Would You Subscribe to a Streaming-Only Netflix Plan?

Netflix CEO Reed Hastings was interviewed by Bloomberg, and he talks about a streaming-only plan.

“Right now, the power of the service is that hybrid message, the best of both,” he said, referring to customers’ ability both to watch online video and to order DVDs under a single plan. “So we’re putting most of our wood behind that. But we recognize at some point in the long term, the streaming will be good enough that an appreciable number of people will find streaming is all they need.”

Netflix needs to increase subscribers so it can spend more to expand its library of titles for online streaming, Hastings said. That involves drawing in more customers renting DVDs by mail, improving the online-streaming technology for computers and getting its software embedded in consumer devices, he said.

Netflix is seeking to make licensing deals with channels like Time Warner Inc.’s HBO and CBS Corp.’s Showtime, Hastings said. 

During the Netflix Q4 2008 earnings call on January 26th, Hastings was asked the same question:

Snirnivoss Anonca – Oppenheimer & Company
I know that the streaming service is currently complementary to the normal subscription service but in the future do you plan to launch a dedicated streaming service?
Reed Hastings
That’s definitely a possibility, there’s nothing that prevents us from offering dedicated. Our view on it is the bulk of the market is interested in the big new releases and in the subscription and we’re able through the DVD combination to provide that. It’s definitely a possibility for the future but we don’t think there’s a big market there for streaming only given the content availability situation which is roughly 100,000 titles on DVD and about 12,000 on streaming.

I'd like a streaming-only account for my kids, who watch their shows and movies on the Roku Player, and are less dependent on new releases. My wife and I watch more new releases, so until there are more titles available I think we need the hybrid DVD/streaming plan.

Would you want to subscribe to a streaming-only plan? What do you think it should cost?

via Engadget HD and Yahoo!

Comments

[steve.]

We watch mostly tv shows and they don't even include all of the episodes for streaming so I would have to say no until their complete library is available.

On a side note according to the Seattle Times a state legislator is trying to get a tax placed on streaming movies and games.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/politics/2008782786_digitalgoods25m.html

[trixare4kids]

I love streaming movies, documentaries and history channel and PBS shows and I really, really love the Roku player.

I would switch to a Streaming Only plan in a hot second, but ONLY if we could stream ALL of Netflix's available content. Until then, no dice. There just isn't quite enough that I actually want to watch so I have to supplement it with DVDS.

Also, I'm sick of "Watch Now" titles expiring. Why is this even necessary when it's a 20 year old movie?

[julie]

I'd like the ability to have the option to have a sub-account that is only streaming.

[Rowell]

If Netflix would be able to stream new release titles in HD along with their bonus content, I would pay up to double my subscription rate per month.

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Diane Calhoun, Lincoln


England

[Walking Turtle]

Netflix Streaming-Only? Yes, I WOULD pay hard American cash for that. Even without new Hollywood releases. The fresh indie releases are the entire point, for this funny-hatted Producing Hot Glass Artist. (Visit the Web site; my name, below, links to it.)

On a friend's streaming+discs NetFlix account (he enjoys both ways), I have discovered such under-rated masterpieces as the Australian indie film, "Ten Canoes", which is not to be missed by anyone with even a flickerin' spark of respect for the human spirit. Then there was that up-front and personal documentary from Cambodia (forgot the title durnit), featuring the former top-dog Khmer Rouge man who once operated Pol Pot's primary "confess-first-and-then-you-can-die" torture prison. (That man was recently put on trial in Phnom Penh for his life, on war crimes and crimes against humanity charges, last I read in the back-channels.)

Then there is "Interstate 60" - a fine "Off-the-Mainstream" flick I'd show again and again to all manner of life-confused friends of every stripe. Too many others to list; point is made anyway.

But do we want Netflix streaming-only accounts? Please, YES*! Peg it at, say, the same rate as the lowball one-DVD-per-month offering and see how many subscribers just send the money, consume the bandwidth, and never even bother to avail themselves of the Netflix Corporate Bulk Mail Permit at all! :)

*Just kindly DO make it Linux compatible (which will require NetFlix Corp to merely first commission and then release a freely downloadable DRM widget/extension for Linux FireFox) and baby, I'm THERE paying a year in *advance* - just like my Skype "not-a-telephone" VOIP account, which costs me the same amount as I'd expect to be paying for access to the movies.

Boys, do this and I give you my personal Sideline Guarantee that you shall indeed significantly improve the bottom line. Or I'll end up eating my Funny Hat in public over the point. (The hat ain't pizen nor septic, OK, only extremely, ah, /chewy/.)

Go ahead, Netflix exex. Sixty-dollar Revenue Chunks - canya' *handle* the Bandwidth Demand on that basis? I think you can. (You know you want to.)

Operate it all by the John 8:32 Protocols and she'll fly just fine.

[Round and Brown]

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