Death of the DVD

Did everyone hear the news? Netflix is officially getting out of the DVD delivery business as of Sept this year. It seems like only yesterday when they announced that they were spinning the DVD service off into a company called "Qwikster" (snicker), then backpedalled. But the writing was on the wall.

The value proposition for Netflix DVDs used to be: pretty much everything released that isn't too new is available for one subscription price, but you can only get a certain number at once and you have to wait ~1 week to get them replaced. But discovery is relatively easy, and it isn't hard to manage your queue. Streaming has a different approach: You can watch as many of a small number of movies/TV shows as you want for a subscription price. If you want to watch something we don't have, you have to subscribe to a different service. So you wind up either watching whatever they put in front of you, or juggling multiple subscriptions. 

Which reminds me, I'm subscribed to Netflix streaming for the Great British Baking Show, but have run out of episodes. OK, I just cancelled.

Also, discovery on streaming sucks - they really just want you to watch the first thing that looks barely watchable. Netflix in particular wants to make their own movies and shows and wants you to watch them. Some have been good, some bad, some in between. But that's not why I watch movies.

I'll skip the rant about streaming quality, given our connectivity issues. Honestly, I have trouble with scratched/broken DVDs too. I had to send back The Trouble with Angels just last week.

So what happens after Sept? Maybe I'll try some of the better quality streaming services - Criterion, TCM, what else? I can always go to the public library, although their selection is pretty small compared to old Netflix. I might even break down and start buying digital movies online from Apple or Amazon. I've resisted this because subscription seems more economical, but who knows? 

And this blog? It was supposed to be about my Netflix DVD queue (and some cocktails), but that won't fly. I could just make it into a random film blog - and I probably will. I could switch over to Letterboxd.com, but I prefer to own my own content. Maybe I'll just shut it down, or go over to a recipes blog or something. We'll see.

In conclusion, shout out to JustWatch.com, which compiles streaming availability for all the movies you cam imagine. I have a feeling I'll be leaning on that a lot.