deleterious duel of the dignitaries
Will we ever domesticate squirrels?
. . .
I've recently started testing out NetFlix. I love their website interface and the recommendations - a true social networking site in action. I can see what my friends have watched, what they're going to see, what they've rated, etc. etc. Their three week trial wasn't really long enough to get more than six movies (three at a time), but I thought it was a pretty good deal, so I decided to try it for one more month.
Apparently I'm now the victim of Netflix throttling - where Netflix intentionally delays the delivery of my DVDs because I'm watching too many DVDs. For those of you not in the know, Netflix charges a flat rate per month and pays for postage of your DVDs both ways - there and back. This means every DVD you watch costs Netflix $0.78 just on postage alone; watching lots of movies means Netflix loses money.
I told Yush about this, who had been suspecting this activity for some time now. He said he was thinking of switching to Blockbuster, but guess what? Blockbuster is throttling DVDs now, too.
Just today I noticed that the DVDs I sent are taking some time to get to me as well; when i was doing the free trial and the first two weeks of my paid trial, service was fantastic. It was fast. It was easy. But this past week, DVDs are slow to come.
This is the sad reality of the price wars between Netflix and Blockbuster's online rental service. Lower price, lower quality of service :(
I'll be cancelling my Netflix account after this month. Nuts.
One has to wonder what these companies will do to combat this. I'm not sure about the economics of this, but if companies are looking to shave pennies off of each DVD sent in, why don't they force the customer to affix the postage on the return? That shaves 50% off the delivery costs for Netflix, while it forces the customer to invest at least something on each DVD - I've already gotten a few DVDs from Netflix I didn't feel like watching so I just returned them. If I was forced to affix a $0.34 postage, I may keep it for a few extra days so I might watch it, which is pretty much Netflix wants to do. The general problem with the "all you can eat buffet" is that there's no incentive for people to stop eating.
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nomo_crispdawg
roy
Your quote still rings true, sir.
haiphong
middle_aged (guest)
boogiesan
pinklemonade
i volunteer at a wildlife rescue center, and lots of the animals get attached to human beings - racoons, oppossums, foxes etc. but squirrels dont get attached at all. they stay just as wild as ever no matter how much you handle them or coddle them.
just FYI =)
roy
PM5K (guest)
If you keep them longer than X ammount of days they charge you something like twenty-four dollars, it's either ten or fourteen days.
If you pay 18.00 a month with NetFlix you could get eighteen movies this way, which is a little more than one every two days. If you keep them more than one day then the math changes, but I personally like the service as I don't need to keep my movies for very long anyhow ;-) ;-) ;-)
roy
What have you been up to lately, anyways? You seem to dissappear then reappear.
PM5K (guest)
;-)