I can understand the outrage over content, wokeness, the direction, etc. But being angry over having to pay for services rendered? Come on. Don't use Netflix (or the alternatives) as a comfy Piratebay. Get it together, we're not children.
Or the value proposition under the new conditions for many users is simply not there?
Paying $X per month and allowing family and friends to watch is both convenient and cheap enough so it doesn't bother you. It's like paying for electricity in a family house.
But when you are forced to be the only user of your paid account you evaluate if the cost for using a service 5-10 hours a month is truly justified.
Degrading people as "children" is not an interesting analysis. It's obvious that Netflix made their bed by flirting with users that like account sharing (long ago). It will not be easy to take that away now.
I understand this and will grant you that. But I'd bet a fair chunk of cash on this password sharing being something other than spouses sharing or running a de facto family account.
I mean: fine, Netflix sux, etc, tt's not worth $X. All fine.
But what's happening here is not that and you all know it. It's easy and cheap to just share passwords. When you do that, you're saying that I should pick up the bill for you. And my answer to you is: tf I'm not! You pay for you, I pay for me.
Fair, both sides should act in their best interest.
What I think is happening is that people realized they aren't getting much value from Netflix and this also served as a wake-up call for them to cancel. If you look at other comments you'll see several stating exactly that: they no longer think Netflix is worth paying for even if they have no trouble at all paying for it only for their own usage (and I'd think 99% of the users of HN can afford it easily).
It's also very possible this will end positively for Netflix i.e. they might want to get rid of the "leeches" and end up only with the paying users that obey their rules. If there are enough such people out there to cover their expenses AND turn a decent profit AND if they are loyal then Netflix will find themselves in a businessman's dream scenario.
In the end time will tell, as it happens with everything. I am mostly just offering you explanations for the current reactions to the news.
Many people already pay for the service. They pay for a multi user account, the problem is that they are cutting off people that are not living under the same roof.
Then they require you to pay an additional $8 for each extra member, it that would be the premium cost (approx $19 where I live) and an additional ~$16 if you add two users. That's $35 a month for a service that is filled with woke bs content, 10% of what you get in the US due to geofencing. This is the way it usually goes for me and my gf:
1. We finally find a movie we want to watch, after a lot of time researching
2. We search for the movie name and where we can stream it for money
3. Oh it says its available on Netflix, HBO and some other renting stores.
4. Oh they were all not available to us. Sometimes we can "purchase" the movie for like $20+ but since that is just a ridicolous amount to watch a movie once we usually don't watch anything at all or pirate it for free.
I have a really hard time seeing a bright future for Netflix in the EU if they continue down this path. Honestly that is probably a good thing though, since european alternatives can take that market share.
The problem is that for europeans that want to pay for contnent it's STILL hard. I still have to download stuff from pirate sites since most content is not available to us for reasons unknown.
What do you suggest that I would do when I want to watch a movie that is not available anywhere? I am here ready with my wallet but no one seems interested.
At least in Germany I can find a streaming source via justwatch.com for most movies that I want to watch. Often they are included in one of the flatrate offerings, but the vast majority of classics are available to rent from Amazon and Apple for ~4 euros.
So of the two alternatives: pay $X for a full subscription or pay $X * 0.2 for a shared one, you are choosing to pay $0 because it is annoying to pay money compared to not paying money?
If it's not good enough to warrant either $X or $X * 0.2, then cancel it. I.e.: Netflix sucks, cancel it!
Y'all are defending not paying while still using said service with arguments that don't support your case.
I stopped pirating stuff a good 15 years ago and Spotify and Netflix are both part of the why. Now, they both kinda suck and I might actually cancel Netflix. But you won't find me on Piratebay for that reason. It's just going to suck for a while.
> Y'all are defending not paying while still using said service with arguments that don't support your case.
I am barely using Netflix though. But yes it happens that sometimes I'll watch something on Netflix, perhaps once or twice a month. Will that warrant a $20 monthly subscription? The answer to that is hell no. They offer a bad service and require us to pay a lot for it so it's simply not worth the money.
I don't pirate that much either anymore tbh. I most often than not just do something else instead. Sometimes I'll pirate it if we really want to watch a movie and it's not available though.
I can't be arsed with the piracy bullshit any more.
The reason that I've not canceled Netflix even though only using it pretty rarely, is that it's still very cheap and I have the "biggest" option. 179 SEK a month in Sweden which is about $17. This is about a third more than _one_ lunch in the city will set you back. Are we really crying over this amount?
I agree with this sentiment but this isn't Netflix' fault (nor is it any of the other service providers'.)
But then this still comes down to a sense of entitlement: I should be able to have access to anything and even though this has value to me, I shouldn't have to pay too much for it.
I do feel this myself as well, however. Definitely not above that. But let's be real here, still.
I feel the same. Netflix (and other streaming sites) provide insane value for a measly subscription price. In comparison, I think books, DVDs, CDs are way overpriced. Youtube Premium is the other thing. They make their own advertisements go away for $5/mo in Hungary, which is half of a cheap meal at a restaurant, and people act like it's pulling teeth.
I know, right? It's so stupid. Similar situation to paying for games. My friend group still games - and we have been growing up in an era with no internet, and rampant piracy. We could barely afford the cheapest hardware, and we have never paid for software. Nowadays though? Every one of has a good job, and gaming comes out way cheaper than any of our hobbies. Some still act like it's the end of the world dropping $20 on a game the group will play.
Fascinating to get downvoted for saying: pay for things you use. I hope you're proud of yourselves.
My salary comes from people that buy product from my employer. What you're saying is that I should work for free for you guys. (No, I do not work at either of the streaming services.)
The problem isn't paying for Netflix, it is that their earlier "love is sharing a password", "sharing is caring" etc. campaign made it seem like password sharing is sanctioned and therefore included in the price. I understand that people are upset now that Netflix have changed their stance without changing the price.
Also I think the downvotes are because of your tone, e.g.
> you're saying is that I should work for free for you guys
I live alone. If I want to share the second screen that Netflix forces me to buy with my brother, why should it matter if he lives with me or not?
And don't mention TOS, they can write whatever they want in there. I wouldn't care if they didn't permit me to watch it in bed either, I watch where I please.