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Comment by staunch | Hacker News Reader

Netflix just needs to raise their damn prices -- or offer a higher tier. Many of us were used to paying $30-$80 for our cable TV packages and another $20-$30/mo for Blockbuster. It's been about 7 years since I paid those, but now I'm only paying $8/mo for TV/movie entertainment in total.

I'd be more than happy to pay $18/mo if it meant I had 2-3x more content.

Netflix: $8/mo, Netflix Plus: $18/mo, and even Netflix Premium: $28/mo.

That they haven't done this is kind of dumbfounding.

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Not sure why you are being downvoted. $10/month is way to low to be sustainable. Netflix has to raise their prices since the content creators are squeezing them because they know they hold all the cards.

> Netflix: $8/mo, Netflix Plus: $18/mo, and even Netflix Premium: $28/mo.

Hmm...that sounds a lot like how traditional cable TV packages are structured.

So? It wasn't price that made cable TV suck. It was the lack of on-demand viewing, alternate device viewing, region restrictions, commercials, etc.

That's all you can eat, though. I don't have to worry about emptying out DVRs, or programming it in, or (if I'm not a DVR subscriber) waiting for it to air and sitting through an absolute assault of commercials.

Additionally, I simply refuse to watch a PPV movie for $5.00 per on top of paying $50/mo for cable. Most of the channels are absolute garbage (yes, I'm looking at you, "reality" TV) or air the programs I actually want to watch so rarely that I end up not watching them at all.

Netflix is simple: Find/browse movie, check user ratings and synopsis, click play. That's Apple-level magic, and it's worth paying a premium, even if it means paying near what I did with cable.

I would cancel my subscription just on principle if they started doing that crap.

I would be willing to just pay more. But tiered content is trash.

Why does it matter if there are higher tiers that have more content?

Your concern is that you would get less than you currently do for $8/mo or something?

Is it as objectionable when considered a higher base price, but letting people opt out of content they don't want and be refunded? I don't understand why tiering is bad. You'd have to avoid an awfully lot of businesses to get away from tiered services.

That's absurd. Back when Netflix was primarily competing with Blockbuster, you would say something like 'Well, if I rent 2 or 3 movies at Blockbuster a month, I'll come out ahead using Netflix'. That's the world that Netflix prices came from.

Now Netflix has grown into something so great that it can replace not only your DVD rentals at Blockbuster, but also your Cable subscription, and for a lot of us, the thought of even buying movies. Suddenly they have gobbled up what used to be $100 worth of money going from my pocket to the industry.

And people cry foul when Netflix raised their prices $5. Get over it.

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