Into the arms of Blockbuster, no. Into the arms of BitTorrent? Perhaps.

I don't understand what they could possibly gain by doing this, but to be honest I don't have much experience with Netflix. However, I'm moving next Wednesday and was planning to sign up. How much should this affect my decision?

I was actually kind of glad to get this email last night. I've got movies scattered all over profiles and wanted to consolidate them into the main account profile, but there's no easy way to do that. You have to manually add them one at a time to other profiles. (i.e. your main profile)

So, I'm quite pleased. They'll be merging them for me.

@tedyc03:

I find the torrents too unreliable and certainly too slow. As long as Netflix keeps sending me 8 flicks at a time as fast as possible, for less than the cost of dinner, I'll remain a customer. Profiles or not.

Seems like the only reason to do this is corporate greed. I am guessing they will start offering additional accounts at discounted rates.

Profiles were one of the best features Netflix offered. This is a huge mistake they are making.

It's so infuriating when a company or website says something like, "Removing this feature will help us improve service" without the slightest hint of how customers will be happier in the end with fewer features. I'm pretty sure I'd prefer it if they made up a totally BS justification for the change versus no justification at all.

@Dakine:

I'm not so sure they'll be consolidating them for you...the way that email read to me is that YOU need to consolidate, as they're just going to delete any additional profiles.

Who really cares? This isn't a big deal. Some people will bitch and moan about anything. It isn't like they're raising prices or going out of business.
Whatever.

@tedyc03:

So, where do you think all those movies on BitTorrent are coming from?

i dont understand, cant he just move his wifes movies to every third place in his que. it would take like 5 minutes.

Netflix remains the best entertainment value around. This is hardly "abusing the customer" as Stephen alleges.

Wow, this totally sucks. I just sent in my polite letter of protest. I would seriously consider cancelling my account over this. It's an awesome feature that can't be costing them that much to implement. A decision like this just serves to piss off customers and reduce the value of membership. I hope they change their mind.

This is a big deal, to me at least. My wife and I share an account. We each get two movies at a time and have two different queues. If I send back a movie, I get one from my queue, and the same for her. With one queue, we'll have to actively manage it so that each time we send back a movie, we have to log into the queue and make sure that either my movie or her movie (depending on who's mailing in) is at the top of the queue.

What good could possibly come from eliminating profiles?

"I hope not, because I'd rather they not let Blockbuster up off the mat."

I'm a Netflix user and all, but I don't see who it benefits to have fewer companies around. Competition = good. No?

@Terd_Ferguson: It is a big deal. Three people in a house? Three separate lists. No one worries about when their next flick will arrive.

Netflix is forsaking service and convenience without offering much by way of how this will improve service. Probably because it wont.

I had no clue this feature even existed. Now I'm really bummed it's going away. Too long has my wife controlled the netflix queue! The profiles option would have been great, then we could fight over who gets the 2 DVD picks.

I won't be cancelling btw. I have netflix setup with my media center streaming to my Xbox 360. Can't beat being able to watch movies and TV shows online for free to my heart's content.

It's not as easy as putting your wife's movie every third movie in the queue. What if she sends her movie back and gets one of yours in the mail? Everyone would have to actively manage their queue, which is probably what they want (more site traffic).

I had no idea that you could even do this with Netflix. I wish I knew because I would have started to use it.

This is a big deal.

My 7 year old daughter has a profile which she is allowed to view, add & edit as she sees fit. Some times, she keeps movies for days and days.

I think Netflix believes I'll open a new account for her.

They're wrong.

We'll be leaving Netflix if they carry through on this decision.

@byrdclaw: suppose I shouldn't say free... maybe legally would be a better word.

I've been a Netflix subscriber for 3 years. I've never used the profiles. I just arrange my queue so my kid gets every 3rd or so movie. It's not a big deal.

I'm a 5+ year subscriber to Netflix and I've always been very satisfied; but this loss of feature will drive me to look elsewhere for video entertainment. Don't know if it will be Blockbuster, but Apple TV is a possiblity.

This is really bad news for me. We've used profiles since they introduced them (one for films, one that manages the TV series we're currently watching, and a third for our son). I thought it was one of Netflix's best features and really helped in not having to micromanage your queues.

I wish Netflix was more upfront about WHY they were discontinuing the service. ". . .this change will help us continue to improve the Netflix website for all our customers." isn't really cutting it for me.

I do think this is worth bitching moaning about. This is exactly the type of change that angry users can get them to reconsider (like eBay's decision to shut down Half.com a few years back).

How is this going to improve the Netflix website?

@brianala: and sending in a polite letter of protest is a good thing. If they get enough polite ones, you never know, they may reinstate this feature.

But people shouldn't be a drama queen like Stephen. He's an idiot.

As it was said already, they of course are hoping that you open multiple accounts. This has nothing to do with customer service, how can it? I don't even use netflix and this makes me mad.

Wow, I just renewed my Netflix subscription this week. I was going to increase my subscription and let my daughter use her separate queue to order titles of her own. Moot point now.

@Dakine: Then you're using the wrong torrent sites. I don't know your connection speed, but if downloading a torrent of a movie in 40 minutes is slower than receiving a DVD through the mail I'd like to meet your postman.

All things considered though this is a pretty shitty thing for Netflix to do. Basically it'll be a crap shoot everytime you receive your movies. This definitely will have an impact on "families" moreso than a single person.

After I got married, I cancelled my account and set up a profile on my wife's. Having to merge our lists would be a major pain, and probably put us over the limit.

Also, juggling both of our DVDs in one queue would be a pain. Bleah.

I actuality don't mind blockbuster. never had any problems with them, and I like being able to just goto the store and get a new movie.

But i don't' see how this is such a bad thing for people...

My husband and I use our profiles to keep our queues separate. I would consider leaving Netflix due to this because he utilizes his queue more than I do mine. Not only that, but I can see this have a major negative impact on customers with children who limit maturity levels on those queues. In addition, their FAQ seems to indicate you will NOT be able to set up separate accounts for people in your household. WTF?

Brilliant plan, Netflix!

A comment from hackingnetflix.com:

"In an economy where people are starting to cut back on discretionary spending such as, let's say, DVD rentals, let's *cut back* on service to make our product less attractive to thousands of people! That way, when they quit our program, it will be less painful for them to lose our service!"

So maybe Netflix is just helping people be fiscally responsible? Until they actually state how this change improves service, that's what I'm going to have to believe...

@Dakine: What does that kind of account run you? We've been thinking of turning off the cable and signing up for a Netflix account. Anyone?

This is the dumbest thing I have ever seen.

The writing on the wall is pretty clear. They will suddenly (SURPRISE!) move to the satellite radio model, which is additional accounts at the same address for a reduced price.

Same model as ReplayTV used, and I believe also what Tivo currently uses.

The end result will be charging extra for the profiles feature.

Yes, this is corporate greed.

Actually, it's nothing but crack dealing. Sell it cheap or give it away at first, and once you're hooked (and you know you have no control over your addiction, right?) charge up the wazoo for the same thing.

That's funny; the multiple profiles was the feature that had finally made up my mind to switch to NetFlix - last week. Just was waiting to finish my Blockbuster movies first - now I'm glad I didn't bother.

My guess is that too many people were gaming the system - I don't remember how, but I know you can do something with the profiles to force them to send you movies that they wouldn't otherwise. Still, it sucks for the 90% of the people who were using them legitimately.

Sounds like they rewrote their website and left that feature out. It's very strange because my wife and I were considering consolidating our queues yesterday and dropping our service to one DVD. It's a PIA to do it manually, so this is just the shove we needed to start sending Netflix LESS money. Thanks Netflix!

Huh...I didn't even know that Netflix had this service to begin with. My wife and I just have separate Netflix accounts, always have.

@Hauler:

Torrents are unreliable. You don't know what you're getting. Could be perfect, or could be a chinese version shot with a vidcam in a noisy theatre. Could be missing half the movie. Could be a completely different movie. Could be not a movie at all.

Also, I actually use my computer for work every day, and I run alot of heavy overhead software, upload several hundred gigs worth of data daily, and fooling with some torrent site that takes attention and bandwidth away from all that is not an option for me. At least not when things like Netflix exist and it's totally avoidable.

I look for better deals on stuff all the time and Netflix is no exception. The day a better deal comes along, I'm all over it. But 8 DVDs every three days for $49 bucks is still top dog.

This is not good, no matter how you spin it. Not bad enough to cancel but maybe enough to never upgrade past one-at-a-time unlimited.

I used to split profiles when we had three-at-a-time and two-at-a-time because my wife and I have very different tastes in movies. If we upgrade our subscription again, I would like to have the option to use two profiles.

I have a buddy too that splits his own queue between movies and TV so he doesn't end up with 20 episodes of Scrubs while Robocop waits around.

@HIV 2 Elway:

I run their maximum account. But i think they have plans as cheap as $16 a month or something.

@Dakine: $4.99 for one-at-a-time, two per month. $8.99 for one-at-a-time, unlimited (which is what I'm using.)

@Dakine: Uhm, you did see the part in the email where it said YOU must move your movies into one queue or print them out, right?

I was telling someone yesterday how cool the separate queues were. I guess Netflix isn't so cool anymore :(.

While this change does make me angry, I doubt it's enough to get me to cancel.

This sucks, I can't imagine that this feature was costing them anything. My wife and I dealt without this feature with Blockbuster and for a while with Netflix. While its not life altering or anything, its a royal pain to have to micromanage your queue so that each person gets their choice of movie. I guess, like some said before, they're hoping you'll open another account at some slight discount for the same household, not likely!

Bah! I had it setup perfectly with 3 profiles. One for me with 2 discs, one for mother 1 disc, one for sister 1 disc. All suggestions and ratings for couple years GONE? BAH! To get the 3 profiles separately it will cost an extra $7.98 per month! Plus the pain of manually rebuilding the queues and re-rating, suggestions etc. Not a good decision. I have gamefly as well and I have been thinking of joining a service that offers games and movies. Maybe time....?

Everyone who's mad about this could stage protest by churning their account for a month.

meh, this kind of behaviour is not surprising from Netflix.

I canceled Netflix years ago when they started throttling my account.

@HIV 2 Elway: I wouldn't do that. Their instant watch movies are older then me. I was really excited about that feature, and so far I've found 2 movies I would actually watch.

What is really sad is the use of the following: "this change will help us continue to improve the Netflix website for all our customers". This is an utter BS.

I can't understand, however, why Netflix is considered a 'good' company. I'm sure I'm not the only one who joined only to learn after providing credit card details that Mac OS X is not supported for instant video. I have double checked the site after that, they never mention it anywhere, even in a fine print.