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Netflix Ships Its Last DVD (netflix.com) 44

It's official: Netflix has shipped its last DVD. "For 25 years, we redefined how people watched films and series at home, and shared the excitement as they opened their mailboxes to our iconic red envelopes," says Netflix in a blog post. "It's the end of an era, but the DVD business built our foundation for the years to come -- giving members unprecedented choice and control, a wide variety of titles to choose from and the freedom to watch as much as they want."

Netflix announced the shut down of its DVD business in April. Here's an infographic the company shared in its post:
Netflix DVD Rental Service Stats
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Netflix Ships Its Last DVD

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  • by Anonymous Coward

    Seriously? People are going to wait for something to arrive in the mail when they can just drive over to Blockbuster?

    Boy were we ever wrong. It still baffles me how this happened, but it did.

  • by Jerry Rivers ( 881171 ) on Friday September 29, 2023 @05:48PM (#63888147)

    ...Blockbuster announcement!

  • "Progress" (Score:5, Insightful)

    by markdavis ( 642305 ) on Friday September 29, 2023 @05:56PM (#63888165)

    Yep.

    So now if you want to rent something- good luck. Probably 3/4 of what Netflix Disc had is not available on ANY streaming platform. And what is available, if you can find it, will be scattered among many different streaming platforms, each with their own pricing and terms and logins and interface and quality and frustrating search. And instead of always seeing a pristine HD picture (assuming Blu-ray, which I was), you might have some pixelated crap, often without even 5.1 surround sound. And none of the extras that are on the disc will be viewable. Or you start working on a series and "poof" it is now no longer carried, right in the middle.

    And sometimes it doesn't matter how good your Internet is- I have excellent Internet and, for example, my watching was interrupted dozens and dozens of times by server issues, or reduced to 240P res or whatnot with my recent 30 day experience on Prime Video (it was free, not gonna pay for that). Verified it wasn't me. And no, it wasn't using WiFi, either- Roku Ultra with Gb feed.

    Library will have 1/1000th of the selection.
    RedBox will have 1/100th and a lot of hassle.

    Such progress. :(

    • own nothing, and not be happy apparently.
      similar boat though, we moved pretty far out into the boonies back in 2019, and the only "ISP" available (at the time) was viasat. which made streaming anything over prime/netflix impossible -- either due to bandwidth caps, or absolute shit latency. So we made frequent use of redbox kiosks. But it was a pain having to drive the 20 miles or so to rent/return, and then the dogshit selection on anything but new releases (there's only so much girlboss marvel schlock i'

      • and the netflix originals being a carefully curated diversity ratio on every. fucking. series.

        I like sci-fi. Give me a good diversity ratio of bipedal mammal-looking creatures, intelligent rocks, artificial life forms, sentient lizard creatures, amorphous blobs, and whatever other intelligence you can think of and I'll be happy.

        • by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

          I like sci-fi. Give me a good diversity ratio of bipedal mammal-looking creatures, intelligent rocks, artificial life forms, sentient lizard creatures, amorphous blobs, and whatever other intelligence you can think of and I'll be happy.

          That's actually why sci-fi exists, actually. Sci-fi is not just about science, it's about the human condition.

          Unfortunately, if you try to write about the human condition, even back in the 19th century you get people who are so offended by wokeness they'd cancel you.

          So creati

          • John: "On Earth - psychiatrists don't come in blue." Zhaan: "Do you have a problem with people of color?" John: "I have a contextual problem. You're an alien." Zhaan: "Yes, that's true. But I do have a green card."
          • by skam240 ( 789197 )

            That's actually why sci-fi exists, actually. Sci-fi is not just about science, it's about the human condition.

            It was about the human condition for some authors but that is absolutely not "why sci fi exists". Social critiquing material is a subset of Sci-fi, there has been plenty of Sci-fi written going all the way back to its early days that was pure escapism.

    • Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)

      by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Friday September 29, 2023 @06:11PM (#63888193)
      Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • Well... what did you expect? Subscription services laced in DRM - who could have ever predicted that these would be detrimental to the customer experience?

      Oh wait, thousands of people did. Loudly. Including me.

      And it's paid off - while everyone on the Netflix-bus is whining about password-sharing being blocked, multiple expensive accounts due to limited selection on each streaming service, geoblocking and all that other crap, we are in a golden age for personal streaming - Plex, Jellyfin etc. work amazingly

    • Well put markdavis.
  • This makes me a little sad - and nostalgic as well. Which seems silly for a company firmly in the dot-com era.

  • From Wikipedia:

    The Blind Side is a 2009 American sports drama film written and directed by John Lee Hancock. Based on the 2006 book of the same name by Michael Lewis, the film tells the story of Michael Oher, a football offensive lineman who overcame an impoverished upbringing to play in the National Football League (NFL) with the help of Leigh Anne and Sean Tuohy. It stars Sandra Bullock as Leigh Anne, Tim McGraw as Sean, and Quinton Aaron as Oher.

    • Which is weird because that is a movie I never hear anybody talk about, whether in real life or even online.

      • by redback ( 15527 )

        I think its just that it was a new movie at the peak of the service.

      • The subject just came up again actually. It turns out most of the movie was a lie and the situation is pretty fucked up. https://apnews.com/article/mic... [apnews.com]

      • by drhamad ( 868567 )
        I mean, no one can account for your knowledge of pop culture. Not only was it a blockbuster movie and one of the top sports movies of all time, but it's been in the news constantly because of the lawsuits going on re: the Michael Oher situation.
        • Yeah, I know, that's what makes it weird . The fact that it's those things and yet people are more interested in the real life drama rather than the film itself furthers my point.

        • by skam240 ( 789197 )

          I know I certainly had no clue this movie existed and I only made the connection to this modern drama because of the post above that gave the Wikipedia summary of it. When I was reading about said modern drama in the news I had no idea the movie was so widely viewed, it sounded like a B movie that lucked out and got some A list stars just looking to snap up a paycheck.

          Then again I've never had any interest in the whole "white savior" thing and I'm not as into sports ball as a lot of folks so I probably just

          • Then again I've never had any interest in the whole "white savior" thing and I'm not as into sports ball as a lot of folks so I probably just ignored the movie when it came out as those seem to be its two defining points.

            Its third defining point was Sandra Bullock somehow managed to get a best actress Oscar for it.

  • The Blind Side? Seriously? That makes no sense to me at all.

  • What are they going to do with all that polycarbonate waste? I think there might be a warehouse fire in the near future...

  • Mail service was big from 1998 - 2009 or so. I'm sure the envelopes will be collector's items and the "last one" will be worth $$$.
    • by davidwr ( 791652 )

      I still have some AOL floppies, with envelopes. I'm still waiting for them to become "collectables." I'm not holding my breath.

  • I have used Netflix DVD since the mid 2000's, and I loved being able to queue up months of movies (which my wife and I would watch once a week). Every week would be a surprise which movie we would get, and that was fun. As others have said, the selection on DVD was tremendous compared to any streaming service at this time. I even appreciated the emails they would send out of movie recommendations, that appeared to be written up by real flesh-and-blood people, that would give you lists of movies to watch,

  • Not bad. I never rented physical media from them, so I have no attachment to it... but something about the fact that a pretty decent film was the last one out the door makes me happy. If it had been a superhero movie, I would have somehow been saddened.

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