[Waterluvian]

Tangent: As much as it feels like we just have “bundles” like the bad old cable days, I really enjoy getting to change streaming providers every 2-3 months. My wife and I just Hoover up whatever we’re interested in then move on. And in a year we’ve got that service back and we Hoover up the last year’s added content that looks good.

Lots of ways to measure it but when I think about how much I pay and what my experience is like, I’m doing far better than in the cable days. I’m much happier.

[eek2121]

I gave up on that nonsense.I have a raspberry pi that rapidly pulls down new torrents for stuff and processes and/or copies it to my media center for free....which is another raspberry pi.

I've no problem paying for content (I am "upper class"), but companies, especially Netflix clearly haven't figured things out.

For Netflix, I am mostly referring to the account sharing stuff. I did not share my account with anyone, but false advertising rubbed me the wrong way, so they went from whatever their current top tier pricing is to zero from me. Other huge gripes include streaming quality and number of streams.

[RockRobotRock]

I can also afford streaming services but choose instead to steal it. You don't need to justify it with such weak excuses.

[mcpackieh]

"steal"

[gsatic]

The 'upper class' dont have enough eye balls to keep the content industry afloat.

[Barrin92]

>My wife and I just Hoover up whatever we’re interested in then move on.

Probably saner than my chaotic good approach of having gone back to torrenting but donating a subscription worth of money to the Against Malaria foundation to ease my conscience now that I'm not a broke student any more. I can't be bothered with the obnoxious subscriptions and autplay UIs

[henry2023]

This is the way to go

[passwordoops]

It's the go-to strategy for us as well, but I'll bet you dollars to donuts this is the next target for some sort of crackdown

[paxys]

They will simply make monthly plans absurdly expensive unless you commit to a 1-year contract. The more things change, the more they stay the same.

[lotsofpulp]

Having a middleman cut out and being able to watch on whatever device you want, whenever you want, is not things staying the same.

My experience of being able to search the TV app on iOS or tvOS or macOS and then being given the option to play, buy, or rent the media is pretty seamless. And subscriptions are simple to cancel, so starting them is not a concern.

Complete opposite of dealing with cable/satellite TV contracts and advertising breaks when watching stuff.

[passwordoops]

You miss the point. First, no middle man had been eliminated anywhere, the platforms have simply replaced them with better offers for the consumer right now. Secondly, Doctorow's law of enshittification more or less dictates that once users and content creators are locked in, the tech company will start to deliver poorer quality service and squeeze as much revenue as possible out of you.

So currently, sure I can move around and it is better than the cable companies, but the trajectory of where the platforms are headed is not a good one and trending towards behavior more aligned with what the cable companies do.

https://www.wired.com/story/tiktok-platforms-cory-doctorow/

[gbear605]

Ironically a one year contract isn’t even an option for Netflix right now (in the US, can’t speak for other countries). Honestly not sure why, since it seems like it’d be more profitable for them, even with a slight discount.

[Waterluvian]

You’ll have to call Netflix to cancel and they’ll just pass you around the call Center until they hang up by accident.

[JimtheCoder]

It's 2023. My ChatGPT based AI agent will continue calling and deliver persuasive Haiku poems requesting a discount on my package. It will persist until it achieves it's desired goal...

[hotpotamus]

I assume the Netflix AI team will develop an agent that convinces your AI to agree to a more expensive plan. They are known for their technical excellence afterall.

[ipaddr]

They just laid off their technical excellence would you settle for the overworked, fearful group that remains?

[ant6n]

More like, if you cancel, your account gets deleted for good, so you lose your profile with users, history, recommendations. You can pay x/month to pause your membership.

[koolba]

Come on, we all know deleting your data would be a premium-only feature.

[XorNot]

Netflix recommendations are useless, so this sounds like a win to me. Random is more interesting then "let us fail at understanding you based on limited demographics".

[ncallaway]

I’d seriously consider paying them a fee for that! I certainly hope they go in that direction.

[ClassyJacket]

Netflix already deletes your account after 10 months, probably for this specific purpose.

[jonhohle]

Is that a new policy? I’ve had Netflix off and on since 2008 (for DVD rentals) and still have info from them. I’m pretty sure we’ve been gone for longer than 10-month windows.

[dharmab]

FTC is enforcing against companies that do this. https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2021/10/...

[andsoitis]

> You’ll have to call Netflix to cancel and they’ll just pass you around the call Center until they hang up by accident.

Nonsense. Cancelling is easy: https://help.netflix.com/en/node/407

[fomine3]

$20 for a month, $120 for 12 months

[vxNsr]

So either pay $240 for 10 different “channels” or pay $120 for one…

[bmicraft]

More like 3, with (hbo) max and disney+. What would the others be?

[geodel]

Agree. I think they would've numbers by now how many are doing like that. Like if its 0.01% maybe not worth the effort now. Once its reach 0.1%, its time to empower customers by providing weekly/monthly/quarterly plans at different pricing points.

[jimcsharp]

Rotating content.

[tzs]

That's a pretty good approach, but there is one drawback that may be significant for some.

You see a movie or show and then want to talk about it with your friends and find that they've all either won't be back on the right streaming service for a new months or they've seen it months ago and aren't that interested in talking about it any more.

[whartung]

That’s just a reality. I tend to not binge shows. Rather I try to slot them into one of my weekly slots.

Since I limit my weekly intake, I also start shows late. A typical conversation for even a new show is as along the lines of “Oh yeah, we binged the entire thing!”

I’ve learned it’s not worth talking about the show to someone who’s seen it since they’re more often than not bursting wanting to talk about something I haven’t seen. Or 2 months later when I’m done, they’ve forgotten a bunch of it anyway, moving on to other stuff I haven’t seen.

It’s not like the old days when there were forums for shows like “Lost” just abuzz with speculation.

[I_AM_A_SMURF]

As much as I hated having to wait for a show to come on TV I do miss the mass event that was watching Game of Thrones when it airs. Especially the last season with watch parties and stuff.

[Larrikin]

I like HBOs new method for releasing their less major hits. They release 2 to 3 episodes a week, which usually is about the amount of episodes I want to watch in one sitting, especially hour long shows. There's less pressure to get through a full season and it still gets the full season out pretty quickly.

I've seen some other services copy this strategy a little bit, releasing 2 to 3 episodes at the start of the season, but then sadly dragging out the season after with single weekly episodes until the end of the season

[atorodius]

Comment sponsored by Big Stream ;)

In seriousness, I think this is actually a neat strategy.