Hey, remember that time Netflix said that they were “making some changes;” that it was going to be exclusively streaming and separate its instant video from its DVD delivery service? Well, as Emily Litella would say, “Never mind!” Netflix has announced, just three weeks after announcing Qwikster for DVD delivery, it’s ditching that idea and just sticking to offering all services as Netflix. Oh, Netflix, you incorrigible scamp.
The decision to form an entirely new service that’s technically the same service under a different name went over like the proverbial lead balloon, and Netflix’s stocks were plummeting even before the Qwikster announcement. It was bad enough that they raised prices by 60 percent, but now they appeared to not really know how to make all of their customers — the ones who liked streaming; the ones who liked DVDs; and the ones who liked streaming and DVDs because streaming selections were not as good as DVD ones, but they still enjoyed the convenience of streaming — happy. And telling them that “Netflix” would no longer offer DVDs, but “Qwikster” would, but “Qwikster = Netflix,” it was just getting all sillypants for everyone!
But now, our long, national nightmare is over, and Netflix will simply offer both services (at the same prices) under the Netflix name, exactly the way they’re doing it right now. Netflix CEO Reed Hastings has acknowledged that the split was causing more confusion than convenience and that he might have bitten off more than he could chew.
It is clear that for many of our members two websites would make things more difficult, so we are going to keep Netflix as one place to go for streaming and DVDs.
This means no change: one website, one account, one password… in other words, no Qwikster.
He also mentioned that the price changes in July were “necessary,” but that there will be no more changes in the price. The Wall Street Journal also quotes him as saying “there is a difference between moving quickly — which Netflix has done very well for years — and moving too fast, which is what we did in this case.” Hastings also assured users that Netflix is working on improving the selection for streaming video, having already added hundreds of movies and 3,500 episodes of TV shows while it attempted to become a purely streaming service. So in the not-too-distant future, it’s very likely that they will ditch the DVDs again and become the exclusively streaming site that they hope to become. But not right now, and certainly not until people start noticing that everything they are looking for on Netflix is available to stream.
Will this be enough to get back into the good graces of the million or so customers it lost? If stocks are any indication, it might be — upon this announcement this morning, Netflix shares rose 8 percent to $127 (up about $10). Hopefully, the only upcoming news about Netflix will involve the acquisition of new content and the production of original content. In the meantime, your Netflix account is safe from the pesky side effects of progress while the company muddles through its growing pains.
(via Netflix, Wall Street Journal)
Published: Oct 10, 2011 10:58 am