Hacking NetFlix

Comcast & Level 3 in Dispute over Traffic; Netflix Streaming Costs to Increase?

The NY Times reports that Level 3, the company that transmits Netflix streaming movies and TV shows, is being charged a "recurring fee" by Comcast due to the amount of traffic they're sending to Comcast customers:

Level 3, which helps to deliver Netflix’s streaming movies, said Comcast had effectively erected a tollbooth that “threatens the open Internet,” and indicated that it would seek government intervention. Comcast quickly denied that the clash had anything to do with network neutrality, instead calling it “a simple commercial dispute.”

The dispute highlighted the growing importance of Internet video delivery — an area that some people say needs to be monitored more closely by regulators. Net neutrality, which posits that Internet traffic should be free of any interference from network operators like Comcast, is thought to be on the December agenda of the Federal Communications Commission.

Comcast posted a response to the allegations:

Now, Level 3 proposes to send traffic to Comcast at a 5:1 ratio over what Comcast sends to Level 3, so Comcast is proposing the same type of commercial solution endorsed by Level 3. Comcast is meeting with Level 3 later this week for that purpose. We are happy to maintain a balanced, no-cost traffic exchange with Level 3. However, when one provider exploits this type of relationship by pushing the burden of massive traffic growth onto the other provider and its customers, we believe this is not fair.

It'll be interesting to see if this increases Netflix's cost to stream a movie, currently estimated at 3-5 cents.

Thanks to LazarusO, Dave, and everyone else for sending this in.

Microsoft Looking to Offer TV Service on Xbox 360

Reuters reports that Microsoft is in talks to create a cable-TV like service on the Xbox 360.

Microsoft's latest explorations after investments in MSNBC and WebTV come as efforts to redefine living room entertainment have accelerated in the past year, with technology companies seeking to offer lower cost alternatives to pricey pay-TV subscriptions.

One scenario under consideration by Microsoft is to create a new TV service on its Xbox gaming console that would establish a "virtual cable operator." The service would charge a monthly fee for access through the Xbox to networks such as ABC, NBC, Fox, CBS, ESPN or CNN, according to two sources familiar with the plans.

The story notes that it would probably be at least a year before we'd see "Microsoft TV," but I would love to see someone give Comcast, Time Warner and the other cable companies some serious competition. Maybe the threat of Microsoft entering the market would finally get the cable companies to give us à la carte?

Subzin Finds Movies From Quotes

Ever wonder what movie a quote came from? Subzin is a cool Netflix hack that lets you search for movies by quotes. For example, I search for "you can't handle the truth," and there were 10 results, including A Few Good Men, The Benchwarmers, and Ace Ventura Pet Detective Jr..

via Daring Fireball.

Netflix is a Swear Word in Reviewer Bios & Not Allowed in Reviews

VoxinSox discovered that Netflix considers the word "Netflix" to be a swear word in reviewer bios.

The word "Netflix" is also not allowed in reviews.

Netflix Stock Breaks $200 Per Share & Becomes $10 Billion Company

Netflix stock briefly broke $200 per share today and is currently trading at $198.92, making Netflix a $10 billion company.

When I started HackingNetflix in November of 2003, NFLX was trading at $23 per share. 

Netflix New Releases for November 30th, 2010

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

Interesting titles include The Sorcerer's Apprentice, The Twilight Saga: Eclipse, The Pacific, Cairo Time, I Am, Valhalla Rising, Waking Sleeping Beauty, Walt & El Grupo, and Parks and Recreation: Season 2. 

Are Computers Making Too Many Decisions for Us?

Joe Delman at Forbes wonders if computers are making too many decisions for us.

Amazon tells us what to buy, Netflix suggests what to watch and Pandora creates playlists for us to listen to. Cars can park themselves and maintain safe following distances, even if you're a chronic tailgater. Computers trade our stocks, and GPS systems guide our travels. And these are just the beginning, as more advanced technologies become mainstream in the years to come.

Is all of this automation pushing us to the lazy future depicted in WALL-E where we forgot how to think?

What do you think?

Roku XD Player Only $67 on Amazon

The Roku XD Streaming Player 1080p is only $67 on Amazon with free shipping, normally $79. Roku is having a sale but the total cost is $74 with shipping. The XD model supports 1080p video, wireless N, and has the enhanced remote, but lacks the USB, dual-band N, and component/optical audio ports of the XDS model. 

If you're thinking about buying a Roku Player and buy through this link you'll help support HackingNetflix.

Netflix's Neil Hunt Says That Netflix A/B Tests Everything

Netflix's Neil Hunt answered a question on Quora about Netflix's approach to testing, and Hunt says they test everything from UI (this explains the 3 different PS3 UI's), movie recommendations, button placement, page load time, and more.

We are very proud of our empirical focus, because it makes us humble - we realize that most of the time, we don't know up-front what customers want.  The feedback from testing quickly sets us straight, and helps make sure that our efforts are really focused at optimizing the things that make a difference in the customer experience.

If I had to summarize our learnings in three words: "simple trumps complete."

via Engadget.

The Reasons Behind Netflix's Move to Amazon's Cloud Services

Cloudscaling scored an interview with Netflix's Adrian Cockcroft, a cloud architect at Netflix. The interview is interesting if you're interested in how Netflix delivers video to millions of customers and want to understand why the selected Amazon's EC2 Web Service.

RLB: Could you describe at a high level what Netflix is doing on AWS?

AC: Encoding movies for streaming, log analysis, production web site and API, most everything that scales with customers and streaming usage. Easier to say what we don’t have there: most internal IT that scales with employee count, legacy stuff, DVD shipping systems, account sign-up and billing systems. We use Akamai, Limelight and Level3 CDN’s for streaming the movies, which is a cloud based service. There is an AWS CDN service, but they aren’t a big enough player in this space at this point.

RLB: What was the key business driver that led to deciding to use AWS rather than your own datacenters?

AC: Business agility and the inability to predict how much capacity we would need when and where for a business whose growth is accelerating. Year on year customer growth is 52% (up from 42% last quarter), year on year customers using streaming is up 145% (from ~4M to ~11M). We need to be a small-ish fish in a big AWS pond to leverage AWS investment in datacenter build-out, rather than building our own pond.

via ReadWriteWeb.