Netflix Apocalypse

I guess I've been pretty bad about keeping up with this blog - it's partly because I got an iPad. I use it for recreational websurfing instead of my laptop, but it isn't much good for blogging, so I just tend to not get around to it. It's only going to get worse. More about that later.

What do you think about the Netflix-alpyse - their new fare structure that decouples DVDs from streaming? Streaming is no longer going to be "free" - included in the price of the DVD rentals. You can get either DVDs or streaming, or both, but it will cost you.

We are mainly into Netflix for the DVDs. I've explained my problems with streaming before, but there's something more than that. Basically, we want a particular movie watching experience - a special time set aside for a specific movie, planned in advance, etc. We have the 3-disc plan, and I tend to try to get a well balanced set of movies,  something exciting, something silly,something classic - for Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights.

The Netflix streaming experience is more like TV, flip through the channels, see if there's something you want to watch.

So, maybe we'll just drop streaming? Well, we could, but we do use streaming - to wach TV. Recently, we've been addicted to Have Gun Will Travel. And, because HGWT can get pretty grim at times, we use The Addams Family as a chaser. This is an experience that's hard to match with discs - we'd need to subscribe on the 15 discs-at-a-time plan.

So, we're dropping the disc part of the subscription. Partly to protest Netflix's price plan, but mainly because - I'm on an extended business trip to Tokyo. I won't be back until early Oct, and Mrs. Spenser doesn't watch movies when I'm not around. We'll sign up again when I get back, probably 3-at-a-time, with streaming.

But don't tell Netflix, it would ruin the protest.

One benefit of this: It will zero out my queue, which is full of movies that I don't really want to watch. And I can lovingly build it up from nothing!