Report: Hulu Thinks Maybe You Shouldn't Cut Your Cable Cord Just Yet
Hulu is one of the many streaming services that have led a growing number of cable and satellite subscribers to cancel their subscriptions and get most of their TV entertainment via the Internet. But a new report claims that Hulu is now looking to appease cable companies by eventually making the service available only to those who are also paying for cable.
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Do Amazon And Netflix Inflate Their Streaming Libraries?
When you read that Amazon offers 17,000 "movies and TV programs" in its streaming library, and that Netflix has 60,000, what do you assume that figure means? Sure, a movie's a movie, but what constitutes a TV program? Using Amazon's math, a "program" is a single episode of a series, meaning that the entire run of "24" counts as 192 programs. Is this a reasonable way to count videos, or is it misleading? Fast Company's stance is clear: they think that both companies are using this trick to inflate their total program count and make their services look more impressive than they are.
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Does Netflix Even Have Any Playable DVDs?
Reader Somedaysomehow is annoyed with Netflix. She's been a loyal customer on the one DVD at a time plan, but lately most of those DVDs have been unplayable. What's the point of continuing to pay for movies in the mail? All complaining to Netflix gets her are bonus DVDs from her queue....which are unplayable, too.
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Netflix CEO Rips Comcast On Net Neutrality
It's been a few weeks since Comcast announced that data chewed up by customers who use the cable company's Xfinity Xbox app won't count toward their monthly data cap. The move ignited a debate over whether or not Comcast was unfairly making its product more readily available than those provided by others, like perhaps... Netflix. Well, yesterday, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings decided it was time to make his position known.
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Netflix Explains How It Comes Up With Its Recommendations
Sometimes Netflix is able to peek deep into your soul and tell you exactly which movies you'll want to watch next, and other times it suggests Power Rangers Samurai. The company is now offering a behind the curtain to explain how it plays matchmaker with you and all the lonely movies out there.
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Netflix Proves That It Still Cares About DVDs, Buys DVD.com URL
In spite of the fact that Netflix has done an awful lot in the last year to distance itself from the disc-by-mail service that made it a household name, the company apparently still wants to be associated with the shiny discs.
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Which Worst Company Contenders Force Customers Into Mandatory Arbitration?
As we sifted through the mountain of nominations for this year's Worst Company In America tournament, we noticed a trend of readers who cited companies' mandatory binding arbitration clauses as a reason for nominating. And while it's businesses like
AT&T and
Sony that have made all the headlines for effectively banning class action lawsuits, there are a
lot of other WCIA contenders who are forcing customers into signing away their rights.
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Worst Company In America Round One: Netflix Vs. GameStop
Everyone else might be thanking God it's Friday, but not the companies that had to start off their weekend by beating the ever-loving crud out of each other in the Worst Company America Thunderdome.
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Welcome to Consumerist's 7th Annual Worst Company In America tournament, where the businesses you nominated face off for a title that none of them will publicly admit to wanting — but which all of them try their hardest to earn. So it's time to fill in the brackets and start another office pool. That is, unless you work at one of the 32 companies competing in the tournament.
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Report: Pay TV Giants Won't Carry Netflix Service
After last week's rather stomach-turning news broke that Netflix was trying to
get in bed with cable companies rather than compete with them by offering its streaming service in the manner of a premium channel, now there's a report that pay TV companies aren't biting.
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Report: Netflix Wants To Piggyback On Cable Services
If reported deals between Netflix and cable giants go through, the company's streaming service will be offered as a bonus to cable packages. Netflix is said to be negotiating with several cable companies to add its service as a possible premium on-demand option.
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Netflix Saves The Day, Overrides Disc Limit To Send Me Martial Arts Movie To Watch With The Guys
For all the rotting fruit hurled at Netflix over the whole
price-doubling thing and the
Qwikster debacle, it is easy to forget how much some people used to adore the company and its customer service.
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Starz Movies Fall Off Netflix Streaming This Week
Your Netflix streaming queue is probably about to get a bit lighter. As we noted
back in September, Netflix and Starz did not renew their deal, meaning about 800 movies will be leaving Netflix's streaming service by the end of the week.
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Would You Pay Extra For Those Services That Use The Most Data On Your Smartphone?
As wireless carriers try to balance the growing demand from smartphone customers with the constant demand from investors to make a profit, some say the future of wireless data plans might stray away from the current tiered structure and toward a model that has customers paying for the services they use the most.
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Netflix Pays Out $9M To Settle Privacy Violation Suit
A
1988 law continues to be the "buffering" in Netflix's success stream. The Video Privacy Protection Act, which forbids movie rental companies from sharing customers' rental history, is not only stopping Netflix from integrating movie-streaming with Facebook in the U.S., but has cost the company $9 million to settle a class-action lawsuit.
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Man Unwittingly Lets Grandkids Run Up $10,000 In Roaming Charges By Streaming Netflix
Doting grandparents know how to keep kids distracted on a family vacation — let'em watch videos to their hearts' content so they quit whining about visiting boring monuments. Unfortunately for one Canadian man, he wasn't banking on the roaming charges he'd rack up to stream Netflix in the states.
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I Stuck With Netflix Through Thick And Thin And All I Got Was This Broken Game Disc
It was Wayne's fault for accidentally sending Netflix his WWE'12 instead of returning
The Magnificent Seven, that much he knows. But he had some hope things would be resolved pleasantly when he called the same day he sent it out, and was assured they'd return it to him.
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Customer Stream Flows Back Toward Netflix
After
ditching Netflix en masse in the third quarter, customers began crawling back to the service at the end of the year.
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Report: Warner Bros. Will Stretch New Release Rental Window From 28 To 56 Days
Apparently no longer content with the
28-day window in which it sells DVDs but doesn't allow companies to rent them out, Warner Bros. is reportedly on the verge of doubling that time frame in an effort to starve viewers into starting to buy movies again.
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If Netflix Wants To Rent Out HBO DVDs, It Will Have To Get Them Elsewhere
The war of words between HBO and Netflix may have just escalated into an actual slap-fight, with HBO announcing that it will no longer be selling DVDs of its shows to the rent-by-mail company.
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Netflix Customers Spent 2 Billion Hours Watching Streaming Video In The Last Part Of 2011
All that time spent in front of computer screens devouring hour after hour of
Downton Abbey/
Breaking Bad/
That Move You Won't Admit You Watched have added up. Neftlix has announced that its members have watched over two billion hours of streaming video — just in the fourth quarter of last year.
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Gap & Netflix Customers Weren't Happy With Them This Holiday Season
Tis the season to get mad at companies for not living up to our standards! Netflix, Overstock.com and Gap were just a few of the holiday disappointments this year in the realm of online shopping, according to a new survey of consumers.
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Netflix CEO Will Take Pay Cut After Rough Year
Although the average CEO saw
hefty pay increases this year, it's a different story for Netflix honcho Reed Hastings. Following a year in which the company introduced a
rate increase coupled with a short-lived decision to
spin off the disc-rental division as Qwikster, causing an
exodus of subscribers, Hastings will receive fewer gold coins to toss into his money bin.
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Walmart Offers $27 Million Settlement In Netflix Class-Action Suit
If you've received an email saying you're entitled to make a claim in a class-action lawsuit against Netflix and Walmart, don't toss it. Walmart has thrown in the towel and is offering to settle with customers who sued the retail giant and Netflix after the two companies made a deal to promote each other's DVD businesses.
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Report: Netflix's Killing Of Qwikster Forces Layoffs
After Netflix
decided against spinning off the DVD rental side of its service as Qwikster, the company reportedly decided it didn't need as many call service reps to handle such duties as fielding inquiries from confused customers.
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Netflix Loses 800K Subscribers In Third Quarter
While no business likes to lose 800,000 customers in the span of a few months, such a drop could pass for good news in the Netflix halls in these post price-hike days.
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Netflix CEO Explains Qwikster Fracas To Catty NYTM Reporter
Netflix CEO Reed Hastings stopped off at the New York Times Magazine to engage with a very ornery reporter on what the whole deal with Qwikster was. If the reporter really asked these questions and didn't just spice them up later to make himself look like a badass, I'm surprised Hastings didn't punch him in the face.
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Watch Out For This Netflix Phishing Scam
There's an email that's been going around that pretends like it's from Netflix and they're having trouble with your credit card. Actually, it's from scammers and they want to steal your credit card.
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Which Internet Provider Is The Best For Streaming Netflix?
How well you'll be able to stream season two of Breaking Bad on Netflix may depend largely on which company you're paying to provide internet service to your home. Netflix has just released the results of its own study on network performance and the results may not surprise you.
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Netflix Lands Deal To Stream Old Seasons Of CW Shows
The revolving door that is Netflix's streaming service has lined up another entrant. The company nailed down a deal to stream previous seasons of scripted CW TV shows starting the year after they air.
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Woot Mocks Netflix Over Qwikster Debacle, Sells Computers At The Same Time
Remember those brief few weeks when Netflix
said it was actually going to rename its DVD service "Qwikster" and separate it from the Netflix website? Ah, those were the days... And now the deal-minded folks at Woot have put together a bit of prose that allows them to poke fun at Netflix, all while trying to sell some Lenovo Notebooks.
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Netflix Cancels Qwikster DVD Service, Goes Back To All-In-One Site
Well, that was fast: Less than a month after Netflix announced it'd be splitting into two sites — Netflix for streaming movies and Qwikster for DVDs — it's decided that that maybe isn't the best idea. For those of you who were outraged, your roars have been heard.
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Another Postal Worker Caught Stealing Netflix DVDs
It's been over five years since we
first wrote about postal workers being busted for detouring Netflix DVDs into their own private stashes, and yet there are apparently still some USPS staffers out there who think they can steal more than 100 DVDs and not have it set off alarm bells.
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Imagine Being Deaf And Only "Breaking Bad's" Season Finale Isn't Subtitled On Netflix Streaming
Imagine watching the first season of
Breaking Bad, getting hooked, and then all of a sudden the last 10 minutes of the season finale are cut off. You have no idea how it ends. You'd be all like, what is this,
The Sopranos? That's similar to what happened to Patrick. He's hearing-impaired and enjoyed watching Breaking Bad on Netflix Instant Streaming with subtitles. That is, until he got to the season finale, which had no subtitles. Netflix doesn't offer Patrick much of a way to make his voice heard, so he's writing here.
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Netflix One-Ups HBO By Snagging DreamWorks Deal
When Netflix started upped its prices for subscribers by splitting streaming and disc rentals into separate subscriptions, the top brass said it would use the additional funds to secure streaming deals. Now the company has something to show for the promise, having secured a deal with DreamWorks for programming that currently goes to HBO. The agreement goes into effect in 2013.
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(Blockbuster)
Dish Launches Blockbuster Movie Pass to Woo Forlorn Netflix Members
By
Paul Eng on
September 23, 2011 4:30 PM
Still upset over Netflix's separation of DVDs-by-mail from online streaming—and effectively charging more if you want the privilege of both services? Or maybe you would be fine with it if the DVD service hadn't been inexplicably renamed Qwikster? Regardless, comeback kid of the year contender Blockbuster wants to welcome you with open arms—and a slight hitch.
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Netflix Wants You To Ask Congress To Let It Stream On Facebook
Netflix would like to buddy up with Facebook, but a 1988 law called the Video Privacy Protection Act, which makes it illegal to publish customers' rental history, prevents it from doing so. Netflix CEO Reed Hastings noted the legal roadblock at Facebook's f8 conference Thursday, and the company publicly asked customers for support.
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Netflix CEO Jokes That Irked Investors May Be Trying To Poison Him
It's been a downer of a week for Netflix CEO Reed Hastings, whose
attempt to soften the blow of deciding to split off his company's DVD-by-mail division into the questionably named Qwikster was met with much derision and an initial dip in the company's stock price. But Hastings has either been able to maintain a sense of humor about the situation or he wants the world to know he fears angry investors are out to poison him.
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Netflix Faces Legal Challenge Over Environmental Concerns In Building New Headquarters
Netflix is on a rough run lately, chasing customers away with a price increase, announcing poorly-received spin-off plans for its disc rental service and failing to secure the Twitter account for its new brand, Qwikster. Now the company is tangled up in a lawsuit over its plans to build a new Bay Area headquarters.
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Oops: Pot-Smoking Elmo Already Claimed @Qwikster On Twitter
Netflix might have flubbed on its due diligence when checking out if there were any a priori uses of the name "Qwikster." (Whether or not just picking that name itself is a flub is
another discussion.) It seems there was already an entity out there using Qwikster, and it'll make it hard for the DVD by mail service to have a good Twitter profile. Yep, @Qwikster is a joint-smoking Elmo who gets bored in English class, harbors negative feelings about his ex-girlfriend, and recently attained level 25 in the Original Gangstaz game for iPhone.
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Netflix DVD Service To Be Renamed Qwikster, Will Offer Video Games
Over on the Netflix blog, CEO Reed Hastings offers a lengthy "my bad" about the way the video delivery service abruptly announced the fracturing of its services into separate streaming and DVD-by-mail offerings. But that doesn't mean Netflix is going back to its old pricing model. In fact, Hastings announced that the DVD delivery service will soon become even more distinct from Netflix's streaming side.
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Netflix Expecting 1 Million More Customers To Flee Following Price Hike
It appears that the folks at Netflix underestimated the potential consumer blowback from its decision to split streaming and DVD delivery into two services, effectively increasing the price on customers by upward of 60%. While the company had originally estimated it wouldn't see too huge of a defection this quarter, it has since changed its tune.
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Netflix: Restricting Streams To One Per Account Was A Glitch
Netflix continued its recent tightening and
price-raising by making it so there can only be one streaming video feed per account. UPDATE: Netflix has clarified and said that all accounts can support at least two concurrent streams. The users who saw/heard that they could only have one stream were experiencing a glitch which Netflix is fixing.
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Starz Won't Renew Netflix Deal When It Expires In February
Come March, Netflix's array of video streaming options could be considerably thinned. Starz announced it's stopped negotiating an extension with Netflix and all its movies and TV shows will vanish from the service when the current deal expires February 28.
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Timing Of Netflix Price Increase Depends On Your Billing Date
Netflix's much-maligned price increase kicks in today, but not for all customers. The new pricing plan, which charges $7.99 a month to stream movies and another $7.99 to rent one DVD at a time, doesn't go into effect until your September billing date. Depending on when your bill is due, you can squeeze a few extra days of the old rates out of your plan before either canceling or choosing either streaming or disc rentals to avoid the bill bump.
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Updated Post: Netflix's Post-Price Hike Messages For Gift Subscription Customers Are Confusing
Amanda and her husband found the news that Netflix was un-bundling DVD and streaming video packages and raising prices disappointing, as did most other customers. They figured that they didn't have to worry about canceling or changing their subscription until early 2012, though, because they had received a one-year subscription as a gift. Twelve prepaid months is twelve prepaid months, right?
Nope. From Netflix's point of view, the gift giver didn't pay for a fixed number of months for the couple—he prepaid a certain amount of money, and the length of their subscription was readjusted once the price went up. Amanda got some clarification from Netflix on this issue. Her prepaid subscription is being left just as it is.
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Netflix Testing Kid-Friendly User Interface
We never thought of the Netflix user interface as being overly complicated, but then again, none of us are 5-year-old kids searching for an episode of That's So Raven. For those youngsters, the online video service has begun offering certain members a "Just For Kids" tab on its website that has a UI optimized for the elementary school set.
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HBO Go To Expand To Video Game Consoles, Web-Connected TVs
While HBO Go, the premium cable network's online streaming service, has already expanded to make itself available on computers and smartphones, it hasn't made the leap to being available on gaming consoles, which would allow you to watch the HBO archive on your TV without having a computer connected. But the CEO of parent company Time Warner says that will soon change.
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Netflix Is Sorry You're Pissed, Glad You Don't Have Many Other Options
Yesterday, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings reiterated
what has been the party line since announcing its controversial price hike earlier this month, that the company is unhappy that you're unhappy, but that it's all going to be better in the long-haul. And it looks like, for now, customers are giving the company the benefit of a doubt.
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Law From 1988 Keeps Netflix And Facebook From Buddying Up
Back in the late 1980s, lawmakers were determined to prevent movie rental companies from publishing customers' rental history. The Video Privacy Protection Act made violations punishable by $2,500 per offense. Now the law is causing headaches for Facebook and Netflix because it's reportedly written in a way that would forbid Netflix from publishing your rental history on your Facebook page.
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Netflix CEO: Company Will Invest Most Of Price Hike In Streaming
When Netflix announced it would split up its streaming and disc subscriptions, making customers choose streaming or one-disc-at-a-time plans at $7.99 a month each, it didn't offer much of an explanation as to why the price hike was needed. A writer at The Motley Fool took CEO Reed Hastings to task and asked him to justify the increase, and was surprised to get a response.
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Netflix Emails 3% Discount To Apologize For Streaming Outage
To say sorry for a outage to their streaming service on Sunday night, Netflix sent around an apology email this morning with a link to click on to get 3% credit off your next bill. Reader Stephen says, "Interesting that Netflix is willing to offer the discount but only to those who open the email and click the link. Wouldn't the right thing be to give the discount to everyone?"
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Stop Netflix Disc Rentals, Lose Your Queue
With an unpopular change in its pricing and services, Netflix is splitting up its streaming and disc subscription offerings, forcing customers to choose a streaming-only or one-at-a-time disc-only plans at $7.99 a month each, or both at no bundled discount. But another choice Netflix is forcing subscribers to make is whether or not they value their queues.
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Want Both Netflix Streaming And DVDs? That Will Now Be $15.98
If you've been enjoying paying $9.99 for unlimited streaming and DVDs from Netflix, get ready to pay more — or have to choose between watching movies online or through your DVD player.
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Netflix Expanding To 43 More Countries Later This Year
Only a year after Netflix went international by
invading Canada, the video service says it now has plans to expand even farther beyond these borders.
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Netflix Lets You Downgrade Video Quality So You Don't Hit Bandwidth Caps
With providers like AT&T and Comcast adding on limits to how much bandwidth you can use per month, Netflix has rolled out a feature that lets you downgrade the streaming video quality so you don't use as much data and incur overages.
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DirecTV Sends Coupons Designed To Look Like Netflix Envelopes
How scared are the satellite and cable providers of Netflix? So much so that DirecTV recently sent out a coupon to customers designed to look exactly like a Netflix mailer, except in blue. You know what they say, imitation is the highest form of flattery.
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Netflix Stops Streaming Sony Movies Due To Temporary Starz Contract Snafu
In case you were trying to watch
Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigalo streaming on Netflix and you were denied, it's because Netflix and Starz, the pay TV distributor for Sony, are having a "temporary contract issue."
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Netflix Now Lets You Use 50 Different Devices To Stream Video
With all the options now available to stream Netflix videos, it was easy to surpass the service's old cap of six devices. Addressing the concern, Netflix has now lifted the limit to 50.
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Netflix Suggests That Your Child Watch A Very Educational Documentary About Porn
Okay, the category Dan and his family were browsing on Netflix is called "Feel-Good Movies." Not "Feel-Good G-Rated Movies," or "Feel-Good Kids' Movies." Still, he was still a little alarmed to see an R-rated documentary on the porn industry between the Rugrats and Leapfrog features recommended for his young son.
"Look what they suggest as 'a feel good movie' right in between Rugrats and Leap Frog," he writes. "Both children's programming and age appropriate for our son. Unlike their suggestion..." More »
Tennessee Lawmakers Pass Bill Making It A Crime To Share Your Netflix Password
If you've ever let a friend or family member know your password for subscription services like Netflix or Rhapsody so they can watch a movie or listen to a song, we hope you don't live in Tennessee, where state legislators have passed a bill making it a crime.
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Study Shows Netflix Surpasses Piracy In Online Traffic
Legal video streaming has become so popular that it's starting to make movie piracy obsolete. A study shows that Netflix streaming takes up more online traffic than any other service.
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Netflix Will Start Streaming Miramax Films In June
Netflix has been so effective at nailing down deals with movie distributors that it's easy to become surprised/enraged when you get a hankering to watch a movie and find it isn't available on instant streaming. Now the company has added Miramax movies to its virtual film brothel, completing the deal
rumored in March. This means several films by Quentin Tarantino, Kevin Smith and Robert Rodriguez will be streamable.
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Netflix Releases App For Some Android Devices
(Some) Android users can now finally get in on the instant-streaming candy train with the long-awaited release of a Netflix app on their platform. For now the app is only available for a relatively thin number of phones, HTC's Incredible, Nexus One, Samsung's Nexus S, Evo 4G, and G2, but the company says they're working diligently to roll it out to more phones. There's just damn many of them.
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Well, At Least Netflix Is Being Realistic
Say what you will about this exit survey for unsubscribing Netflix customers, but at least it's realistic about why people cancel Netflix. It's especially thoughtful of Netflix to include the addresses of still-functioning torrent sites for those users who aren't yet familiar with them.
(Thanks, MedicallyNeedy!) More »
Netflix Now Has More Subscribers Than Comcast
The Rubicon has been crossed. Netflix now has more people subscribed to it than Comcast. Netflix reported 23.6 million subscribers at the end of the 2011 first quarter, while Comcast ended 2010 with 22.8 million. (They could still possibly report more but considering that they've been dropping the past few quarters, it's unlikely). See, we don't need to worry about hegemony or legal monopolies, they'll just obsolete themselves out of business.
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Netflix Wants To Charge Extra For Multiple Video Streams, Swim In Piles Of Cash
Netflix was sitting around looking at its money when it realized that it didn't quite have enough to do the whole Scrooge McDuck swimming maneuver, so the video giant has come up with an idea: "family plans" that allow you to stream more than one program at once.
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Wave Hello To Netflix Control Via Xbox's Kinect
Back in November, when Microsoft released Kinect — its motion and voice sensing Xbox 360 add-on — it lacked compatibility with the Netflix streaming app. Now Microsoft has finally gotten around to (sort of) correcting that shortcoming, releasing a free downloadable update that lets Kinect owners to yell and wave at their videos to get them to pause, play and rewind.
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Netflix Locks Down Exclusive Streaming Rights To Mad Men
Netflix may not be interested in charging viewers extra to
watch specific shows, but it appears very interested in paying companies to make sure it's the only place you can find some programming.
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Netflix CEO: Pay-Per-View Not In Company's Future
While Amazon now offers both a subscription streaming video selection and pay-per-view movies, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings says that is a road his company has no plans on going down right now.
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Is A Worldwide Netflix Expansion Coming Soon?
If you envy your American and Canadian friends' access to Netflix, you may not have much longer to wait until you receive red envelopes of your very own. Our friends at Hacking Netflix noticed something interesting in "employment" section of the company's website. They're looking for quality assurance analysts who speak one of many languages, which signals a massive Netflix rollout in Asia, South America, and Europe.
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Report: Netflix & Miramax To Make Pulp Fiction And 700 More Movies Available For Streaming
With every big dotcom, electronics manufacturer and cable provider suddenly jumping on the streaming video bandwagon in the last 18 months, it's safe to say that industry leader Netflix is experiencing some big changes. The company's mainstay content providers,
Showtime and
Starz getting skimpy with their shows, Netflix is looking to make friends elsewhere. And according to the Wall Street Journal, the video service is oh-so-close to making a deal with Miramax that would stream the studio's library of more than 700 films to customers.
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Starz To Delay Putting Its Shows On Netflix
A day after hearing that Showtime
will be pulling its show archive from Netflix comes bad news for fans of violent, orgy-filled TV shows about gladiators — Pay cable channel Starz won't be rushing to put all of its original content on Netflix anymore.
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Showtime Will Yank Shows From Netflix Streaming
If you're catching up on Showtime shows via Netflix streaming, you'd better step up your pace, because Showtime doesn't plan on renewing its pact with the streaming company when it expires this summer.
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Netflix Pays $100M To Make A TV Show Of Its Own
In a risky yet inevitable move into original programming, Netflix is shoving a massive stack of chips onto the table, betting it can hang with the likes of HBO and Showtime. The video streaming and DVD rental giant is committing an estimated $100 million to buy and develop two 13-episode seasons of House of Cards, a drama produced and directed by David Fincher, starring Kevin Spacey.
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Nintendo 3DS Will Stream Netflix, Connect Automatically For Free To AT&T WiFi Hot Spots
Nintendo's 3DS handheld, which is due out March 27, will hook up with AT&T and Netflix in a super-hot threesome that will eventually let gamers stream movies while on the go.
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Netflix Will Subtitle 80 Percent Of Streaming Videos By End Of Year
Netflix has been working on
adding subtitles to streaming content for a while, and has made significant headway since last year.
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Netflix Will Stream CBS Shows Starting In April
Now that Netflix will face some formidable video streaming competition in the form of
Redbox and
Amazon, it will need to keep adding content to remain in the front of the pack.
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Amazon To Battle Netflix, Offer Unlimited Streaming To Prime Members
Nearly six months after the initial reports that it was
working on a subscription video streaming service, Amazon announced today that it was joining the group of companies trying to unseat Netflix as the king of video streaming services by offering a "new benefit" to Amazon Prime members — unlimited video streaming from a library of 5,000 titles.
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Criterion Collection May Give Film Buffs A Reason To Pay For Hulu Plus
The two major reasons most people give for not ponying up $8 a month for Hulu Plus are that the service lacks the movie library of Netflix
and you still need to sit through commercial breaks. But Hulu's new, commercial-free deal with the revered Criterion Collection could possibly tempt a few film fans to join.
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Netflix Tops Customer Loyalty List
The results of Brand Keys' annual survey of customer loyalty have been released and in its first year of inclusion, Netflix came out on top of the list of all 528 brands, beating out reigning champ Apple.
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Best Buy Using 28-Day Netflix Delay To Push DVD Sales
Since Netflix began making agreements with movie studios to wait 28 days before renting out new releases, Blockbuster has been
making the biggest deal about its ability to rent movies on the release date. But now it looks like Best Buy has decided to remind movie watchers that it still sells DVDs and that they don't have to wait to get them.
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More People Stream Netflix, Fewer Subscribe To Premium Channels
There are only so many monthly fees people are willing to pay to watch movies at home, and Netflix's options seem to be dominating those of premium channels.
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Netflix Stops Letting You Add To DVD Queue From Streaming Devices
For years, Netflix steadily made its service more user-friendly by adding devices on which it let you stream films and improving the apps that let you do so. But now the company has taken a step backward in functionality by removing the ability to add DVDs to your queue from everything but the Netflix site.
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Netflix Coming Soon To Your Remote Control
Because accessing Netflix isn't easy enough, the video company announced earlier today that it has partnered with the makers of several devices to integrate a Netflix-specific button on remote controls.
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Roku Having Trouble Streaming 30 Rock (Updated)
UPDATE: A Roku spokesman says the company has fixed the 30 Rock streaming issue.
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Roku Rep Tells Me There Are Secret Limits To Netflix Streaming (Updated)
Update: A Roku spokesman said there is no limitation on Netflix streaming. His statement:
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Time Warner CEO Is Talking $#!% About Netflix
Who isn't scared of Netflix? Jeffrey L. Bewkes, the chief executive of Time Warner, that's who. The NYT says that although Netflix has been a successful business partner to the major studios for the past few years — the deals are expiring and they won't get such an easy ride next time.
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Movie Studios Blocking Special Features On Rental DVDs
In an apparent effort to give customers a reason to buy DVDs instead of renting them, movie studios have begun disabling certain features of new releases on discs rented out by Blockbuster and Netflix.
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Netflix Will Stream Disney Shows 15 Days After They Air
Donning a pair of metaphorical mouse ears, Neflix cut a streaming video deal with Disney that advances the service's quest to give viewers reasons to can satellite and cable TV.
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Report: Netflix Offering Big Cash For Access To In-Season TV Shows
While Netflix has made a huge move in the last two years to expand its library of streaming movies and TV shows, the company has only been able to make a few deals that give users access to recently broadcast episodes. But a report in the New York Post claims Netflix is offering networks top-dollar for access to fresher content.
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Your Clever Netflix Plan Vs Reality
You get on the Netflix plan thinking you've scored such a great deal. Unlimited movies per month! By the time I'm done plundering the cinema archives, I'll be only paying cents a film! Take that, movie theater and rental store! But then slowly your interest wanes as the novelty wears off. Soon that early Bergman flick is collecting dust and you realize you're paying a monthly fee for a red and white coffee coaster...
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Netflix Offers $7.99 Streaming-Only Plan, Raises Prices On Existing Plans
Since Netflix began offering its streaming video library, many customers have been asking for an option to go disc-free. Today, they got what they wished for as the company announced a $7.99/month plan for streaming-only. On the down side, they are also raising rates on those with existing unlimited disc-and-streaming plans.
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Blockbuster To Waste $15-20 Million On TV Ads
Bankrupt relic of a bygone time, Blockbuster Video, announced plans yesterday to launch its first national TV ad campaign since 2007 and that they plan on somehow taking aim at Redbox and Netflix.
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Hulu Plus Drops Price To $7.99/Month
After kicking around in invite-only mode since the summer at the price of $9.99/month, Hulu's premium service Hulu Plus went live for all interested parties today — and at two dollars per month less.
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Android Overcomes Hollywood's Trust Issues, Gets To Stream Netflix Next Year
One thing Droid doesn't do is stream Netflix, making the platform the object of ridicule to cackling, finger-pointing iPhone owners. Sobbing Androidites who wonder why they can't stream 30 Rock episodes like the cool kids can only shake their fists to the heavens and scream "Why?"
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Netflix Has Another Streaming Outage, Apologizes With Credits
On Tuesday night Netflix suffered another temporary streaming outage. This late afternoon they once again apologized by sending out customers an email offering a 2-3% reduction off their bill or an extension of their free trial. You'll have to click on the link in the email to claim the credit. Hey, if Netflix keeps going at this rate, soon we'll end up with a free month!
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Netfix Has No Plans To Put Ads In Streaming Videos
TV shows now represent half of what Netflix customers are streaming to their computers, gaming consoles and other devices. It has to be tempting for the company to look at those numbers and think about the cash it could make from slipping a few 15-second ads in during the already existing fade-outs. But, says a Netflix exec, that's not what the company is all about.
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Warner Bros. Considering Longer Delay For New Releases On Netflix
Earlier this year, Warner Bros. was one of the first home video companies to make a deal with Netflix that would
delay the availability of new releases by 28 days in exchange for greater access to Warner's catalog. Now the company says it is mulling over the possibility of making that delay even longer.
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Now You Can Finally Search Netflix On Xbox 360
The Xbox 360 was the first video game console to allow Netflix subscribers to stream movies to their TV, but while the the
PlayStation 3 and
Nintendo Wii have recently improved their Netflix apps, the Xbox remained stuck in 2008. That is, until yesterday's update of the console's software.
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Netflix Apologizes For Brief Outage, Offers Bill Credit
As we mentioned in a recent story, Netflix
experienced a crash to its site and streaming services on Friday. Over the weekend, the company not only sent out an apology e-mail to customers, it also offered a small credit to their monthly bill.
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Report: Netflix Accounts For Up To 20% Of Downstream Bandwidth In U.S.
If you needed anymore convincing that streaming video is now a
big deal for Netflix, a new study says that, during certain parts of the day, streams from Netflix account for around 1/5 of the downstream traffic in the U.S.
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Netflix Now Considers Itself A Streaming Company That Happens To Also Mail DVDs
Netflix is now an online content streaming company that has a nice little side business in mailing DVDs, according to CEO Reed Hastings.
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Netflix On Wii Now Disc-Free
Finally, the tyranny of the Netflix disc is no longer! As of today, Wii owners who had been using the family friendly gaming console to access Netflix's streaming video selection will no longer need to take out their Wii Sports or Lego Indiana Jones disc in order to watch a movie.
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One Netflix User Movie Review It's Tough To Argue With
While cruising through Netflix's user-submitted movie reviews, Roxie entered a wormhole that led her to this amazingly concise and to-the-point
review of the hit new TV series Example 23.976, which drew universal raves for being a perfect example of 23.976 frames per second.
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Netflix Bringing Surround Sound To PS3 Users Starting Oct. 18
We've previously reported that PlayStation 3 users will soon
no longer need a disc to stream Netflix movies through the device. Now comes news that there will be an added perk when the revamped Netflix streaming app debuts on Oct. 18 — Dolby surround sound.
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Use Feedfliks To Track What's Expiring Soon On Netflix
As Netflix continues to make deals that
expand its library of streaming movie and TV shows, it's easy to get a little overwhelmed by the new offerings and forget to watch something you'd been intending to stream. Now the folks at Feedfliks.com have created a sortable list that can help you keep track of what's coming and going on Netflix.
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Netflix Agrees To Delay Rentals Of New Sony Releases By 28 Days
Yesterday, Netflix continued to demonstrate its focus on expanding the company's online streaming library — at the risk of losing business on new release DVD rentals — by announcing a deal with Sony that would delay rentals of the studio's new titles by 28 days. In exchange, Netflix receives access to streaming licenses for more Sony titles.
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Netflix/NBC Deal Allows Streaming Of All SNL Episodes, Lots Of Battlestar Galactica
Fresh off its
invasion of Canada, Netflix recently announced a deal with NBC/Universal that will add a bunch of the entertainment company's network and cable TV offerings to Netflix's streaming service.
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Netflix Will Start Treating Americans As Well As Canadians 'Over Coming Months'
Making an about-face after stirring up a hornet's nest of discontent by saying Americans were too self-absorbed to notice his company was providing cheap, streaming-only access to Canadian customers, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings said he was joking and that Americans would get a similar service soon.
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Netflix CEO: Americans Too Self-Absorbed To Notice Netflix Is Cheaper In Canada
Earlier this week, Netflix finally did what the military hasn't had the guts to do —
invade Canada... with a streaming-only video service. But unlike most U.S. products that go across borders, the people in Canadaland are actually paying less than anyone else. But the CEO of Netflix isn't worried about causing an uproar on this side of Niagara Falls.
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College Libraries Save Money By Ignoring Netflix Terms Of Use
Plenty of Americans have cut their household entertainment budgets by subscribing to Netflix instead of seeing movies in theaters or purchasing DVDs. Now, some college libraries are doing the same thing, sort of. They're using rented DVDs or streaming video instead of purchasing the movies that professors assign. Is this a violation of Netflix's terms of use? Yes. But the librarians don't particularly care, and Netflix doesn't seem to, either. Yet. As a Netflix spokesman said, "We just don't want to be pursuing libraries."
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Netflix Will May Let You Stream 'The Expendables' Shortly After It Hits Blu-ray/DVD
To Blockbuster and other competitors, Netflix must seem like the guy in a game of Monopoly who collects Boardwalk and Park Place early on, then proceeds to run everyone else out of business with a grin. The rental giant reached a deal with Nu Image/Millennium Group (distributors of The Expendables and Brooklyn's Finest) to stream its films shortly after they reach home video.
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New AppleTV Is Smaller, Cheaper, Allows For Netflix Streaming
In addition to highlighting its
line of overhauled iPods earlier today, Apple also debuted its much improved (or at least significantly smaller) Apple TV device, which not only lets you stream iTunes video and music through your TV, but also Netflix's Watch Instantly library of shows and movies.
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Amazon To Challenge Netflix With Subscription Video Service?
While many companies have recently gotten into the on-demand video business, only a small handful have attempted to follow the Netflix model of offering unlimited video streaming for a flat monthly rate. But the market leader could face a challenge in the near-future from Amazon.com, which is reportedly looking to start a subscription service that would compete directly with Netflix.
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Send Us The Questions You Want Netflix To Answer
We know that many of you are subscribers to Netflix, and that many of you have a lot of questions about where the company is heading as the streaming video market grows and more companies — even retailers like Best Buy, Walmart and Sears — get into the on-demand video business. Well, Netflix has just agreed to respond to questions from Consumerist readers on this and other topics.
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Netflix Now Streams To iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch
Adding a feature Apple junkies have been clamoring for, Netflix upgraded its App Store application to allow it to stream movies and TV shows for subscribers.
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HBO Shows Too Good For Streaming On Netflix
Were you late to the True Blood game and hoping to catch up by streaming old seasons on Netflix? If so, you've got a long wait ahead of you since HBO's Co-President has poo-pooed the idea of bringing the network's catalog of shows and movies to Netflix's Watch Instantly library.
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Comcast & Blockbuster Try To Double-Team Netflix With DVDsByMail
With Netflix
invading Canada and Redbox
thinking about going online, the once-great Blockbuster Video has teamed up with Comcast to launch a joint effort: DVDsByMail.com.
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More People Getting DVDs From Library Than From Netflix Or Redbox
Why rent the cow when you can borrow the milk for free? That seems to be the mindset of many Americans, as a new study claims that more DVDs are borrowed from libraries each day than are rented via Netflix, Redbox or Blockbuster.
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PS3 Will Get Netflix Streaming App By October
Since November, PS3 users have had to lug a special disc into their machines in order to stream Netflix. But during an earnings call Wednesday, CEO Reed Hastings announced the disc will be rendered obsolete by software within the next few months. This will put the PS3 on par with the Xbox 360 for disc-less Netflix streaming.
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Netflix: We Can Murder Your Account With No Notice At Our Whim
It's amazing what we agree to every day when we scroll through infinite screens of dense legalese to click the box that said we've read and agree to abide by the terms of service on various sites. Brandon discovered that Neftlix users have all consented for the company to stop its endless supply of movie and TV shows for any reason whatsoever.
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Netflix To Offer Streaming-Only Service In Canada
We know that Consumerist has readers in Canada; we can hear them gloating every time we write about health care. But for years, we've had something our neighbors to the north (unless you're reading this in Alaska) have been coveting — Netflix. Alas, that piece of Americana is soon to go international when it launches a video-streaming service in Canada later this year.
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Redbox Wants To Get Into Online DVD Rental & Streaming Biz
While Redbox might be doing bang-up business with their 24,000 DVD rental kiosks around the country, the company knows how quickly you can go from the front of the pack to the rear (just ask Blockbuster). So in an attempt to compete with online rental and streaming service Netflix, Redbox's president says it's hatching a plan to expand its market to online users.
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Can You Stream Netflix Movies At 30,000 Feet?
Not happy with your in-flight entertainment selections? Well, if you have access to onboard WiFi, the folks at HackingNetflix.com say you might be able to stream Netflix films to your iPad or laptop.
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Netflix Is Fine With No Saturday Mail Delivery; Amazon, Not So Much
When we first wrote about the US Postal Service's
plan to put an end to Saturday deliveries, only 35% of the 7,000 readers polled thought it would be a hassle to their way of life. However, many commenters wanted to know what this would mean for deliveries of their precious Netflix DVDs. Yesterday, they got their answer.
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Lacking Nicolas Cage In Your Netflix? There's A Hack For That
I, like most Netflix customers, have a ridiculous number of movies in my DVD and Watch Instantly queues. But until this morning, I hadn't realized one thing my queue was desperately missing: Nicolas Cage saturation. Thankfully, someone has come up with a remedy for this error.
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Come November You Will Be Able To Search Netflix Streaming Content Via Xbox
Netflix-streaming Xbox 360 players will have one less reason to be jealous of Roku owners come November. At the E3 video game conference in Los Angeles, Microsoft announced it will let Netflix users search and add streaming movies and TV shows through the console, bypassing the need to do it the old-fashioned way on a computer.
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Is Comcast Choking My Bandwidth To Keep Me From Watching Too Much TV Online?
Gen fears Comcast is choking his bandwidth because he's streamed too many TV shows. He keeps getting suspicious messages that say his internet connection has slowed when he tries to watch episodes of Law & Order: SVU.
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Netflix Apologizes For Roku Disruption With Bill Credit
Savvily taking the proactive route rather than suffering customer backlash, Netflix is sending out emails with account-specific links that users can click on to save 5 percent off their next bill.
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Netflix Is Indeed Coming To iPhone Says Steve Jobs
Back in April, Apple and Netflix ticked off a vocal handful of iPhone owners by deciding to launch the first mobile version of the video service's streaming videos
on the then-untested iPad. But at today's much ballyhooed new iPhone announcement, Apple's Chief Executive Guru Steve Jobs was happy to let everyone know that Netflix is coming to the iPhone.
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Redbox CEO Scoffs At Netflix's Video Library
In April, it was Blockbuster CEO Jim Keyes
ragging on Netflix's selection of streaming video, now it's Mitch Lowe, CEO of more relevant competitor Redbox who is scoffing at Netflix's growing archive of older movies and TV shows.
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Postal Worker Pleads Guilty To Stealing Netflix Discs
Being a Netflix customer requires a certain amount of trust in the US Postal Service — that they'll deliver your movie promptly and without stomping on it and that they'll return it in the same condition. But a former postal worker in Texas violated that trust, and has admitted to swiping Netflix discs before they got to their intended destinations.
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(Netflix)
Netflix Now Offering HD Streaming On PCs And Macs
Netflix customers using computers can now get something that Xbox 360 and TiVo users have taken for granted: HD streaming. However, the fact that Netflix is now apparently making most of its HD titles available for high-def computer streaming doesn't necessarily mean you'll actually get the highest resolution on your rig. And, no matter how sharp the picture is, some films will still be just as bad.
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Netflix Won't Accept My Credit Card Because Of Security Code Glitch
Chuck thought he'd get his mom a Mother's Day gift that would keep on giving — a Netflix subscription. But the site denied his card and he called customer service, which still couldn't take his money, attributing the denial to a problem with the 3-digit CID code on the back of the card.
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Netflix Rolls Out Some Captions For Streaming Video
Netflix streaming is great. If you're like me and most of your Netflix queue consists of TV series and independent movies, it's the best deal in entertainment. One of its major flaws, though, is that video streams lack captions or closed-captioning. Netflix is starting to fix this problem...but only for a limited number of videos and only for users who stream on their Mac or Windows PCs.
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Analyst: Blockbuster Losing Customers At Unprecedented Rate
In spite of its recent moves to remain competitive, video rental dinosaur Blockbuster continues to lose ground to newer services like Netflix and Redbox. And a new report from analyst Michael Pachter with Wedbush Morgan Securities makes the scenario look even more bleak.
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Netflix For Wii Discs Shipping To Everyone Now
A few weeks back, we wrote that Netflix had
shipped out a load of discs to Wii users as the final test of their streaming video product for the Nintendo gaming console. And while the
initial results weren't exactly mind-blowing, they must have been good enough because Netflix has decided to fully launch the program today.
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Netflix Users Must Now Wait 28 Days For New Fox & Universal Titles
Hot on the heels of Blockbuster's announcement of a deal with Fox and Sony that would
allow it to offer new titles for rent and streaming on the day of DVD release, comes news of what appears to be another bad deal for Netflix subscribers — They'll now have to wait 28 days for new releases from Fox and Universal.
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Netflix Tells Consumerist Why They Chose iPad For First Mobile App
When we posted earlier today that
Netflix had launched an app for the iPad that allowed users to watch streaming video, many readers expressed disappointment that the video delivery company had opted to go with the iPad over all other devices to make its mobile debut. So we spoke with them to find out why.
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Netflix Brings Streaming Video To iPad
After speculation in recent days that Netflix would be launching an application that would allow people to watch movies on the new Apple iPad, the video delivery service confirmed the news this morning and the app is now available through the iTunes store.
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Postal Service's Saturday Cuts Will Hurt Netflix
Ethan Epstein of Slate's The Big Money draws the natural conclusion that the USPS's
plans to stop Saturday service
won't work out so well for rent-by-mail companies such as Netflix.
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Netflix Streaming For Wii Loads Slow, But Still Faster Than PS3
Now that Wii-owning Netflix customers have received their streaming discs, let the console wars begin anew! At stake now: which provides the best Netflix-browsing experience....and the least agonizingly slow load times?
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Netflix Sends Out Discs To Test Streaming Via Wii
It's been known for quite some time that Netflix
would be offering streaming video via the Nintendo Wii. And today the video delivery service announced they've sent out the first batch of discs to some Wii-owning Netflix customers so that they can finally get the ball rolling.
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Blockbuster Gets Warner Bros. Movies 28 Days Before Netflix
A week after Blockbuster announced it
could be heading down the road to bankruptcy, there's some good news for the once-mammoth video vendor. They announced yesterday that they've reached an agreement with Time Warner that would allow them to rent Warner Bros. DVDs in their stores and by mail a full four weeks before Netflix.
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Blockbuster Says They Might Have To File For Bankruptcy
This may come as bad news to the 4 of you left out there that still rent videos at Blockbuster. The once-great chain of video stores is once again teetering on the edge of filing for bankruptcy.
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Netflix Coming To Windows Phone 7
In an effort to make sure that you can't go anywhere without watching Netflix movies, software developers Vertigo recently unveiled the Netflix app they're working on for the recently unveiled Windows Phone 7.
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Netflix Cancels $1 Million Contest, Settles Privacy Lawsuit
As part of a settlement in a privacy lawsuit filed against Netflix late last year, the video delivery service has called off their $1 million Next Big Thing contest that started the whole problem in the first place.
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Netflix Changes Movie Page Setup, Users Freak Out
Have you noticed Netflix's new movie information page? A lot of other people have. The new, cleaner layout rearranges the user interface a bit, and removes social features from movie pages—you can't see which of your friends have watched, rated, or reviewed that particular movie. Is this a good move, or a terrible one?
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Lawsuit Filed Over Netflix/Warner 28-Day Waiting Period
Is anyone really surprised it came to this? A Netflix subscriber isn't happy about having to wait 28 days for Warner Home Video movies to be made available on the video delivery service, so she's filed a class action lawsuit.
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Way To Defeat The Entire Point Of Streaming Video, Netflix
Netflix has the five-part miniseries "Torchwood: Children of Earth" available for Instant Streaming. (It's good. You should watch it.) Cameron would like to watch it, but doesn't really see the point. For some reason, the second of five episodes can't be streamed, and must be watched on DVD.
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Netflix To Stream In 1080p And 5.1... Someday
For those of us who really enjoy streaming Netflix movies through our Xbox 360 or PS3, it seemed like wonderful news yesterday when it was reported that some Watch It Now flicks would be made available in both 1080p and 5.1 surround in the near future. Alas, after some clarification, it looks like only part of this is true.
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Long Queue Waits Sort Of Defeat The Point Of Netflix
Jeff is patiently waiting for the recently released movies in his Netflix queue, but his taste in films is evidently working against him. He says that the top ten discs in his queue all have long waits, and he is frustrated. Is he being throttled, a victim of having popular tastes, or both?
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Netflix CEO Explains Why They Made The 28-Day Delay Deal
Earlier this month,
Netflix made a deal with Warner Bros. to delay new DVD releases for 28 days. Over at Hacking Netflix, the CEO of the company
goes into some detail on why he approached Warner Bros. to begin with (it was his idea, not theirs), and why he thinks it will work out better for everyone except those customers who signed up expecting all new releases all the time.
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Netflix Streaming Finally Coming To The Wii
Those of you with the Wii will no longer be left out of the Netflix streaming party. The service is coming to the console this spring.
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See What Your Zipcode Likes To Rent On Netflix
The NYT has taken some data released by Netflix (the top 50 rental titles for each zipcode) and made some interactive heat maps out of it. It's weirdly fun.
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Netflix Agrees To Delay Warner Bros. New DVDs For 28 Days
Netflix has agreed to terms with Warner Bros. that will delay rentals of new DVD releases for 28 days. Warner Bros. has unilaterally imposed the same restriction on Redbox — and those negotiations were apparently much less friendly and involved more lawyers.
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Closeted Lesbian Sues Netflix For Potential Outing
Here's the problem with anonymized data: if it were truly anonymized, it wouldn't be useful to anyone for anything. With enough data about a person—say, their age, gender, and zip code—
it's not hard to narrow down who someone is. That's the idea behind a class-action lawsuit against Netflix regarding the customer data they released to the public as part of the Netflix Prize project, a contest to help create better movie recommendations. A closeted lesbian alleges that the data available about her could reveal her identity.
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Netflix Offers Ex-Customer Disappearing Free Trial
Dana used to be a Netflix subscriber, and they want her back. To entice her back, they sent her an e-mail offering a free trial. She decided to try it out...but Netflix wouldn't let her. Because, according to their system, she is an existing Netflix customer. Who received an email addressing her as a former customer.
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How Clean Are Netflix DVDs?
Netflix DVDs and their envelopes pass from hand to hand, and from home to home, with all sorts of interesting opportunities for contamination. What sorts of bacteria are on them? A Texas local news
team set out to find out and discovered...well, not much of anything likely to kill you. Sorry to disappoint.
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Netflix Streaming Coming To PS3 In November
—>Sony is barging in on Microsoft's territory, having hammered out a deal to stream Netflix movies over the console just like the Xbox 360 for no additional charge beyond the Netflix membership. More »
Check Your Netflix Envelopes This Week For Blu-ray Coupon
—>Hacking Netflix spotted some sweet savings on the inside of envelopes sent out by the movie rent-by-mail service: $50 off coupons that would bring the price of an Insignia Blu-ray player down to about $100 or $150. The coupon expires Saturday. More »
Watch Wizard Of Oz For Free Online On Oct 3
—>You can start watching Wizard of Oz for free online via Netflix from 9am October 3rd to 9am October 4th. The promo is part of the 70th anniversary of Dorothy and the gang's epic adventure. Yay, free flying monkeys! More »
Yeah, Blockbuster Is Pretty Much F*#$%$
—>Back in the day there used to be these things called VHS tapes. They used to cost a lot of money — so there were these places you could go to rent them. The last surviving relic of this bygone era, Blockbuster Video (also known as the company that was almost stupid enough to buy Circuit City), announced in a regulatory filing today that it plans to close over 800 stores by the end of next year. This is nearly twice the number they previously announced. More »
Netflix Refunds Your Money Without You Even Asking
—>If other companies were smart, and they mostly aren't, they would adopt Netflix's strategy of having periodic outages then apologizing and offering credits without their customers having to do anything. Whenever this happens (as it apparently did on August 30) we get a flood of delighted emails from their customers, many of whom didn't even notice the outage in the first place. More »
Video Mailbox: Like Netflix, Only 15 Years Too Early
—>I had always thought that mail-order video rental only came to be after the invention of DVDs because video tapes are too bulky and delicate to send through the mail on a regular basis. I was wrong. More »
Why Is An Andy Richter Movie Stalking Me On Netflix?
—>Netflix customer service says that search results are unaffected by sponsorships. Still, that doesn't explain what happened when Melissa Leff tried to add some movies to her Netflix queue: nearly every search she tried brought up the Andy Richter star vehicle Aliens in the Attic. More »
Deciphering Netflix Pricing Strategy
—>If you've found Netflix's pricing pyramid a bit tough to unravel, you're not alone. The cost of renting 3 DVDs is $17/month, whereas 6 DVDs is $36 (16.99 and 35.99, to be precise, but we don't count pennies here). Similarly, 4 DVDs is $24/month, 8 is $48. By traditional economies of scale, this may not make much sense: Getting 6 DVDs costs MORE than getting two 3 DVD subscriptions. And getting 8 DVDs isn't any cheaper than getting two 4 DVD plans. More »
Inside A Netflix Shipping Center
—>HackingNetflix was invited to tour a Netflix shipping center where 50 employees process as many as 90,000 discs a day. Pretty cool. More »
Are Blu-ray Netflix Customers Paying Extra Because The Discs Keep Cracking?
—>Do you rent Blu-ray discs from Netflix? Have you had any show up with a crack on the outer edge that makes the disc unplayable? Victor just wrote to us that he's received several Blu-ray discs lately that are damaged, and he's wondering if it's just him or part of a wider problem. More »
Watch Out For Throttling If You're On A Blockbuster Rental Plan
—>Robert's recent experience with his local Blockbuster just underscores how ill-equipped the rental chain is to compete against Netflix and new-star-on-the-block Redbox. Whether Robert has caught them deliberately throttling his account, or he's just the victim of a poorly implemented system, it's not the kind of customer experience you should have to settle for anymore. More »
Netflix Can't Decide Whether Puerto Rico Is In The USA
—>Puerto Rico and other U.S. Territories are in sort of an awkward place. Are they part of America, or not? Sure, they can't vote in presidential elections, but they are on the back of a quarter. This confusion has led to problems for Netflix users in Puerto Rico. Netflix will provide them with DVDs-by-mail service at the same price as service in the 48 contiguous United States, but considerably slower. However, they won't let Puerto Rico customers stream movies over the Internet, which would be handy while they wait three or four days for their DVDs to show up. More »
If we owned a Blockbuster franchise, we'd seriously think about just renting out the space to a bunch of Redbox kiosks. Blockbuster reported a 42% drop in revenue for the first quarter of 2009, which CEO Jim Keyes blamed on people going out to watch movies at theaters instead. Regarding the Redbox threat, Keyes said they hope to have 3,000 kiosks functioning by the end of the year. Redbox, on the other hand, has about 12,000. [Reuters] More »
Netflix Offers Not Only Unlimited Rentals, But Also Unlimited Vacation
—>In this age of decreasing perks, it's semi-refreshing, semi-enraging to discover that Netflix salaried employees get unlimited vacation. Workers can fly the coop for more than a month at a time without checking in. More »
Take A Peek Inside A Netflix Mailing Facility
—>You might want to hum a little of the Mister Rogers' Neighborhood theme song music as you click over to Boston.com to view these photos of what goes down at a Netflix facility. We like how they all wear red tees—they're like Netflix elves merrily providing DVDs to the nation. (Maybe they just did it for photo day, though.) More »
Netflix Raising Blu-Ray Rates By $1 Per Tier
—>Netflix is raising its rates for Blu-ray subscribers (again). The rate change is between $1-$9, increasing by $1 for each successive tier. The breakdown, via Engadget, and what Netflix emailed customers, inside. More »
How To Delete Your Online Accounts
—>PC Mag has assembled a list of instructions on how to wipe your account from a long list of websites, including Classmates.com (you'll have to call), Windows Live ID (it's complicated), and Friendster (ha ha ha). In many cases, canceling is as straightforward as clicking a link and authorizing the cancellation, but it's nice to see all the phone numbers and tips collected in one spot. More »
Blockbuster's Stock Nosedives On News It Is Investigating Bankruptcy
—>Blockbuster's stock just dropped 79% this afternoon after Bloomberg published a story that said the company hired the firm Kirkland & Ellis "to evaluate restructuring options, including a possible pre-packaged bankruptcy." Blockbuster says they've only hired the firm for "refinancing and capital raising initiatives," and that they do not intend to file for bankruptcy. More »
Blockbuster Reduces Total Access Benefits, Disguises Change As "No More Due Dates!"
—>Blockbuster's Total Access subscription service—their bid for relevance in the Netflix era—used to ship the next movie in your queue as soon as you dropped it off at a Blockbuster store in exchange for a free rental. Now the next movie won't ship until you return that free store rental—in other words, now it will count as the next movie in your queue. Of course, in Blockbuster marketing-speak, that's considered a great new benefit. More »
Blockbuster To Add Video Games to TotalAccess Service, Netflix Yawns
—>HackingNetflix has sent word that Blockbuster will be testing video game rentals through their Netflix-variant "TotalAccess". More »
Hey, guess who isn't broke? Netflix. [Bizjournals] More »
Need to save money on textbooks? Textbook Media offsets the cost of its digital copies by inserting ads at chapter breaks. BookSwim rents textbooks. Also see these old suggestions, and today's morning deal. More »
What's The Matter With GameFly?
—>Considering the price of buying or renting video games, GameFly, a Netflix-style program for video games, seems like a useful service. According to our inbox, not so much. More »
How To Cancel Cable/Satellite TV Without Being Miserable
—>CNet has an article about a couple who saw the writing on the wall, recession-wise, and canceled their satellite TV package. Surprisingly, they are, in fact, still alive and not at all depressed. More »
Those of you with Macs will soon be able to use Netflix's "Watch Instantly" feature. Hooray! [CrunchGear] More »
$1 Netflix Price Hike For Blu-Ray Access
—>Netflix will be start charging you $1 more per month to offset the costs of Blu-Ray movies, starting November 5. You have to opt-in to the Blu-Ray access, and the $1 surcharge, by going to "your account" and "add Blu-Ray access." If you don't already have Blu-Ray access on your account, then your membership price stays the same. Sounds like they needed to invent a way to make more money and this fee, admittedly small, seemed the best way to go about it. Copy of the email they sent subscribers, inside. More »
Maximize Your Netflix Membership With FeedFlix
—>We first discovered the very useful FeedFlix back in May, and since then the site's been updated to present more data on how well you utilize your Netflix membership. By pasting in any of your private Netflix RSS feeds, you'll see a breakdown of your activity stats, like how long on average you keep titles and your average cost-per-rental. A handy new feature is the "email alerts" function, where you'll receive a weekly reminder if you've kept a title past a certain number of days. We've included a screenshot below. More »
Netflix Screws Up, Makes Thousands Of Customers Happy?
—>We've had no less than 20 people email us to congratulate Netflix for apologizing after their shipping system experienced some delays. Here's the email and some comments from Netflix's customers: More »
Netflix Says "I Do" To Microsoft's Xbox Live
—>During their press briefing at E3, Microsoft announced that they have entered a partnership with Netflix, according to MSNBC. The (unholy) union means that starting this fall, Xbox users will be able to view streaming videos from Netflix's collection, however, they may only select from the 10,000 movies and shows which are available online and not the complete DVD library which includes some 100,000 titles. Microsoft has been touting this new service as free, however, that's not completely true. Details, inside... More »
Netflix Profiles To Stay!
—>Netflix announced today that they will not be removing the beloved profiles function that let users set up separate movie queues. Hooray! Speaking from personal experience, when two people share one netflix account, having two queues is essential to maintaining domestic tranquility. Looks like they listened to the 1270 people who left comments on the blog post announcing the feature's removal. An email to subscribers also thanked them for the customer emails and calls that advocated for keeping the profiles. The news was released on the Netflix community blog by one of the Netflix website production managers. Full announcement, inside... More »
Netflix Eliminates User Profiles, Infuriates Customers
—>Netlfix announced yesterday that they'll be eliminating the ability to set up separate queues or "profiles" within one account. Some customers, like reader Stephen are hopping mad about it. More »
Does The World Need A Blockbuster Digital Download "ATM?"
—>At their shareholders meeting Wednesday, Blockbuster announced that they would soon begin testing a "ATM"-style machine that consumers could use to download movies "on the go." More »
Companies Don't Hate You... They Just Love Phone Trees More
—>Companies are slowly learning that those infuriating automated phone trees aren't the answer to their customer service problems. Some experts even claim that automated systems anger customers. The New York Times decided to trace the history of the hated trees, while wondering if things will ever change. More »
Use FeedFlix To Monitor Your Netflix Usage Patterns
If you're the type of Netflix user who enjoys maximizing the value of your membership, you might find the new website FeedFlix interesting. The service scrapes data from your personal Netflix rss feeds and generates interesting graphs about how long you keep rentals, how many you rent per week, and your cost-per-rental. Sure, you could do this all yourself with a spreadsheet, or maybe Yahoo! Pipes, but FeedFlix is free and works instantly. More »
Netflix's Statement On "Are These Netflix DVDs Legit?"
—>After seeing our post where a reader raised concerns about whether Netflix DVDs he got with unofficial-looking labels and messed-up menus were counterfeit, Netflix's VP of Corporate Communications, Steve Swasey, sent us the following lovenote to calm our fears: More »
Are These Netflix DVDs Legit?
—>There are few companies that we love more than Netflix. Usually their service and support are top-notch among DVD renters. However, Consumerist Forums reader "muffinman" has a concern. He has been receiving what he believes are counterfeit DVDs and has some compelling photo evidence. Please help us crack the case and tell us what you think. His letter and pictures inside... More »
A California court has upheld the scrawny Netflix "throttling" settlement from 2006. That was when Netflix settled a class-action lawsuit that alleged they intentionally slowed down the rental rates of high-renting customers. The settlement only really benefited lawyers and Netflix, but it stands.
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You Love Netflix And Have Flooded Our Inbox With Compliments
—>Netflix was having some serious shipping and website problems Monday, and today our inbox is flooded with happy customers asking us to congratulate Netflix. Why? More »
Netflix has been asking its members about their Xbox 360 usage habits as it considers whether to stream movie rentals over the device. Are you a Netflix subscriber who owns a 360? Were you surveyed?
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IFC Seals Devilish Pact With Blockbuster
—>IFC has inked a "devilish" multi-year exclusive distribution deal with Blockbuster, says Chicago Sun-Times blogger and editor of RogerEbert.com, Jim Emerson. More »
Netflix Goes Blu-Ray Exclusive
—>Another nail in the coffin of the format war: top DVD rental service Netflix has announced that they will be going Blu-Ray exclusive. More »
"Why Blockbuster Will Never Survive"
—>Reader and commenter Salviati writes in to share his personal experience with Blockbuster and his theory for why they will never survive fierce competition from Netflix and the new Apple video rentals. More »
Researches Claim To Reverse Netflix's Anonymization
—>Researchers from Department of Computer Sciences at the University of Texas at Austin say they can reverse Netflix's anonymous data (which was released in to the public as part of a contest to see if someone could design a better rating system) by comparing it to only a few ratings on IMDb. The result? Specific users can be identified and linked to their (ostensibly) private ratings.
Releasing the data and just removing the names does nothing for privacy," Shmatikov told SecurityFocus. "If you know their name and a few records, then you can identify that person in the other (private) database." More »
Is Netflix costing the post office millions of dollars with its poorly-designed DVD mailers? Um, sort of. [Machinist] More »
NBC Cuts A Deal With Netflix
—>NBC has but a deal with Netflix that will let its users stream episodes of "Heroes" the day after they air. The deal will also provide access to past seasons of NBC shows, says a Netflix press release. More »
Blockbuster Total Access Fails, Netflix Wins
—>We're ready to call Netflix the winner of this battle of the video war, based on Blockbusters remarkably sad third quarter numbers and the flood of pissed off emails we've been getting from Blockbuster's (former) customers. More »
Time To Offer Flexible Magazine Subscriptions
—>Taking a page from Netflix, Time is developing a service that will let customers pay a single monthly price for up to seven rotating magazine subscriptions. Dubbed Maghound, the service is Time's attempt to augment the yearly subscription model by embracing the internet. More »
A Plague Of Cracked Blu-Ray Discs From Netflix?
—>Grant is having a problem renting blu-ray discs from Netflix. More »
Netflix Restores Confidence, Bank Account
—>Reader Josh sent us an account of Netflix's pro-consumer, 'just-say-yes' customer service that we have lauded in the past. Josh had asked to suspend his account until September 18, but Netflix unexpectedly reactivated his account on September 11, sending his bank account into overdraft. Josh called customer service to ask for an explanation and a refund. He writes: More »
The Ace Up Netflix's Sleeve: Excellent Customer Service
—>Netflix is investing in superior customer service to differentiate themselves from Blockbuster as the two rental giants remain locked in a vicious price war. The company has completely shunned email-based support, instead relying on 200 friendly Oregonians to answer calls around the clock. Netflix CSRs, unlike most, are not given target call durations, and are encouraged to "err on the side of generosity" when dispensing compensation. They have one shockingly simple goal: satisfy the customer. More »
Netflix Aims To Destroy Blockbuster, Drops Prices Yet Again
—>Netflix has dropped the price of their 3 movie at a time service... again, says Consumerist's sister site Gizmodo. We don't really know what else to say about it because it was only a few weeks ago that we posted the last Netflix price-cut. More »
Blockbuster Tries To Thwart Netflix, Gobbles Up Movie Download Service
—>Blockbuster has purchased Movielink, an ailing movie download service cobbled together by film studios to combat online piracy. The deal will give Blockbuster access to movies from Sony, Universal, Paramount, MGM, and Warner Brothers. Netflix's download service, by contrast, offers a limited selection of mostly older movies. The deal is the latest salvo fired in the consumer-friendly war of the movie rental services. No word yet on how long hackers might take to crack the new download service. More »
Blockbuster Raises Prices, Gives You Until Yesterday To Change Your Plan
—>Blockbuster would like you to know that you are a valued customer... and that you have until yesterday to change your plan before the new pricing goes into effect. More »
Craigslist, Netflix and several other websites are down following six successive power outages in San Fran's SOMA 'hood. [Boing Boing] More »
Netflix Sticks It To Blockbuster, Cuts Prices Again
—>The consumer-friendly price war between Netflix and Blockbuster rages on this week as Netflix cuts the price of its two most popular subscription plans by $1. The cost of Netflix's 3-DVD plan will drop to $16.99, while the 1-DVD plan will fall to $8.99. The price drops will make Netflix plans $1 cheaper than comparable Blockbuster plans featuring Total Access. Both retailers slashed the price of their 2-DVD options last month to $13.99. The latest move from Netflix is meant to drain much-needed cash from Blockbuster. From the Chicago Tribune:
Stepping up its attack on Netflix also has been hurting Blockbuster, which has had to spend more heavily on DVDs to ensure sure its stores have enough discs to keep up with the additional demand from its roughly 3 million online subscribers. The company lost $49 million in the first quarter. More »
Netflix Lowers Costs As Blockbuster Prepares To Raise Prices
—>Netflix has reduced the cost of its 2-DVD plan by $1 to $13.99, matching a move made by Blockbuster earlier this month. Blockbuster had expected to be dancing triumphantly atop the battered and bankrupt corpse of its rival by now, but Netflix's staying power is causing Blockbuster to re-think its strategy. By the end of the year, Blockbuster will raise the price of its Total Access service, which allows subscribers access to its retail locations.
The company said in the filing that it planned to modify its popular Total Access plan before the end of the year to "strike the appropriate balance between continued subscriber growth and enhanced profitability."
Netflix's email to subscribers, after the jump:
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Maxed Out: Take It For What It's Worth
—>We just finished watching Maxed Out, the recent documentary about the viperous evils of the credit industry. We agree with the basic premise: Underinformed debtors are getting taking advantage of. And the stories are horrific, with three different people driven to suicide because of debt. The doc does a good job of outlining the links from debtor, to bank, to debt collector, to government representatives. It's a nasty apparatus. More »
Maxed Out Now On DVD
—>The Maxed Out credit industry documentary hit DVD Tuesday. More »
Fast Food Nation Movie Review: Read The Book
—>Catching up on our Netflix pile, we watched Fast Food Nation last night. This is our movie review: read the book. More »
Netflix Recommends Moses Movie For Lovers Of Death Wish 3
—>Speaking of God and marketing, here's a movie recommendation Netflix made to Sam. Because he enjoyed Death Wish 3, Netflix thought he would enjoy The Bible Collection: Moses. More »
Free Netflix Rentals For Brooklyn Residents?
—>The Brooklyn Public Library may replace its DVD inventory with a Netflix subscription. According to the NY Post, talks are underway to offer free Netflix deliveries to any Brooklyn resident with a library card. The proposal makes sense when you consider the challenge of maintaining a DVD collection in fifty-eight branches.
"DVDs are very expensive to buy, and they're also very expensive to move because they're delicate," Vitali said. More »
Blockbuster CEO Will Resign
The video-rental chain, which has struggled to compete with changing movie-viewing habits and upstart services such as Netflix, said Tuesday that Mr. Antioco, who has led the company since 1997, would step down by the end of the year. The agreement drew praise from activist investor Carl Icahn, who sits on Blockbuster's board. In previous years, Mr. Icahn has sparred with Mr. Antioco about how to run the company and how much Mr. Antioco gets paid.
"Late Fee" Antioco will be collecting $5 million when he resigns.
—MEGHANN MARCO More »
Blockbuster Weighing Charge For Total Access
—>Blockbuster may soon levy a $4-$6 surcharge for Total Access. By allowing DVDs to be exchanged as free in-store rentals, Total Access dangles a potential workout before couch-potatoes who would otherwise return DVDs exclusively by mail. Blockbuster is quietly circulating a survey to gauge potential outrage to a price hike.
One of the ideas is to offer Mail-Only plans, which would allow members to receive and return DVDs only by mail, without the option to return them at a Blockbuster store and exchange them for free in-store DVDs. More »
Enable Netflix Video-On-Demand
—>If you're not one of the lucky people who has Netflix video-on-demand pushed to their account, you can click here to enable it. More »
iTunes + Netflix = Cancel Cable?
A blogger over at ZDNet realized that he could cancel part of his cable, order his shows on iTunes, watch movies on Netflix and save $300 a year.
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Netflix On The Internet
The movie streams, so users will have to stay connected to the internet while watching. Netflix plans to roll out the service across these glorious United States of America portions at a time, to ensure its servers have enough capacity.
—MEGHANN MARCO More »
Netflix Hides Its Customer Service Number
—>A few weeks back 60 minutes did a profile of Netflix and its owner, Reed Hastings, (who has to have the best corporate name since Warren Widicus.) Anyway, much like our readers, Reed could not find Netflix's customer service number the Netflix website. More »
Free Blockbuster Rentals For Netflix Subscribers
Blockbuster will give you a free online rental for each Netflix envelope flap you bring into a store. You must have a Blockbuster membership to qualify. The promotions lasts until Dec. 21. It's an effort to get Netflix subscribers to sign up for Blockbuster's Total Access Online service. More »
Help A Consumerist: What Netflix Alternative?
It's not always bitch bitch bitch here at the Consumerist, so we like to turn over a thread to readers looking for some practical consumer advice every once and a while. Maumita writes: More »
The News: Squeaky Clean
• Inflation in May dissimilar to matzoh. [
NYT]
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Netflix Still Boning Best Customers
—>We were a bit surprised by the renewed ruckus concerning Netflix throttling the turn around speed of heavy users, considering it's been a well-worn topic on Netflix blogs for at least a couple of years. But thanks to a new article on CNN.com, the issue is back to upset a whole new set of customers. More »
FTC Says Netflix Settlement Insufficient
—>Score one for the FTC—and by proxy, consumers—for their statement in the Netflix class action settlement, which as originally proposed offered a one-month upgrade to customers affected. (So if you were on a three-a-month plan, you'd get a four-a-month plan for a single month.) A one-month upgrade that would automatically transition into the higher movies-per-month plan after the free period. Ars Technica reports this quote from the FTC:
In the instant case, the Commission believes that the negative option aspect of the proposed settlement appears dangerously close to being a promotional gimmick. Specifically, the value of the benefit offered each class member is very low, both because those members who accept the benefit receive very little of value and because it is reasonably foreseeable that many class members will forgo any benefit altogether to avoid the negative option.
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Postal Workers Busted Stealing Netflix DVDs
Colorado police have charged two postal workers for plucking out Netflix DVDs from the mail.
According to court records, between January and March of 2005, 503 Netflix DVD movies destined for Lyons, Colorado were reported missing or stolen. Netflix told investigators the loss represents 23.33 percent of all DVD movies mailed to that postal area.
Any Netflix subscriber has probably had a movie or two go missing over the course of their subscription. We wonder if disc theft is far more widespread than Netflix would like to acknowledge.
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