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Netflix’s Prices Are Rising Faster Than Cable

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Re: Netflix’s Prices Are Rising Faster Than Cable

#391

Post by bradknowles »

sedatk wrote: post #381
pnathan wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

After having sampled Disney+, HBOMax, Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Prime a fair bit in the past year, my take is that Netflix has the UX nailed. I can, for instance, "thumbs down" a recommendation. Some offerings I never want to see. Their catalog tends to the darker themes, and I'm not fond of that. Hulu and Amazon Prime are mostly irrelevant to me. I'll probably axe the Hulu sub. HBO has a few things I like. Disney+ t…

UX is a night and day difference between Netflix and its competitors. It's mind-boggling that the giants like Disney and HBO can't even get close. It's especially more noticeable on slow devices like Smart TV's.

With respect, I hate, loathe, and despise the auto-play part of the Netflix UI. I hate that more than anything else I could possibly love about Netflix. Far too fucking distracting while you’re trying to focus on something else that you might actually want to watch.

And yes, I’ve gone into the settings to turn that feature off, and it doesn’t entirely work. It does reduce the auto-play somewhat, but not entirely.

I’ll fucking delete my Netflix account and the Netflix app from our AppleTV device, if that shit gets any worse.

Re: Netflix’s Prices Are Rising Faster Than Cable

#392

Post by vorpalhex »

Nextgrid wrote: post #274
inanutshellus wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Youtube is pretty magical. It has everything, even in the "kid zone". Which also means I can't leave them unsupervised for 30 minutes and come back. If I do, my kids will've gone from educational video about the rain forest to sponsored video to toy videos to slime to fart jokes to music videos of bikini-clad bimbos to steamy romance videos to ... Anyway it's just too much work to curate youtube for a child, IMO. For…

I see so many of these complaints about YT having lots of good family-friendly content but at the same time being terrible at curation even in the kids mode. Seems like the problem can be solved with a crowdsourced list of family-friendly videos (on GitHub?) managed by trusted collaborators and then a simple page that embeds only these videos? Over time I assume it should work given enough people contributing. It's n…

Youtube tries to "hook" you. Between autoplay and recommended thumbnails (that can't be disabled) it's easy to get "hijacked".

The worst part is that recommendations aren't in line with the content level of what you are viewing.

Re: Netflix’s Prices Are Rising Faster Than Cable

#393

Post by bradknowles »

boringg wrote: post #385
pnathan wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

After having sampled Disney+, HBOMax, Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Prime a fair bit in the past year, my take is that Netflix has the UX nailed. I can, for instance, "thumbs down" a recommendation. Some offerings I never want to see. Their catalog tends to the darker themes, and I'm not fond of that. Hulu and Amazon Prime are mostly irrelevant to me. I'll probably axe the Hulu sub. HBO has a few things I like. Disney+ t…

I offed my Hulu sub a long time ago. Prime is free with my account so I'm largely indifferent (their UX is pretty painful). Too bad Netflix doesn't have a sports deal for live content.

Whereas I hate, loathe, and despise pretty much all sports.

I’d be really happy if I could delete all sports from all video sources I have available to me, or at least just hide them so that I don’t have to look at any of that crap.

Re: Netflix’s Prices Are Rising Faster Than Cable

#394

Post by at_a_remove »

I wonder how long it will be until they reconsider their "disc by mail" approach.

Bear with me a bit: one of the largest complaints I hear from people is the fragmentation, that is, if you have a particular section of content, you need a particular subscription. Many people are fine with "whatever is on these N services I have" but others are not. They want a particular film or show.

Blockbuster is gone, but for one store in Oregon. Redbox has managed to skim off the top of any rentals. Family Video has apparently pivoted to selling discs at some very reasonable-looking prices. This leaves Netflix as the sole group that could work on distributing the "long tail" of movies that are not in the cream skimmed off by Redbox.

I have never used it myself, but I have heard secondhand that Netflix has been neglecting this segment, letting the waiting lists for desired movies become longer and longer. It may simply be inherently unprofitable. However, if it is only relatively unprofitable, they may turn this around and refresh the service. One of the bigger problems with it is that the discs all eventually die, so something that only had a few thousand copies made will eventually just vanish, as mishandling kills one disc after another.

It's interesting to think about it. I will admit that I am one of those "I want to see this, not 'whatever is available,' but this particular thing!" viewers, but perhaps my segment of the population is so small as to just not be worth it.

Re: Netflix’s Prices Are Rising Faster Than Cable

#395

Post by bradknowles »

gtaylor wrote: post #313
pnathan wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

After having sampled Disney+, HBOMax, Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Prime a fair bit in the past year, my take is that Netflix has the UX nailed. I can, for instance, "thumbs down" a recommendation. Some offerings I never want to see. Their catalog tends to the darker themes, and I'm not fond of that. Hulu and Amazon Prime are mostly irrelevant to me. I'll probably axe the Hulu sub. HBO has a few things I like. Disney+ t…

I feel like there are two minutes of ads for every ten minutes of content on Hulu. It's ridiculous that you have to pay even more for an experience that is similar to the flat rate on Netflix and Disney+.

I refuse to watch anything on Hulu. Every time my wife insists and makes me watch something she really, really wants to see on Hulu, I am reminded of why I refuse to watch it.

And yes, we have the highest level of Hulu+ that is supposed to avoid most ads.

Re: Netflix’s Prices Are Rising Faster Than Cable

#396

Post by zuminator »

ethbr0 wrote: post #386
sedatk wrote: post #381

Earlier quoted context omitted.

UX is a night and day difference between Netflix and its competitors. It's mind-boggling that the giants like Disney and HBO can't even get close. It's especially more noticeable on slow devices like Smart TV's.

It's the minor things that jump out to me. Peacock uses a white glow around the preview picture as their selection indicator. No border. Just a faint glow. HBO Max has no way of navigating to a show page from your most recently viewed carousel. You have to find or search the show separately. It's death by a thousand cuts, but jesus... use your competitor's app. See what UX works and what doesn't. I can't imagine any…

Paramount+ has subtitles that are almost impossible to read with some videos. And you're forced to watch an unskippable ad for their other content when you start your first show of the day, even if you have the commercial free plan.

Amazon Prime awkwardly splits their shows into individual seasons ('series' in UK) in such a way that it's difficult to ascertain how much of the show you'll actually be able to watch on Prime. Other seasons may be available to rent, purchase, watch on one of their partner subscription services, and/or watch for free on their IMDb TV ad-supported service, all of which is haphazardly jumbled together in their main window in no particular order.

Re: Netflix’s Prices Are Rising Faster Than Cable

#398

Post by bradknowles »

ericmay wrote: post #205
discardable_dan wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm about in your boat, except with HBO Max instead of Apple TV+ (their shows aren't as appealing to me). And as those numbers climb and I look at one to cut, Netflix is the easiest. That's the whole point, though: Netflix is going to be the service on the chopping block before these others.

Why aren't Apple's shows (and movies?) appealing to you? If you dropped them on HBO I wouldn't know the difference. There are lots of different genres, great actors, and compelling stories. We have Netflix (via T-Mobile), Hulu, Prime, HBO, Disney+ and Apple TV. Some of these (Disney/Hulu) are from family or friends. WE only pay for Prime (probably the lowest quality of all of these) and Apple TV (because of Apple One…

I have enjoyed Ted Lasso, For All Mankind, and Foundation. That’s all I can recall at the moment for AppleTV+. Still enough to make it worthwhile as part of my AppleOne account.

Re: Netflix’s Prices Are Rising Faster Than Cable

#399

Post by cestith »

pnathan wrote: post #270
samwillis wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I don't entirely agree with you I do think the price of Netflix is getting a little higher than the value we personally get out of it. Our personal breakdown this year (in the UK): Adults in the house, we are quite picky but if we love it then we will keep watching: Netflix @£9.99: 2 tv shows, 4-5 films Apple TV+ @£4.99: 3 tv shows, 2 films Disney Plus @£7.99: 1 tv show, Loads of movies Amazon Prime @£7.99: 3 t…

After having sampled Disney+, HBOMax, Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Prime a fair bit in the past year, my take is that Netflix has the UX nailed. I can, for instance, "thumbs down" a recommendation. Some offerings I never want to see. Their catalog tends to the darker themes, and I'm not fond of that. Hulu and Amazon Prime are mostly irrelevant to me. I'll probably axe the Hulu sub. HBO has a few things I like. Disney+ t…

IF you want Disney+ but are on the fence about Hulu and you're in the US, there's a bundle. I'm not sure about elsewhere.

$13.99 for Disney+, Hulu (with ads), and ESPN+. $19.99 if you want the Hulu with no ads.

https://www.disneyplus.com/welcome/disney-hulu-espn-bundle

Re: Netflix’s Prices Are Rising Faster Than Cable

#400

Post by birdyrooster »

discardable_dan wrote: post #2

I said this again recently, but it's worth repeating: Netflix is on the very fast downward slope. Their catalog is wilting, the space is heating up with well-established competitors moving in and serving the precise content that Netflix originally built their brand on, and their efforts to fund a new catalog with new IP (and taking ownership of old IP) is destroying the business model that made them so appealing in t…

I saw this reality working for them in 2012 and I lost a lot of money not buying the discounted options. When were pitching about becoming HBO before HBO became them, and I thought, who the hell wants to be in HBO’s market?? Netflix at that time was considered externally as a tech play but internally they always knew they would go Hollywood.
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