Charles writes, "I go thru periods of high and average use, and am well familiar with the practice of "throttling". I understand that Netflix has to make a buck, and of course I still like getting a value myself.
One technique to combat throttling mentioned elsewhere is to discontinue one membership and then start another one with a different credit card. Apparently (at least at one time) Netflix only tracked the credit card number that paid for the account, so as you expect you get the honeymoon all over again.
For me, there's only one very understandable drawback. I've rated thousands of movies, and the rating / rental history doesn't go to your "new" profile.
I thought it would be a useful feature for some software program to be able maintain an offline database that could then be uploaded via script to the netflix site, in effect synchronizing the rental history and ratings when you moved from one profile to the next."
Other readers have asked for a program to exchange movie ratings and queues between Netflix and Blockbuster Online, or from IMDB or Yahoo! Movies.
Any developers want to write software for more than 8 million DVD-by-mail customers?
I've been searching for something like this myself. The closest thing I've found is FlixQueue.
http://www.5hyphen.com/FlixQueue/index.htm
It isn't the answer but it doesn't seem bad. It does download your queue, history, and suggestions. It does not download your ratings. Nor does it have any support for BBO or other sites.
Posted by: danb | March 15, 2007 at 01:58 PM
One way I think to stop throttling is to go back and forth between programs - for example, from "5 out" to "8 out".
Posted by: kcholt68 | March 15, 2007 at 06:57 PM
"One technique to combat throttling mentioned elsewhere is to discontinue one membership and then start another one with a different credit card."
It seems to me that is a lot of trouble, is it really that much of a pain to wait the extra day? I don't know, I guess I am lucky, we watch so much tv that sometimes I am happy when my movies take an extra day, gives me a night to catch up on my DVR.
Posted by: ninjagrrl | March 17, 2007 at 07:52 AM
Netflix is made up of all sorts of renters, and I do consider the service a great value.
I guess all the lying about when they receive the returns is what bugs me more than anything else. It fuels the urge to resist!
Posted by: lasitter | March 18, 2007 at 07:42 PM
How do I add Rubicon to my list ?
Posted by: Marina Pery | August 30, 2010 at 08:23 PM