Netflix raises Blu-ray rental rates

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23 Apr 08 13:43 by Timmie in category Uncategorized To news archive

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Netflix’ CEO, Reed Hasting, has announced that the monthly subscription fees for Blu-ray customers will go up. The company stated that it will add a ‘modest premium’ to these rates. After an investor’s call Netflix decided to take action and said that these measures are plain logic since customers are already used to paying more for high-def content.

Hastings defended the increase by saying that high-defenition content is more expensive at retail. "As you are aware, purchasing Blu-Ray DVDs costs more both at retail and wholesale than standard definition DVDs, and consumers are used to paying more for high-definition content in every other channel, including video rental stores, video-on-demand, and cable channels," Hastings said on TVPredictions.com yesterday.

Now that Netflix will increase its fee on Blu-ray rentals we can expect the original DVD format to exist longer. At this point the percentage of subscribers who rent Blu-ray discs are still in single digits, Hastings continues. With a price increase many don’t expect this percentage to go up any time soon.

The price increase is bad, but needed Hastings says, since Netflix plans to expand its inventory. Well, the consumer loses once again.

20 Comments

guest: Posts: 15288; Posted on: 23 Apr 08 15:04

Another Blu-Ray gouger to the rescue... thanks to all who supported Blu-ray. You really screwed all of us over big time.

IkbenHenk: Posts: 15; Posted on: 23 Apr 08 15:21

But if HD DVD would have won, wouldn't they have done the same?

u_n_s97: Posts: 446; Posted on: 23 Apr 08 15:39

@IkbenHenk how I love these reactions like yours...

No mate, this is NOT about HD-DVD, if you don't mind... Get it, this is another BR related "raise", and how many yet to come ??? Oh Tim, your last sentence is totally true.

DukeNukem: Posts: 998; Posted on: 23 Apr 08 15:44

Probably, but I would have been okay with that. At least I would've had the knowledge that Sony lost the format war. I could've gone to my grave a happy man. Now I'll just go a bitter b@stard. By the way, WTF is wrong with this site? You type a reaction, click "Post it" and are logged out? Then you have to log back in and re-type your reaction. This site is getting worse every day.

guest: Posts: 15288; Posted on: 23 Apr 08 17:54

I totally agree. I like how the related news/articles on a subject can be 6 YEARS OLD!!! Are they out of their freakin mind? That is NOT "related". It's twice removed! Please limit the "related news/articles" to 6 months at most!

Chuckwagon: Posts: 163; Posted on: 23 Apr 08 18:44

I love the rationale that "the customers are used to getting screwed, so we thought we'd jump on and stick it to them as well." One more greedy company, that was already making good profits, decides that it isn't enough to do well and be healthy as a company, you have to do REALLY well, and if that means screwing the customer, so be it. Great.

Crabbyappleton: Posts: 5756; Posted on: 23 Apr 08 20:33

If you think they are screwing you now, wait untill they think they have a decent enough Bluray base to start phasing out DVD! That's when they can really start putting the screws to the consumer, charging for everything you want to do with your purchase, once you get it home. This is what all this fancy DRM is for! :r Let's face it, piracy over the Internet is impractical with 15-20 gig file sizes, there is no need for all these controls, except for enhancing after the sale cash flow. :r Everyone needs to boycott Bluray and keep buying DVD with its CSS and ~4.5 gig file sizes. :d

DukeNukem: Posts: 998; Posted on: 23 Apr 08 21:43

"Everyone needs to boycott Bluray and keep buying DVD with its CSS and ~4.5 gig file sizes." Agreed.

Hypnosis4U2NV: Posts: 1464; Posted on: 23 Apr 08 21:57

Increasing the rental rates for Blu-Ray releases is really pathetic.. Do you know what the wait times for Blu-Ray releases is? Hopefully they are going to spend the additional revenue to purchase more Blu-Ray titles.. +1 - Boycott this ridiculous format.. DVD is here to stay..

guest: Posts: 15288; Posted on: 23 Apr 08 22:21

I will also boycott. I wont buy 1 BR product. I will try my best to convince others as well. This is really pathetic. Customers need to stand up for their rights, rather than letting every company walk all over us. It's getting worse all the time. And the reason it gets worse is because uneducated idiotstick consumers playing right into their hands. It still cracks me up at how people try to say their LCD tv picture looks so great. Ya right.. if you like blurred and pixilated motion, then by all means, enjoy your sub-par quality that you have been basically brainwashed into believing is better. :S

shaolin007: Posts: 883; Posted on: 23 Apr 08 23:25

"If you think they are screwing you now, wait untill they think they have a decent enough Bluray base to start phasing out DVD! " Yep, I can see that coming too!

guest: Posts: 15288; Posted on: 24 Apr 08 00:37

HD-DVD would not have gone up in price since it cheaper to author and produce than BR Disc. not much but would still be cheaper yet BR prices still keep going up oh well http://wesleytech.com/blu-ray-vs-hd-dvd-replication-costs-analyzed-again/113/

greensabath: Posts: 47; Posted on: 24 Apr 08 06:14

"Everyone needs to boycott Bluray and keep buying DVD with its CSS and ~4.5 gig file sizes." Umm..I agree with you wanting to stick with dvd...but give it credit where it's due....its 8.5 gb. Most dvds...correction...all dvds now are dual-layer

guest: Posts: 15288; Posted on: 24 Apr 08 17:10

" Let's face it, piracy over the Internet is impractical with 15-20 gig file sizes, there is no need for all these controls, except for enhancing after the sale cash flow. " That what x.264 is for... :B

DeadMan: Posts: 1560; Posted on: 24 Apr 08 17:56

I've seen 40+GB images shared over torrent sites. It's not about speed it's about seed.

u_n_s97: Posts: 446; Posted on: 24 Apr 08 19:52

I actually do not think downloading illegal contents which are 20-30 GB or more is really a problem for most of us. /let's say torrenting is just one method, there are several other methods to download these movies from the net... / But well, when some of us want to pay for renting or a few of us even wanna buy these movies themselves and the prices are just raising day by day, well it's quite questionable how long people will spend their money at Netflix instead of downloading... I think it's quite strange to raise prices when more and more contents are available in HD format so it's losing its magic, not to mention if they want us to rent or buy something then prices should go down and not up...

dread100: Posts: 8; Posted on: 24 Apr 08 19:59

"As you are aware, purchasing Blu-Ray DVDs costs more both at retail and wholesale than standard definition DVDs" try play.com not expensive at all

PPeter: Posts: 90; Posted on: 24 Apr 08 20:16

Personally, if I bought an original film in DVD format, I will not hesitate to download the high def version of the same film. I will not pay extra high price for renting or buying Blu-ray films, not at all. I live in Hungary, in my country downloading film and music for private use is not illegal anyway (we pay very high copyright levy fee in the blank media prices for compensating) and I will not feel guilty if I paid earlier for the same film in SD version. The film industry made a very bad decision to choose Blu-ray instead of HD DVD, and they try to force us to pay the higher manufacturing costs. I wonder how long Sony can subsidies and compensate for those few companies which were convinced to bought expensive BD manufacturing lines. Industry sources indicates that BD50 manufacturing yields are terrible, one BD50 disc costs almost 5$ to produce, and Sony/BDA donates 3$ for each disc to make the disc price acceptable. LOL.

jumpyg: Posts: 254; Posted on: 25 Apr 08 04:24

I think it's outrageous that movies are getting more expensive! Gas, milk, cars, and everything else cost the same now as they did in the 1950s, right?

SciFer: Posts: 193; Posted on: 25 Apr 08 06:59

You know, if companies like NetFlix continue to get greedy, then the business model that made them who they are will also be their demise. In this day and age where the wars are 'Tech", we'll continually see the rise and fall of corporate tech empires. They were nobody several years ago and if they raise their prices to much, the people will decide to turn elsewhere for HD content. Turn your back on the consumers that got you where you are then watch us turn our backs on you, how dare you netflix, greedy bastards :r . I for one will be cancelling my memebership with them. How's that for a REACTION?!
This message was edited at: 25-04-2008 07:02

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