Netflix Plunges on Guarded Outlook for New 2012 Signups | Hacker News Reader

Netflix Plunges on Guarded Outlook for New 2012 Signups

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17 pointsmikexstudios16 comments

They just sent me an email begging me to sign up again. I quit the streaming service because I ran out of interesting things to watch.

(Of course the email is a "no reply" - we want to talk at you, not hear from you - and gives no indication that there is any new worthwhile content.)

I see that happening to me. I have about 30 movies in the streaming selection that I've been meaning to watch. That rate of me watching them is currently faster than the rate I've seen new movies being released that I would like watching. So I'll reach a point where I might quit it, or just put it on hold for half a year maybe.

Then there is also the selection aspect. Streaming movies, on average, seem sub-par to the dvd selection. I know Netflix is between a rock and hard place. Content owners probably want too much money in order to enable streaming, but if Netflix start charging more, customers will drop it.

What if they had streaming tiers - basic/premium/ultimate. And charge more for some movies so that content owners would accept streaming as an option. Maybe I would pay the same or even more than I pay for DVDs just to have the convenience of not having to deal with physical discs, mailing them, waiting for them.

What you are getting at is that Netflix doesn't even provide you with the option. For example if you want to watch a Keanu Reeves film (that isn't one of the 6 lame ones they list) then tough. They provide absolutely no way to view them, or even indicate an interest in wanting to do so.

I might suggest that either you have already watched a lot of movies or your definition of interesting is rather narrow. I have hundreds of films in my instant queue. The number of critically acclaimed TV shows is pretty large, too. Have you seen all of Mad Men? Battlestar Galactica? Breaking Bad? Arrested Development or Louie? It would take a while just to get through those. There are, of course, many more. Lots of documentaries and smaller films you might not yet have heard of, but that you might like a lot.

It's hard for me to understand why anybody would think there's nothing interesting to see there.

I have 400 laserdiscs and 700 DVD cases (some are TV shows with multiple discs or films and their sequels). I stopped buying DVDs many years ago, but then again Netflix hasn't been acquiring recent films either - one example article http://www.forbes.com/sites/frederickallen/2011/02/02/netfli...

I also haven't had TV service since 2003 and don't torrent or similar - all my viewing has been by buying DVDs, seeing things at the cinema/on planes etc or on Hulu.

And once I did sign up for Netflix I did catch up TV shows (eg the new series of Futurama). Out of your examples I already own BSG on DVD. The others don't really interest me as I'm not a particular big fan of them. (I'm British and have lived in the US for over a decade, but my tastes don't really go for the things you list.)

To be clear there is a heck of a lot of stuff I did want to watch. When I first signed up for Netflix I spent several weeks typing things into their search engine only to get responses along the lines of available for mail order only, or doesn't exist. Following recommendations etc did mean I ended up with a queue, but it is mediocre stuff. So I gave up and read more books instead.

Two random content examples for you. Try to find "Northern Exposure" (TV series) or marvel at how Netflix thinks Keanu Reeves has only ever done 6 films.

At the end of the day, it all boils down to content. We're going through an age of amazing television, especially with AMC and HBO. Netflix needs to either provide GREAT content that they create, or they have to get HBO and AMC on board (which is pretty difficult). I'm sure sports broadcasting rights are really ratcheted down, but It would be cool if they broke into the live streaming side of things. I'm sure they have the capacity to handle a football game or hockey game.

AMC is on board, at least with past seasons of Breaking Bad, Mad Men, and Walking Dead

Not surprising. Netflix lost their connection with their core business and stopped listening and responding to feedback. Ultimately, this will be what destroys them.

A few names come to mind: Polaroid, Kodak, RIM (ok, not quite yet but soon enough). Any others?

What's interesting to me is that Polaroid/Kodak have kicked the bucket, while Fujifilm continues to thrive as a "chemical company". It's really rather impressive what they've been able to accomplish, in a country whose culture is wholly against the kind of high risk decision making that the current CEO has been able to carry out.

I assume that by 'core business' you mean the DVD rent-by-mail business? Keeping that would have been a terrible strategy. You only need to look at its competitors to see that (if there are any left).

They shed a lot of customers in order to pivot but it was pivot or die.

I'd more likely place blame on competition ramping up like Amazon and Redbox and them being severely squeezed by content providers who've been jacking up their rates at renegotiation time.

I think this is what really bothered me about them, its almost like that cliched part in a breakup where you get to go "you've changed".

Years ago, I was a netflix evangelist, getting into heated online arguments with my friends about how awesome netflix was and how it was going to decimate blockbuster (Can you imagine how chuffed I was when that actually happened and my friends had to issue mea culpas, one by one?)

I really thought people were being hyper reactive when netflix first announced their pricing changes and Qwikster, I was actually going to buy a ton of the stock when it was at $64.

But I witnessed their newfound intransigence first hand, they wouldn't let me use the ipad app unless I had signed up for streaming (even though I was a paying customer with an actual DVD queue that I wanted to manage), they removed the ability to put an account on hold, forcing me to cancel my account after almost 6 years as a loyal customer, and the kicker was when I actually went and got an AppleTV and realized that for the way I watch movies, netflix was just a waste of money.

Oddly enough, I was such a fanboi that I would have continued to support them anyway, but there was just this corporate ugliness that I saw in their new direction that made me sever my ties with them.

Netflix never really built on the lead that they got in the movie rental space, they should have built a box that they'd have sold to users as a loss leader to let people watch movies directly from them ... but they never did, now they're dependent on the studios, and hardware makers (Sony, Samsung, Apple etc) to actually deliver movies to people which is not a good place to be. It almost reminds me of how Microsoft surrendered it mobile and tablet lead to Apple ... only Microsoft had strengths in other areas that let it absorb such a massive screwup.

I don't know that Netflix can do the same thing, especially in the face of vicious competition.

I really do wish them the best of luck though, because (just like most real life relationships) even though we've broken up, I still think of them very fondly from time to time.

> they should have built a box that they'd have sold to users as a loss leader to let people watch movies directly from them ... but they never did, now they're dependent on the studios

There is Roku, an app for Android tablets (used it on ASUS transformer, works great), an app on my Vizio TV (also works great), my LG blue ray player also has Netflix support (also works great). I wouldn't want another box in my house or around me like Roku even it was free just to handle Netflix.

What I want is a better selection of streaming movies. And unless Netflix starts producing their own movies, I don't see what you mean by them not being dependent on studios.

Content owners, it seems, think they can and should run their own streaming and distribution and they see Netflix eating their lunch. I bet each one of them think they are the shit and their content is so awesome, customers will trip over themselves to pay extra or buy specific hardware just for them for a premium just to watch that content.

And I would guess every contents owner thinks that. Except I really don't see myself having 10 different apps for each of the studio and picking based on owners what to watch (For ex. I wouldn't say, hmm, I wonder what wonderful movies Sony Studio App has today).

If Netflix just stayed as a DVD mailing service, they would certainly have become the next Kodak. But they're disrupting themselves (and pissing off existing customers like you).

As a Canadian, all I've known is the streaming only Netflix, and I've been a fanboy since I signed up in 2010. I see no reason to stop since the service has only been getting better!

I have used Netflix on ~25 of the last 30 days. I haven't purchased film in over a decade.

After finding yet one more set of episodes removed from streaming -- in addition to however many movies I'd previously queued up -- I'm about done with Netflix. I'd hung in there because I liked the service and their early attitude.

But now, even if this is not Netflix' fault, I think I'm done sending any of my money -- even via the Netflix indermediaries -- to content owners who jerk me around this way.

There was a fellow -- in France, IIRC -- who wrote a fairly well-worded if polemic argument for no longer enabling these content owner abusers through one's financial contributions.

While I've never been a content pirate (not that I don't endorse some of the associated goals and principles), I'm ready to retreat further into my books and works and do my 2 cents to help "big media" starve -- perhaps, hopefully, at least enough to get hungry enough to try harder to find a better distribution model. Or to help the real content producers (in all their various roles) do an end run around these self-serving, rapacious middlemen.

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