Netflix Raises Monthly Subscription Prices in US, Canada (reuters.com) 36
Netflix has raised its monthly subscription price by $1 to $2 per month in the United States depending on the plan, the company said on Friday, to help pay for new programming to compete in the crowded streaming TV market. From a report: The standard plan, which allows for two simultaneous streams, now costs $15.49 per month, up from $13.99, in the United States. Prices also went up in Canada, where the standard plan climbed to C$16.49 from C$14.99. The price increases, the first in those markets since October 2020, took effect immediately for new customers. Existing members will see the new prices in the coming weeks when they receive their monthly bills.
And so it continues... (Score:4, Insightful)
The Western markets get milked whilst India gets subsidised.
Started in the UK when they jacked up the prices over 10% a year for 2 years running whilst giving no new content other than the Bollywood shite it was buying.
Now I guess North America is getting the same treatment. It's a joke, expand into new markets sure, don't jack up prices in existing markets, give people nothing for the price increase (in fact, even way less good content than they used to get), then use it to try and appease difference markets and expect not to lose market share.
This is why Disney+ and Amazon Instant Video are much better offerings in the UK now, I imagine the same will become true in North America, increasing price and decreasing content isn't a winning philosophy.
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North American subscriber fees are funding Korean programming. Or at least that's all I've seen new lately. Don't get me wrong, there's actually a lot of good content if you don't mind subtitles.
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The Western markets get milked whilst India gets subsidised.
Started in the UK when they jacked up the prices over 10% a year for 2 years running whilst giving no new content other than the Bollywood shite it was buying.
Who said they have to give new programming in return?
You don't like it? You're free to cancel your subscription at any time.
It worked! (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:It worked! (Score:4, Insightful)
While I agree with your intended sentiment - at least now we can control costs somewhat by binge-subscribing. For example I can subscribe to Paramount Plus for a month or two, watch everything I care about, and then drop the subscription again.
Re:It worked! (Score:4, Interesting)
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That's pretty much a given with the rotating subscription model. If there is stuff you have to see when it comes out, you have to subscribe to that service. If you're patient, you can stick with one service at a time and rotate between them. Overall, I suspect the number of people prepared to do that is relatively small, as it doesn't scale well to families, and there is social pressure to watch things as they come out (to avoid spoilers online if nothing else).
On the other hand, I think that model works
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Except when they start releasing content weekly instead of as a complete season. I guess you could wait until the entire season is released before subscribing.
You are going to come back to the same service in 6 months anyway. Skip anything that's in the process of being released.
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Re: It worked! (Score:2)
There is a big difference... no ads.
I
I can see why Netflix is raising prices (Score:4, Funny)
After all, quality programming like that Cowboy Bebop live action show doesn't come cheap!
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Re: I can see why Netflix is raising prices (Score:2)
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Cowboy Bebop was surprisingly good! I admit after checking out their other conversions I had an extremely low bar. The 1st episode was intentionally super close to the cartoon episode... frankly, I wonder why bother doing that? just because a number of people are bigoted against animation?
As they change things going forward with it they most likely will go backwards. It was OK in the rest the season and fairly close without totally messing it up like all the other conversions.
Maybe with a normal expectat
How dare they? (Score:4, Insightful)
Yep. I'm totally canceling my Netflix subscription. 2 minutes or less of my salary? The nerve.
Streaming services are an unbelievably great dollar-per-hour deal on entertainment. Even with a $2 increase.
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Torrent sites and a good seedbox are cheaper.
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The content is infringing in such a case, however. And knowingly copying infringing content is also infringement.
Shoplifting is cheaper than paying for stuff too. Doesn't mean it's something you recommend as a money saver.
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The fault in that line of reasoning is that it assumes that what the person who infringes on copyright perceives as their gain was somehow ever supposed to be what the copyright holder supposedly lost. The infringer gains a copy, but the copyright holder still has their copy, so where's the theft, right?
Except what the copyright holder actually loses when copyright infringement occurs is generally of no value to the infringer (if it were, ironically, they wouldn't want to infringe in the first place).
Overhead (Score:2)
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I've literally never seen a single thing he's been in, but apparently I'm paying for it. Thanks for the information.
I don't enjoy much of their original content (Score:3)
I wish they'd split it off into being the lure for a premium package. Give me films and TV shows, that they can get at a reasonable price, for a lower price. There's lots of legal alternatives out there, albeit with commercials. Heck, my Samsung devices now offer "Samsung TV" for free, and Sony's Crackle, and the Pluto channel, also offer a lot of content. I have Amazon Prime for the free shipping, Subscribe and Save discounts, and 5% off because I use their card, but it also comes with Prime Video, which offers some decent stuff.
With the economy being so challenging, and inflation high while incomes don't rise to match, Netflix picked a time to jack up prices that will earn some well deserved resentment, and which will be remembered. They could become a virtual cord to be cut.
My brother and sister-in-law enjoy the access to my premium HD account, so I guess I won't cancel. But if it was just me ...
P.S. Quality versus quantity, and maybe Netflix has a problem with some of its executives enjoying playing at being film and TV executives, so they're churning out content just to satisfy this new found addiction of theirs.
Crowd pleasers aren't that hard to anticipate, stick to those, and avoid gambling with their customer's money, since we're footing the bill for their failed attempts to expand their appeal.
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Netflix really seems like it needs to pare down it's original offerings, I gotta agree there. It's seemingly obvious its a consequence of the old school studios finally utilizing their back catalogs to launch services, especially over the last few years alone with HBO, Disney and Paramount all launching. Netflix feels like it's trying to replicate the catalog those companies took decades to make and speedrun it. There are some excellent Netflix shows but their hit ratio seems pretty low, especially with
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You know it's bad when you hear about it on /. (Score:2)
before the company even says anything themselves. I got billed $13.99 exactly a week ago and they haven't said shit. I remember when it was like $9/mo. I'd cancel if the wife didn't like all the stand up specials, especially since F is for Family isn't doing anymore runs.
Yup, solid logic AF (Score:1)
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"Because of crowded competition we'll give subscribers one more reason to drop NF" - makes perfect sense since they most likely won't have any fresh D+ movies.
No kidding. This article made me realize how little I watch Netflix now that I have so many other choices.
Cut the Connection to Flix (Score:1)
It adds up (Score:2)
We used to complain about cable, and their forced bundled offerings. But streaming services are now as expensive, too.
"Want to watch college football? You need to buy our HD package + local channels + sports comprehensive, which includes everything from tennis to curling".
Now we have come back full circle.
Netflix = $15.50
Disney+ = $7
HBO = $15
Peacock, Hulu, Paramount+, ESPN+, Starz, and others have various content scattered among them. There is no longer a single service that can have most of our needs.
And g
We need to make more woke movies! (Score:2)
Netflix has determined that in order to make more woke movies with big Hollywood expensive woke stars, it will need more money from suffering subscribers.
In Soviet Hollywood, garbage is more expensive than nutritious food.