscure DRM error code, and instructions to call a Netflix 800 number. Rather than wake Reed Hastings up at an ungodly hour, I Googled around and followed advice to delete a particular Silverlight related file, and restart the browser.
Again, no dice, but at least now the error code was one that prompted me to upgrade my version of Silverlight. Downloaded, installed, restart browser. Log back in for the third or fourth time. NOW I can watch my movie.
Let's just say that was only mildly annoyed by all of this because the first month was free. And the process in the end was somewhat less painful than hunting for a working stream (...or what that must be like, I'm sure). ;)
One free month is more than enough time to re-evaluate whether their streaming catalog is worth the 7.99 monthly price. I do hope they've added more A-list movies on the streaming side, because it's just not worth it for me to tack on another eight bucks to get access to the DVD catalog.
People used to be screaming at all the popups and popunders in the early 2000s. People stopped screaming because adblockers and customer complaints in general end up getting rid of them.......except for Netflix! WTF!
They still use them. Saw a few this week, and I still won't support Netflix because of it.
Personally, I think as a geek, you shouldn't support them either.
If you report them to Netflix I'm sure they'll be glad to shut down that affiliate's account.
Either that or you got malware.
I don't think they have credible competitors§ yet. There's Hulu and there's Amazon Prime videos, but neither, to me, have the same breadth.
§I mean, via internet delivery. Even DVD mail delivery, they are very good, but that's not a growth market.
The downside is that I cannot watch the first season of the former... unless I fire up Netflix :)
One advantage of Netflix is that they give you a really dense page full of easy to read selections when you're hunting for something to watch.
But they're the only two legal games in town that don't charge an arm and a leg.
We love netflix at home. They're seriously starting to ramp up on TV series licenses and 80s and 90s hit movies now (where we as Gen-Xers go for our nostalgia trips).
And, I'm starting to see some AAA blockbusters show up from the recent past (<5 years ago). So, it's coming along nicely for our needs and definitely for the price. I've never understood how people who say "well, cable has bigger hits faster", but not only do you have to pay $50+ for digital HD cable, but >$10 on top for HBO/Cinemax/premiums, and pay to "rent" on-demand recent hit movies.
Now that is the ripoff.
Personally, I don't like Netflix's streaming video model, I much prefer that of Amazon's but I would definitely like to see the price decrease. Having a large library of movies (mostly older, some fairly recent), doesn't do me any good unless it has the movie I want to watch at that time. I don't watch all that many movies so when I do watch one I want it to choose from any movie to do so, not be limited to a subset of movies for which they were able to negotiate rights to stream them.
I think the "buffet" model of streaming content works for TV shows a lot better since they're shorter and most people are more willing to watch what they consider a "sub-optimal" choice of a show than a movie.
So that's 2 movies a month for roughly the same amount? With Netflix, I watch 2 movies a day. Have to agree that the offering is a little sparse, but it's a much better alternative than watching regular TV.
You watch too many movies :)
The thing you're talking about is quite comparable to the iTunes Store. Most, if not all, of the videos that are free with Prime Instant Videos can also be rented one at a time by people who aren't Amazon Prime members.
I also think paying for rentals one at a time makes more sense for watching movies.
$0.50 a viewing would be great, but I wouldn't take it over $10 a year for access to the same library.
Netflix works in all these places and works well.