Poor Netflix

Netflix released their first earnings report since their disastrous plan to raise prices and essentially  lower service to predictable results, down nearly a million customers and the value of their stock down billions since the start of summer. The silly thing is that this was all self-inflicted. Netflix management acted like yet another pompous company (or CEO) who underestimated the intelligence of their customers and are paying for it. What's more interesting is many seem to be taking the company's actions seemingly personally (and I guess that could include me since I'm writing about it).

While people would have been upset with any price increase, a reasonable explanation (i.e. we are separating DVD and streaming to save on licensing fees, we are increasing prices due to rising costs in obtaining streaming rights, etc) would have at least been seen as somewhat logical. Instead, not only did the company raise prices, they told customers they were doing them a favor by charging the same price for streaming and DVD instead of making one service a bit cheaper as an add on to the other (ex: DVD or streaming for $11 and for just $5 more get the other service, in lieu of $8 for and $8 for streaming), forgetting people like a bargain. Worse, in doing so, they made it very easy for customers to not only cancel one version of the service, they also made it easier for them to look at competitors. Thanks to their moves the person who used to let the DVD sit on their TV for weeks while they watched streaming, is not very aware they don't watch enough movies a month on DVD to make it more economical then getting the latest movie from the Redbox stand at the supermarket (and to see what Amazon, Hulu or Apple have to compete with Netflix). 

If I, a normal consumer can see these issues, then one has to wonder what else I and their senior management have missed. And I'm sure not going to invest in a company where I perceive senior management to be less adapt than I in running their company.

In the meantime, we're having a great time streaming older TV shows from Netflix such as the Star Treks, Dr. Who, Family Guy and many other older TV shows no longer in reruns or we missed when they were first on.  Netflix is just an interchangeable service provider. When they die, we'll all just move onto the next provider (which I imagine will be the cable companies/internet providers at the end).