Corporations bank on the fact that the majority of people would rather complain than go back on what’s convenient for them. This was obvious from the start.
If they ever start instituting ads regardless of membership tier, then it’s back to buying discs for me. It’s just going to turn into another cable service eventually.
Average daily Sign-ups to Netflix reached 73k during that period, a +102% increase from the prior 60-day average. […] Cancels also increased during this period, but not as much as Sign-ups. The ratio of Sign-ups to Cancels since May 23rd is up +25.6% compared to the previous 60-day period.
I had a family account, but I stopped using it since going abroad to uni once they cracked down. The amount of content is just at the point where I don't see any value to subscribing.
Generally though, exactly what killed cable TV is killing my use of Netflix and other services. All the interesting stuff is now so spread out on so many different services, it's just no longer worth it.
Dealing with N different subscriptions and different websites, is too much BS to deal with AND pay for, so I'm just going to run my own server.
It is trivial to sign up for a service when you want to watch something, and then cancel it when you don't, until there's something else you want to watch on the service. That is the benefit over cable.
Most people still treat it like a cable subscription: always on, even if they're not watching it.
That’s a good thought and would probably work if I lived alone and only watched one thing at a time.
But I would say it depends on your use case and the size of your household. We are 4 ppl in my family that watch different content on the same TV at different times of the day. We have Netflix (the wife’s show is here), Disney (kids), HBO (me), Viaplay (family movies in my native language when we all watch together). I have been sharing thease accounts with my brothers family but we are about to move to Plex, I would rather buy DVD or digital releases and host it myself then use all thease subscriptions.
If they would price it better, could work together and all be used in the same interface on my tv then maybe I would be willing to go back.
I have spent thousands of dollars over the years on my Plex setup. I'd caution against the assumption that switching to Plex and hosting your media is going to be cheaper in the short run, or maybe even the long run, than paying for streaming services. Depending on your use case you may even need to pay for Plexpass. (Hardware encoding, iirc, is locked behind their Plexpass subscription.) And factor in the inevitable troubleshooting you'll have to do when something doesn't work for your brother's family.
Do the math for yourself, is all I'm saying. It's not automatically the better solution.
Those are all good points and I’m happy you replied, as it will probably help other who read this 😊
However I already have a Plex server for my older media (VHS 😅 tapes) that I have converted to digital, that’s hosted on my NAS, and lifetime Plex pass. I have been meaning to look into open source replacements but many older smart tvs only have Plex 🤷
I should probably have mentioned as well that the inconvenience of having multiple apps are a bigger hurdle for my family then the cost, as that pushes us towards things like Plex where the kids could find everything in one app
I’m not surprised. The number of people sharing accounts who now need their own was always likely to be greater than the number who were going to cancel. They only had to convert a fraction of the non-subdividing viewers for it to work out in their favour. I think they’ll find they have less viewers now, though.
The approach of tacitly allowing account sharing to build viewership then cracking down on it to boost revenue is smart enough as a business strategy. It signals what most of these companies will do when it comes time to really monetise.
I worry for the future of the internet when YouTube and Google really kick off. It’s going to be a subscription hellscape (it is already, but it’s going to be so much worse).
The approach of tacitly allowing account sharing to build viewership then cracking down on it to boost revenue is smart enough as a business strategy. It signals what most of these companies will do when it comes time to really monetise.
It’s less extreme than Hulu’s method of going from an all free service to a subscription service. When you think about it from Hulu’s perspective there’s no way they would make less money and unlike social media sites like Twitter or Facebook the users’ labor isn’t the content. The movies and tv shows are.
I don’t have a link for it, but I read that YouTube is working on a 3 strikes policy for anyone using AdBlock programs… So after the 3rd warning you’re not able to watch anything on YouTube at all…
I didn’t think there was doubt this would work, it’s just a dumbass way of making up the “lost” profit. When you got a Netflix subscription before this, it was based on the total simultaneous screen count. Where the screens are should not matter, and never should have mattered. A simpler, less idiotic solution would have been to rethink the price per screen cost and adjust the plans. It would have been a more acceptable compromise that accomplished the same goal.
IMO this is not surprising, I actually considered buying stock in Netflix, because they were so low.
I’m guessing the ones to complain the most, were the ones who were at the free end of those shared passwords.
I don’t use Netflix myself, but adding advertising for slightly cheaper subscriptions, and ending password sharing, seemed like an almost guaranteed win for Netflix to me. At least in the short term.
People here may disagree and find it outrageous, but most people probably don’t care enough to make a big deal out of it, and will simply choose the option that suit their needs best.
I haven’t followed the Netflix password news all that closely because I barely ever use Netflix - but when I do use it it’s through password sharing an account my sister pays for. That worked as recently as just a week ago.
If someone is actively watching something and a second person logs in to the same account and starts watching something, Netflix recognizes it within a minute and displays a message to the second person that logged in stating that someone is already logged in to the account.
As long as you’re not watching at the same time as each other, you should be good to go.
That’s not how it works. You will be forced to set a “home” for your account, which then IP locks your account for stationary devices. Anyone else not on that IP and not on a mobile device won’t be able to watch.
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