Hacking NetFlix

Netflix Raising Blu-ray Subscription Plan Prices April 27th

Netflix will be raising the subscription price for Blu-ray customers by about 20% on April 27th. Netflix's Steve Swasey on the reasons behind the price increase:

"This is still a great value when you consider it’s unlimited rental and Blu-ray discs cost about 30 percent more than standard definition discs.  Other rental services charge a $1-$2 premium per rental transaction. 

Netflix is buying more titles on Blu-ray to accommodate the increasing number of Netflix members who prefer renting movies on Blu-ray over standard definition DVD.  In fact, the Blu-ray selection at Netflix has grown more than 60 percent in just six months to more than 1,300 titles, and is continuing to expand quickly.

Blu-ray discs are substantially more expensive than standard definition DVDs – often as much as 30 percent more.  More Netflix members are choosing Blu-ray – almost 10 percent now."

You can turn Blu-ray DVD access on or off by going to "Your Account" and selecting "Manage Blu-ray access."

Here's the new subscription pricing for Blu-ray titles:

Update: Here's the e-mail that they're sending to customers:

What do you think of the new Blu-ray pricing?

NY Times on The Netflix Queue Wars

Michael Wilson in the New York Times writes about queue wars, Netflix is the New Relationship Battleground. 

“Let’s say there’s a couple things I want to see,” she said. In that case, she will sneak into the queue and move her movie to the top, often dashing the hopes of her husband, Grant, a reactor operator at a power plant, at the last moment.
“My husband had looked at the mail and thought a guy flick was coming in, and it’s a chick flick,” Ms. Newton said of a recent dust-up. “He’ll go back through and move stuff back up the queue. It’s who keeps up with the queue, as awful as that sounds.”
They recently cut back from a two-disc $13.99 monthly subscription to the austerity plan of one disc at a time, $8.99, putting all the more pressure on who wins the battle of the queue.
“Right now we have, ‘Man on Fire,’ ” she said. (The 2004 film stars Denzel Washington — decidedly not a chick flick.) “We’re not sure who put it there,” Ms. Newton said skeptically. “He’s saying it wasn’t him. He hasn’t watched it yet. If he doesn’t watch it in the next few days, it’s going back.”

Do you fight over your queue, or use Profiles to save your relationship?

Rolling Stone Names Netflix CEO Reed Hastings "Agent of Change"

Rolling Stone listed Netflix CEO Reed Hastings as #33 on a list of people that are Agents of Change.

WHAT HE'S CHANGING: Our idea of watching movies. His new Netflix on-demand service reshuffles the way people rent films — instantly, over the Internet, for one flat fee a month. It's the most appealing, legal alternative to bootlegging — and could save Hollywood from the same fate as the music business.
ENEMIES SAY: "Netflix doesn't really have or do anything that we can't and don't already do ourselves," said Blockbuster CEO Jim Keyes last August.

New Releases for March 31st, 2009

Click here for the full list of new releases this week (134). 

Interesting titles include Slumdog Millionaire, Marley & Me, Seven Pounds, Ricky Gervais: Out of England: The Stand-Up Special, California Dreams: Seasons 1 & 2, Hope & Faith: Season 1, In Plain Sight: Season 1, The IT Crowd: Season 1, Spectacular, Danton, Special, The Butterfly Effect 3: Revelations, Jerome Robbins: Something to Dance About, Jim Gaffigan: King Baby, Dennis Miller: The HBO Comedy Specials, Tell No One, Timecrimes, and Yella.

Netflix Launching Taste Preferences, Personalized Homepages, & Customized Browsing

Todd Yellin, director of product management at Netflix, announced new personalization features that will be rolled out to all customers in the next week. 

"As we do with all new features, we will rapidly iterate and improve on what we launch—particularly on the ability to mix and match categories to improve on the personalized genres we offer. Any feedback you have is appreciated as we strive to perfect and expand these features."

We already got a sneak peek at the Taste Preferences feature (thanks to Bradford) that enables you to set your suggestions by mood, qualities, and storylines.

The new personalized Netflix homepage and streaming pages will reflect your recent rental activity (rentals, streaming and ratings) as well as your genre selections.

Yellin on the new customized browsing feature, "When members click on any of their specially chosen personalized genres they’ll not only see relevant movies/TV shows, but also a way to mix and match other categories to create new combinations. Members find this to be a particularly good way to explore titles that are available to watch instantly."

What do you think of the new features?

How Would You Rate Netflix Customer Service?

Have you ever called Netflix customer service? 

How would you rate the experience? How long did you wait? Did they resolve your problem or answer your question?

Reader Request: Save to Streaming Queue

John writes, "I would like to be able to save movies to the instant queue even though they are not currently available for instant viewing.  This way when they do become available they just show up on my Roku. I have 147 titles in my DVD queue but 42 titles I don’t plan on viewing via DVD they are just there as reminders to myself that I wouldn’t mind seeing these titles when they become available for instant viewing."

What do you think? Should Netflix create a way for you to save movies only in the streaming queue?

When Netflix Recommendations Go Wrong

John writes, "I thought you might enjoy this crazy movie recommendation I got today (see the attached screenshot), which seems to indicate that fans of the despair and violence of The Wire and the lacerating misanthropy of Curb Your Enthusiasm will also enjoy an animated show for 3-year-olds."

Have you experienced any strange Netflix recommendations?

Kenflix: SF Video Store Subscription Plan

Flickr user Molly captured the following photo of San Francisco's Four Star Video's answer to Netflix: Kenflix.

Blockbuster OnDemand on TiVo DVRs in Q2; Will Sell TiVos in Stores

Blockbuster OnDemand will join Netflix Streaming and Amazon Video On Demand on TiVo DVRs in Q2, and Blockbuster will also sell TiVo DVRs in stores. More info on HackingBlockbuster.

Interesting tidbit: Blockbuster OnDemand will work on TiVo Series2 DVRs along with Amazon VOD, while Netflix Streaming requires a Series3.