I'm hearing that Netflix is thinking about charging for streaming...
Sounds like we will know Thursday.
I personaly think it's a a bad move.

"hearing" where?

i'd be pretty surprised if they did this. they'd have to actually add some new streaming titles, and lord knows that'll never happen.

I've heard rumors they might start charging in the future, but nothing substantiated. Wouldn't surprise me though, although it would be a kick in the nuts after the Blu-Ray increase.

Unless they're considering them separate markets (since there's no shortage of Blu-Ray fans claiming they won't watch anything below Blu-Ray and thus I assume they've all canceled their cable/satellite as well).

But a lot of people (like me) appreciate having all media available to me, and use Blu-Ray, DVD, TV, and streaming.

i'd be pretty surprised if they did this. they'd have to actually add some new streaming titles, and lord knows that'll never happen.

They add new titles all the time. Unless you mean more day-and-date stuff, which they might be able to do if they actually charge for it (which is why Vudu and AppleTV get them). I just hope if they do start charging, they do get day-and-date and it's still buffet, not PPV or 24-hour rentals.

actually, i kinda wish they'd do an "all you can eat" subscription for just streaming only... and price it less than i pay now on the 1 disk at a time plan... since i use netflix almost exclusively for streaming, if i could pay less to not have access to disks, that works for me...

actually, i kinda wish they'd do an "all you can eat" subscription for just streaming only... and price it less than i pay now on the 1 disk at a time plan... since i use netflix almost exclusively for streaming, if i could pay less to not have access to disks, that works for me...

Agreed.

Once my 2 free weeks are up, I'll probably pay for at least 1 month(@ $8.99) for their lowest package that allows streaming. I have no intention of using their DVD mail service.

I wouldn't mind a $5.99 streaming package, but I seriously doubt they something with a lower price, especially since they are probably gonna have to fork over serious cash to upgrade rights for streaming. My guess is it will be something like $10 for streaming only or the base $8.99 base single dvd rate + $5 or so for extra streaming abilities.

To compete with the now pretty huge streaming library Amazon has, I think they are gonna have to stick to the 1 price per month model, in order to compete, based on their current streaming content library. I won't use Amazon because those per movie prices add up FAST.

actually, i kinda wish they'd do an "all you can eat" subscription for just streaming only... and price it less than i pay now on the 1 disk at a time plan... since i use netflix almost exclusively for streaming, if i could pay less to not have access to disks, that works for me...

That sure would be sweet!

It is probably a bit of a challenge for them right now. One one hand, streaming has helped grow their overall business and lowered their acquisition costs, lowered churn and lowered the average number of DVDs shipped (to their customers using streaming).

On the other hand, I am sure they want to test the market to see how they can directly drive revenue specifically for the streaming offering. I think it makes sense to have something like a $5.99 streaming only offering, and do something like charge $2-$3 per subscriber to add unlimited streaming to the existing package.

Who really knows. They might just stand pat as their existing model of not charging has fueled their stock price and driven subscriber growth well beyond projections in the last 2 quarters.

Who really knows. They might just stand pat as their existing model of not charging has fueled their stock price and driven subscriber growth well beyond projections in the last 2 quarters.

yea, "who really knows" probably sums it up the best... :)

and given what has happened to their overall business lately, it's hard to say "change it" (although i have to believe that the economy has fed part of that growth, people staying home more, watching more movies, maybe?)...

kinda leads me to believe that if (when) they do move to a different pricing model for streaming, it'll be for standalone...

i'd be willing to even pay more than i pay now, if the library grew at a similar ratio to the price increase...

to be honest, if they were able to go day and date for everything, i'd pay 25-35 a month for that...

they could even "tier" it the way they do with the physical media packages...

tier a: free, you get what you get now.
tier b: $10/month, you get tier a + all movies a month after release date
tier c: $35/month, the whole shebang.

I'm hearing that Netflix is thinking about charging for streaming...
Sounds like we will know Thursday.
I personaly think it's a a bad move.

Personally, I am fine with my current 1 Blu Ray at a time + unlimited streaming plan. I am finding a lot of interesting films to watch on the watch instantly service. In fact if I had to drop one the Blu Ray service or the streaming, I'd drop the Blu Ray. For now, I love having access to the indie and foreign movies they have. It just opened up a whole new world of movies that I had never considered before.

Initially HD was my primary criteria for a movie, now it's the content. I am using Netflix streaming for most of my movies now, with Apple TV for the more recent releases. For the titles I want to buy I end up with the Blu Ray. I keep my Blu Ray queue stacked up with those titles that are not available yet to rent on Apple TV HD and I have no interest in buying.

From a value perspective, all I can say is that the Netflix watch instantly service is the best thing around. Sure, I'd like the audio to be at least on par with Vudu or Apple TV and to have more HD content, but for where they are in their product lifecycle it's very compelling. My Hulu viewing just went to almost zero ever since I signed up with Netflix. However, I've noticed that Hulu has also recently upped both their quality of titles and service. Hulu for me works only with my Safari browser. IE 8 is really choppy.

I just got my Roku box set up but haven't tried the Amazon service yet, so with that both Apple TV AND Hulu may go to zero soon. Who knows :)

Personally, I am fine with my current 1 Blu Ray at a time + unlimited streaming plan. I am finding a lot of interesting films to watch on the watch instantly service. In fact if I had to drop one the Blu Ray service or the streaming, I'd drop the Blu Ray. For now, I love having access to the indie and foreign movies they have. It just opened up a whole new world of movies that I had never considered before.

Initially HD was my primary criteria for a movie, now it's the content. I am using Netflix streaming for most of my movies now, with Apple TV for the more recent releases. For the titles I want to buy I end up with the Blu Ray. I keep my Blu Ray queue stacked up with those titles that are not available yet to rent on Apple TV HD and I have no interest in buying.

From a value perspective, all I can say is that the Netflix watch instantly service is the best thing around. Sure, I'd like the audio to be at least on par with Vudu or Apple TV and to have more HD content, but for where they are in their product lifecycle it's very compelling. My Hulu viewing just went to almost zero ever since I signed up with Netflix. However, I've noticed that Hulu has also recently upped both their quality of titles and service. Hulu for me works only with my Safari browser. IE 8 is really choppy.

I just got my Roku box set up but haven't tried the Amazon service yet, so with that both Apple TV AND Hulu may go to zero soon. Who knows :)

I think you'll be very happy with Amazon HD on Roku. Just rolled out yesterday and I checked out a 2-min preview and it looked great on my KURO. My guess is you'll be phasing out Apple TV movies and streaming HD from Amazon on Roku.

I don't think it's a matter of if rather when. Just like when Blockbuster let you exchange unlimited returns for free rentals and Netflix didn't charge extra for Blu-rays. If it's too good to be true it won't last. :)

My guess is streaming will become a separate service with several plans being available. Within a couple of years the streaming business will be big enough that someone will make an effort to capture the lion's share and at the same time make a profit.

Netflix appears to be in the best position to do this and as such can go from being the cheapest to the most expensive. Apple dominates the music download business and recently gave in with higher (and lower) priced downloads.

Until someone dominates the video download business I think the availability of current movies will be hit or miss. The studios simply won't have a large enough vested interest to really serve the market. Similar to the current state of Blu-ray for me. I have a hard time finding four films a month I want to view. Once in a while I walk down the DVD aisles and see they are still making good movies.

I think you'll be very happy with Amazon HD on Roku. Just rolled out yesterday and I checked out a 2-min preview and it looked great on my KURO. My guess is you'll be phasing out Apple TV movies and streaming HD from Amazon on Roku.

This may sound silly, but can you use one Roku box for Netflix and Amazon services? Or do you have to buy 2 , or unregister one service and then register a new service?

Jay

This may sound silly, but can you use one Roku box for Netflix and Amazon services? Or do you have to buy 2 , or unregister one service and then register a new service?

Jay

They both show as options on you screen so you can click on one or the other.

My understanding is that they will eventually charge for streaming but only as a streaming only membership, since they don't yet have that service plan. Prices for current plans (that automatically receive streaming) should not change. The thing that gets me is how they keep increasing the Blu Ray fee. I used to pay almost $20/mo for the 3 out at a time plan with BRD access. Figured I never really needed three movies at a time so I bumped it down to 2, saving $7 a month. Or so I thought. They had another BRD rate increase and my monthly savings is only down to about $4 now. I've been with them from the start and they never throw their long time customers a bone. I still get my queue scrambled, releases throttled. Anything to impress the new customers.

I still get my queue scrambled, releases throttled. Anything to impress the new customers.That is why I quit both Netflix and Blockbuster. If you could get the new releases on a regular basis I think it's well worth their 2 or 3 out at a time plans. Since you can get the less popular titles for free compared to renting one hot new release per week locally.

I tried both multiple times and never had any luck getting new releases which is pretty much my only interest. So I rent them locally paying about the same price. I just don't get all of the filler rentals in between.

Now I'm trying VUDU's HDX films which are about the same price as local rentals. The HD and SD downloads are a little less.

I tried Blockbuster for a while and it was great....until they stopped sending movies completely. Sometimes I would have a couple movies at the top of my queue that had a wait status. Normally the next available movie is sent. After two weeks of not getting movies this one instance I called and the rather snooty CSR said I had to manually put available movies at the top. This was and has never been the case as long as I've been with Netflix so I canceled.