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

cuz I know people suddenly acquire smarts if it means seeing Hangover 2 on a flatscreen as opposed to figuring out that tax cuts for the rich don't help them.

http://boisee.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/01/web%20point%20of%20interest-8641.jpg

Morbs, I was agreeing with with you, why u comin at me?

I get dvds from my local rental spot if I'm looking for something obscure

you've got a local rental spot? there are zero in my town. the only places that have DVDs are the library and those redbox things, which altogether carry about 100 titles. unless I want to go into the city and hope they've got a copy of death note III or the lathe of heaven or whatever weird thing I feel like watching.

agree w/ morbs that the concept of "almost everything" being on DVD is laughable. but the netflix physical catalog does sit on 10+ years of heavy DVD production which is unlikely to be reproduced in the blu-ray world, and although it could easily be reproduced in the streaming world it just doesn't seem to be happening with any volume or velocity...

if ISPs continue throttling or start charging based on GBs/TBs

Start charging?

nearly every movie ever made is published on DVD

Then, bitch, please please PLEASE let me borrow your DVD of Howdy, Broadway (Charles J. Hunt, 1929)!

sorry Whiney, Monday misinterpretation + paranoia

physical media forever

considering tattooing this across my shoulders

can't decide: henna, or sharpie?

lol

just out of curiosity i checked to see how many of the movies in my queue are available for streaming: 17 out of 111. as i said, i just think this is way premature. i'd love to know the behind the scenes rationale for it.

maybe they're dramatically underestimating how long it takes you to watch 111 movies

over *OVERestiating* arghgh

ok i give up

surely the rationale is: DVD mailing costs a lot more to operate than streaming, so let's try to phase that out and beef up the streaming division.

the thing about the "well clearly they're going to do something really awesome with streaming soon" logic is...why would they not wait to shit on long-time dvd users until AFTER beefing up the stream scene?

so let's try to phase that out and beef up the streaming division.

Yes but for this to work, they'd have to actually BEEF UP the streaming division.

Seems like streaming is contingent on agreements with studios, distributors, etc., and so, while cheaper for them, it's also more unstable than just having a giant library of DVDs to lend.

I think they want to force the studios/distributors to realize that streaming is the future and Netflix is the juggernaut that they'll have to work with to get their content out.

The thing is, the studios aren't going to give up something like On Demand, which would be pointless if new releases became available on streaming.

netflix streaming selection is pretty great if you only like shitty horror movies, wesley snipes, and movies that have "national lampoon presents" in the title

also, kid's cartoons (I watched the entire Avengers season the week I took off because I go bored)

they are slowly adding more criterion titles to streaming but i feel like they are taking some away too ...

They used to have a deal with Criterion, but that's gone to Hulu now. I think they still get the ones that IFC releases through Criterion though.

There's actually a lot of stuff for foreign/arthouse types. I've got well over 100 in my instant queue.

Their deal with Criterion expires at the end of this year. After December 31 they will have NO Criterion stuff available for streaming.

my deal with streaming will probably expire at that point too

basically how the digital delivery of movies/tv plays out ie who wins/who gets what parts etc is one of the biggest lol business fights of the next decade and will have profound implications for all the industries in that ecosystem - netflix has known this all along, which is why theyre called netflix and not netdvd - apple knows this, nbcuniversal knows this, google know its, time warner knows it - they all know that whoever controls this market will be a much larger more powerful company in the near future and whoever doesnt will be greatly diminished

not to say this wasnt stupid by netflix, cause pissing off yr customers never is, but theyre a v smart company w/a p amazing track record so far, so i wouldnt personal dismiss any move they make out of hand

btw didnt realize read hastings was gay before i saw that video

this kind of blew my mind a few years ago when i first saw it (to the extent that a corporate hr powerpoint deck can blow ones mind) http://www.slideshare.net/reed2001/culture-1798664

possible pro-tip for streaming: it seems to work way better going direct from my router to the BR player we're using to stream rather than via wireless

I can't decide if I'm going to drop the Blu-Ray plan - I use streaming to watch documentaries and TV shows and if people are over and we suddenly want to relive 1996 and watch Trainspotting or w/e, all the Serious Movies are in my physical queue and I'd much rather watch them on BR... but I've also had Mikey & Nicky sitting, unwatched, on the table for six weeks.

Oh yeah, you need to have a wired connection. Wireless is not going to be a great experience.

"not to say this wasnt stupid by netflix, cause pissing off yr customers never is"

have to disagree here, based on the fortunes of george lucas.
also, one rationale i've read for the move is they want to get more individuals to subscribe, not households, and DVD side encourages household plans.

http://i.imgur.com/U8yGB.png

that deck is pretty great

One thing that occurs to me -- maybe Netflix should and/or is planning to create a wider variety of streaming plans. With the current single unlimited streaming option they're kind of caught between people who don't want to pay a single cent more and people who are fed up with the limited selection (sometimes these are the same people -- perhaps they're also the ones who want tax cuts for the rich and no service reductions). They can't improve the selection without more revenue to pay off the studios. Maybe the answer is to offer tiers of plans either based on bandwidth or number of movies or movie quality or access to selection. It makes sense to me that if they're going to do this, it's easier if it also involves disentangling the streaming plans from the DVD plans, which is sort of a clunky way of doing things.

bursts of complexity

Maybe the answer is to offer tiers of plans either based on bandwidth or number of movies or movie quality or access to selection. I

My understanding is that they're about to put a major limit on the number of devices that can stream simultaneously from a single account, so large families who want to use it on multiple devices at once will have to buy multiple accounts. Not that it will matter when your ISP is throttling you.

I'm surprised they haven't done that already, at one point I had three friends all streaming at different homes from my NF account.

pretty cool friends who come over to watch netflix on their computers instead of hang out

three friends all streaming at different homes three friends all streaming at different homes three friends all streaming at different homes three friends all streaming at different homes three friends all streaming at different homes

Hard to fault them for wanting the curb that. I'm guessing there were eventually be some sort of family package with various tiers of streams available.

Pro-tip, Whiney: Read the actual text before you spring to 11 on the outrage meter.

I can fault them just fine! (slinks away to set up a slingbox to circumvent device limitation...)

whiney's too angry to know what he's gonna be angry about

Would be interesting if Netflix could have something like premium channels: pay so-and-so to stream HBO shows, so-and-so for Criterion, etc. Build a package that way.

my anger is always expressed in all-lowercase

Is it time to change the thread title?

your love is always expressed in comic sans

I wish I could find info somewhere about how long the Hulu/Criterion deal is. I imagine it's several years, though.

I've got a Netflix copy of Elevator to the Gallows ready to return. Should I keep it or piss on it?

Managing two queues without being able to cross check them is a hassle for sure, and managing two accounts is, too, to a lesser extent. I'm surprised no one has mentioned special features (that I've noticed, anyway). There are some movies or shows whose special features I really want to see, not the least of which is closed captioning. CC works when I stream on my computer, but not through my BR player, which is not top of the line, but it's a fucking Blu Ray player, which is more than a lot of people have.

I prefer non-physical media by a mile, but only if it's equivalent to the physical media, and NF streaming is not even close. Besides the lack of "special" features, the interface feels clunky (even on a nicer machine than my BR), and the buffering - upon loading or when reversing or advancing - is way too slow.

anyone can watch it on their tv if they have the energy and known how to set it up

― iatee, Monday, September 19, 2011 9:56 AM (3 hours ago) Bookmark

Not really. I have an HDTV and a Sony Vaio laptop. It isn't impossible to feed the video stream to the TV, but it would take some fairly pricey and jerry rigging b/c they lack compatible outputs and inputs. And again, an HDTV and a Vaio are more advanced hardware than a lot of people have. Plus I am craftier than a lot of users.

"It isn't impossible to feed the video stream to the TV, but it would take some fairly pricey and jerry rigging b/c they lack compatible outputs and inputs."

Um, no it wouldn't.

With my HDTV and computer, it would. I spent a great deal of time researching this.