Netflix BD disc rental discussion thread - Page 221

to be fair, that's slightly obscure. Not that they shouldn't carry it - I wish they carried Buffy Season 8 too.

According to Amazon, All-Star Superman is the #3 top selling new BD released this week behind Megamind and Due Date and #18 overall in BD. Well above the handful of other "obscure" titles that Netflix deigned to offer (or mostly not offer) this week.

interesting. I've never heard of it until this post. I wonder how much of that is because of the rental availability.

The good sales numbers may actually be working against you.

They may not be a big rental demand for the title since it appears a lot of people are buying it.

They're buying it BECAUSE they can't rent it...exactly what the studios want. That is the reason why Fox and Warners stripped down their rental discs as well.

I'm not sure that's correct. I buy a lot of the animated DC movies. They are all well done. Not to mention this is based on a really famous and well thought out comic book. Comic nerds are weird people.

Or the day after there's a wait!

Netflix emailed me an explanation and an amend.


So the extra DVD is a good deal although they should have told me this immediately instead of a day later. I've gotten titles from other shipping centers in the past and they were treated just like any other title with an email saying it will take extra time to get to me.

^ They have always, without fail, sent me an extra disc when one has to ship from another center. That only happens a handful of times each year though.

Everything I've rented in the past two or three years has come from my local center so I've been lucky. In the past I'd never got an extra disc when they did ship from another center. This extra disc is nice especially since I dropped one disc when they raised their prices a few weeks ago.

I read a few pages of this thread, but before wading through the 111 pages (yeesh) I figured I'd just put it out there - does Netflix "throttle" to customers? I live in NY city and I used to get 1 day turnarounds - I'd put it in the mail and the next morning I'd get an email that it had been returned. It was like clockwork. Then they'd ship and the next day I'd get the films. But then, after a couple of months, now that my plan is larger service has slowed considerably - 2-3 days or more each way. I called and they said it's probably due to "weather slowdowns." What weather? If they can ship it in a day (cause the NF center is in the same city), they my bet is that they are throttling me.

Is this the case?

yes, they do throttle if you are a real heavy user. Though that it seems like if you're not over 10 discs a month per "disc out" you pay for, you should be fine.

Our plan size has varied from 2- to 4-at-a-time over the past couple of years (currently 3 aat, for the past year) and we've noticed no change in speed. It has remained as you say: we mail Day 1 (pickup from our mailbox in late afteroon), NF acknowledges receipt and mailing of new disc the next day, we receive new disc Day 3. Infrequently, if we mail by mid a.m. on Day 1, we might get a new disc the next day; maybe has happened 5 times in 2 years). Nearest NF center is an hour away.


Not saying it isn't so, but I'm just curious: What's the source of your info that NF does indeed throttle?

It says so right in their terms of service publication.

In determining priority for shipping and inventory allocation, we may utilize many different factors, including the number and type of DVDs you rent through our service, the membership plan you select, as well as other uses of our service by you. For example, if all other factors are the same, we give priority to those members who receive the fewest DVDs through our service. The type, number, mix and weighting of the various factors impacting shipping and inventory allocation will change from time to time and will be made in our sole and absolute discretion. As a result of your viewing habits and our operational practices, the actual number of DVDs you rent in any month may vary, and you may experience differentiated service during the course of your membership. Also, such service may be different from the service we provide to other members on the same membership plan. The type of differentiated service you may experience includes, (i) the shipment of your next available DVD occurring at least one business day following return of your previously viewed DVD, (ii) delivery taking longer, as the shipments may not be sent from your local distribution center and (iii) the DVDs you receive coming from lower in your Queue more often than our other members. These effects will not occur unless we are faced with limited inventory at your local distribution center or when the number of shipments to be processed by that distribution center on that day is exceeded. In our unlimited plans, we do not establish a monthly limit on the number of DVDs you can rent.

http://www.netflix.com/TermsOfUse#accept

I guess I should start reading those agreements that I always just blindly click "agree" on... I'm on the 8-dvds at a time blu-ray plan. It ain't cheap. So I'm still, frankly, kind of pissed that they're starting to throttle my service. Yes, it's in their terms (thanks for pointing that out), but I expect them NOT to do so for the money I'm shelling out. That, and also, the agent I spoke to on the phone explicitly stated that it was due to mail "slow downs," and when I asked if they were just holding discs back on me she stated that they "immediately" enter discs into their system when received. I've seen a definite delay there too. So their agreement appears to say one thing while their agents kind of say something different.

Guess I'll sign up for Blockbuster now instead...

Guess not.

8 dvds................??????

do you do anything else? haha

I just KNEW someone was going to have something to say about that... And no, I don't

haha. that's your business, i just wouldn't have the time

I'm sure the fact that you can't rent All-Star Superman from Netflix, Blockbuster or Redbox on BD has had some influence on its sales numbers, although I guess my very small point was that it was not a completely obscure title. Warner should be very proud of their 20 point gain since their introduction of the rental delay (unless of course another home video distributor that is not actively practicing shenanigans posted a 30 point gain).

Anyway, I rent and buy all kinds of things, but just in case one might be wondering whether or not Blockbuster Online was the savior of your weirdo movie fetish - I have to say unfortunately that they are not (sadly it goes further than these 20):

wow......... that list is sad

I never saw "On Order" when I had BB.

To be fair to Blockbuster, my queue there is almost entirely populated by discs that Netflix does not carry.

doesn't look like BB carries them either...

True enough.

Just for kicks, I searched BB to see if they had any of the stuff that is sitting in the dead zone section of my queue. At least half the stuff was available through them. It was only some of the more obscure or (as yet) unreleased stuff that wasn't there.

I'm considering the idea of dropping from 3 discs to 2 on Netflix and doing a single disc plan through BB just for stuff on BD as well as titles that NF doesn't stock.

Is BB still alive and well? I thought they were dead in the water with the bankruptcy or whatever it is, but if they're still alive and well I may consider having a plan with both netflix and them as well...

So far.

It's not like you have to sign a commitment or anything. If you don't like it, just cancel.

sounds like a reasonable thing to do to me. I would do this if I wasn't already getting far too many discs to watch as it is.

To be fair, I haven't really had any issue getting stuff that I want (aside from the handful of items that are completely unavailable). I can get new releases if I get a disc back in time. I haven't had any throttling issues, either.

My thing is, I'm a disc renter and Netflix seems to not want me. The raise my monthly fee while accepting delays in disc availability and aren't replacing discs that become unavailable from their catalog. They also aren't stocking quite a few titles that have since come out on BD.

With BB, they seem to take new releases more seriously and the in store exchanges lesson the chance I'll have to wait a month for the disc to go from "long wait" to "available now". In fact, since, so far, BB doesn't have a 28 day delay to begin with, I have the potential to get a new release before Netflix even gets it.

However, I can't see dropping Netflix because I don't think BB can beat the speed of Netflix's turnaround times. Further, I do stream titles from time to time, despite not wanting to do it in place of disc rentals.

My biggest issue with Netflix is they don't seem to want my money. Instead, they have encouraged me to go to increasingly smaller plans while I continue to go through the same number of discs as I always have. They could have me on a more profitable plan, but seem to think that simply raising rates and encouraging me to decrease my turnaround times is a better idea. I pay less per month on a 3 out plan than I paid on the 4 out plan before the last BD access increase, yet get the same number of discs per month. I pay less and cost more now.

Is that good business sense?

Oddly enough, in the past few weeks my delivery times with BB have been excellent where they have lagged a bit in the past. It's as if someone(s) is taking pride in their work even as the ship goes down.

I hear the orchestra on the Titanic sounded fantastic that night...

But, in all seriousness, until they actually go under, if you can get good service from them, there's no reason not to give them your business.

It's not XM/Sirius or TiVo where if they go under, you've invested in hardware that has become paper weights.

The only real risk is if their billing department continues with business as usual after the rest disappears. But, that's what the 800 number on the back of the credit card is for.

Absolutely!

That is my observation as well. Delivery times has improved much more than it used to be. I have dropped my Netflix subscription from 6 out to 1 out and signed up with 3 out at BB 3 months ago and so far I am happy. I noticed that all Blu-ray titles I want that were not available @ Netflix are there at BB. I thought those titles were never released on Blu-ray.
All this time, while coughing more $$ for the Blu-ray option, Netflix didn't even bother to carry all available blu-ray titles while charging for such service. How is this a good business practice? Isn't this an outright fraud ? BB has a much better selection of Blu-ray discs, are available at the same date as release date, and Netflix charges more for Blu-ray option and doesn't carry all blu-ray titles and for the ones it does, doesn't have enough copies of it. I hardly get new release from Netlix any more. All have very long wait status. Once BB's future becomes clear, I will ditch Netflix for good. I have been a Netflix member since 2001 and I was a very satisfied customer until a few months ago.