Netflix - Not bad! Qwikster - uh, never mind...

Their streaming selection is much improved from the last time I looked! Just watched La Grande Illusion.

there's a ton of good stuff! I watched Claire Denis "L'intrus" yesterday <3<3<3.. in the middle of Chéreau's "Gabrielle" right now & am reserving judgment for the moment

"La regle du jeu" is on streaming as well btw

Just starting Dreyer's Vampyr now.

in the middle of Chéreau's "Gabrielle" right now & am reserving judgment for the moment

have been dithering over seeing gabrielle so if you want to add to the chorus please recommend/badmouth

i voted it number one in the films of the 2000s poll. it's a masterpiece. utterly unique and magnificent.

I am getting sick of seeing 'very long wait' for every new movie that comes out. I expect it with huge blockbusters, but even Black Dynamite is showing that to me. This didn't used to happen, and I've been a subscriber for years, and am always quick to return movies, so I don't really get why it's so bad right now. Anyone else think this is worse than it has been?

Yes, started in December for whatever reason. This, combined with their blu-ray premium, their delay of new warners discs, and 15 out of 20 blu-rays being cracked, drove me at least temporarily into the dying arms of Blockbuster. I'm having fun with in store exchanges but I don't think the store is going to be around for much longer. The main downsides to the switch are that Blockbuster shipping turnaround is about a day slower, no console streaming and a few titles aren't available on Blu-ray. Blockbuster also lists many new titles as short or long waits, but they seem to ship faster anyway.

Apparently, all the cracked discs are due to the post office running them through machines. When they get enough complaints, they dispatch a fixer to the branch in question. This seems to be a bigger problem for more fragile blu-ray discs. It's worth noting that I've had nothing cracked from Blockbuster.

I'm really annoyed because I've loved Netflix for so long and recommended them to everyone, but it seems like they've lost their way lately on some pretty critical things.

been seeing the 'very long wait' more and more but it doesn't really bother me, Netflix still beats anything else i'd be doing to get the same fix. only bummer is sometimes by the time i get around to renting a new release it's already playing on HBO or whatever and i feel like it was a waste of a rental.

on my local rental charts, the top 5 horror movies include all 3 Underworld movies. I do not know why that is.

Yes, the streaming capability is one reason I don't just dump them. I feel kind of like I helped make Netflix a monopoly (at least for mail-order movie rentals), and now that it is one, it's getting shitty and there's nothing I can do about it other than "boycott" it by canceling. And then I start thinking... I guess it's not that big a deal if I have to wait a few weeks to see a new movie. It's not just new movies, though. I wanted to watch 'Damages', and for some reason disc 1 of season 1 is 'short wait'.

I hope in a few years, subscription-based streaming services will rule the day. The concept of having to deal with having hard copies of movies or music seems old-fashioned.

seems to me that its most very long wait on new releases, which are always the easiest to torrent? i do fine by torrenting the newest stuff and using netflix for slightly older/more difficult-to-find movies

obv thats not a 'legal' solution but

def. agree that streaming would be my choice for the way of the future. id probably pay the $8/mo im paying right now just for the streaming service without the DVD portion.

thing about torrents is I'd rather watch new movies on my tv instead of my computer monitor. I haven't figured out how to stream HD stuff from my PC to the PS3.

u can't do a monitor cable straight into the TV?

For brand new movies you have to make sure that you have return a movie on the Saturday before the movie's release date. In most cases I will get new releases on the Tuesday they come out if I have an next available movie spot on Monday morning. But yeah sometimes its just a forever wait (Paranormal Activity has been at VERY LONG WAIT since it came out.)

thing about torrents is I'd rather watch new movies on my tv instead of my computer monitor. I haven't figured out how to stream HD stuff from my PC to the PS3.

http://tversity.com/

every torrent i've ever seen looks like garbage and most people watch them on their retarded computer screens. not paying the competley tiny and fair amount of money it takes to have a netflix account is some true savagery imo

hey whiney

not sure who youre arguing with

but im glad you feel passionately about something

I've tried tversity and the windows 7 media server, and it's choppy as fuck. I think it's because Wi-Fi is the only way my PS3 can talk to my PC (my PC is in the other room, and it's not worth moving the whole thing). I've also tried using my laptop to connect directly, but couldn't get it to look right (probably due to super shitty video card in laptop).

Alex, that's a good tip - I'll give that a shot next time. I just want to see Zombieland, dammit. It's been sitting at the top of my queue since it came out.

I got annoyed with occasional wifi (old airport express) choppiness and just use a thumb drive. Make a root level folder called VIDEO and the PS3 will see it and play almost anything.

Also, I would just torrent everything but I like watching in Blu-ray quality if possible.

I just recently got my PC video card plugged into my TV and have been watching some movies off my Watch Instantly queue. There's enough stuff on there to keep me busy for a while, but I'm starting to wonder if they will ever manage to expand the list of streaming movies in a truly meaningful way.

hi-def torrents arent too hard to find, especially for big h'wood movies! theyre much larger files, granted, and my shitty laptop cant play them. but a PS3 could.

Does the amount of wait you have depend on how far up your list it is? I've got some new stuff in the middle of my (60+) list so it's not a high priority, but would you get it sooner if you left it at the top?

You get the first available movie that's in your queue.

HD torrents aren't bad at all, but visibly (and audibly) not as good as a real Blu-ray.

I hope in a few years, subscription-based streaming services will rule the day. The concept of having to deal with having hard copies of movies or music seems old-fashioned.

Anyway, there are some 230 DVDs in my Netflix queue and only three of them are listed as having a short or long wait, and I've had fewer problems lately with damaged discs than in the past. I don't use blu-ray yet, though.

xxp But there must be some way of determining who gets an in-demand dvd. A previous Netflix type service I used a while back would give you priority if you had a sought-after film at the top of your list compared to someone who had it lower down. So I would have thought that it would be some combination of amount of time you've waited for it x priority?

Also, some people are saying that the "long wait" times are due to the holidays (new subscribers etc), but I've never had this problem in all my years as a customer.

xp
Sorry that sounded a bit stupid. What I was wondering is if I could put it at the top of my queue and have the 'wait' time appear shorter just because I wanted it more.

"But there must be some way of determining who gets an in-demand dvd. "

Probably but the logic is probably so arcane that I wouldn't bother stressing about it. How many Very Long Wait movies do you guys have anyway that this is such an enormous issue?

xpost

With Netflix it's supposedly whatever is available when they receive your last envelope. They will mail to you your #1 choice if available. If not then #2, if not then #3. Simple as that.

"What I was wondering is if I could put it at the top of my queue and have the 'wait' time appear shorter just because I wanted it more."

It won't change the "wait" time as posted, but you'll get it sooner cuz it's at the top of your queue!

When I paused my service, 8 of my top 10 were "Very Long Wait". It had been that way since the end of November.

Switching to DVD usually made them slightly less of a wait. However, Blu-ray is pretty much the only reason I'm using a mailing service anyway.

I guess the movies I want to watch no one else cares about then. I see this happen with some brand new releases, but I usually get them within a couple of weeks.

Only one is a V long wait! (Maybe more when I've gone thru the ILX film poll). Just intersted in the logic behind it, is all.
Just had a look at their FAQs and they don't really say except that you may get a 'differentiated' service depending on how you use your account, and they tend to give priority to those who receive fewest DVDs (all other things being equal).

I've never had a problem with Netflix, great service actually. Think once I've had an unwatchable disk and one time I had to wait an extra day while processing.

And to be clear, the DVD's definitely had waits too (something I had almost never experienced previously).

Ah Blu-ray. Okay that's a whole different animal.

who gives a fuck, if you have to wait they send you an extra dvd!

i have 500 discs in my queue and three are short waits. no problems on this end.

For years, I've been able to get new releases within a week of release. Now I can't. They're not managing service level expectations very well.

And Fig, I'm talking about DVD wait times too.

xxp obviously some people give a fuck.

well obviously, but WHY?

they send you an extra one and then the one you wanted comes A WHOLE DAY LATER...

this is a degree of whiny tight-assery that should be filed under some word that "first world problems" won't adequately cover

They send you the next one in your queue, but they won't send the one you want until it is 1. in stock, and 2. they receive the next envelope from you.

When it takes 5 weeks for those stars to align it can be annoying.

IN MY DAY WE HAD TO GO TO THE PENNY ARCADE AND FEED THE MACHINE