As you read here, or on some other source, Netflix is raising their prices for the streaming and DVD combo service. They are raising it from $9.99 per month to $15.98. From the sound of their blog post on the subject, they are pretty resolute on this change.
As always, our members can easily choose to change or cancel their unlimited streaming plan, unlimited DVD plan, or both by visiting Your Account.
That sounds eerily like, “It’s my way, or the highway.”
Well, thanks to Netflix raising their prices 60% it’s going to cause people to look for alternatives to Netflix. I just resurrected my Hulu account that has sat dormant for a couple of years. I signed up for the service when it launched but didn’t find the service compelling. Now that I may be rethinking my choice of streaming video service, and the Hulu service is much more mature now, it may be a viable option. The price is the same $7.99 as Netflix and they have a large number of television shows and movies to choose from. Not as large as Netflix, but may be doable. The thing that will make it possible to switch will be the content for kids. Perusing the television shows I’m not seeing a lot of programming for children, except for Naruto.
I think Matthew Leech has a good plan for replacing the DVD portion of Netflix. I didn’t think about using those red kiosks at the grocery store. They rentals are only $1 (if you remember to return them the next day) and they have the latest DVDs there even before Amazon VOD. I’m still holding onto the idea that Amazon will bolster their streaming offerings with their Prime service as well. That along with the cheap or free shipping that comes with the service would work well for the family.
One bright spot in this whole thing is the fact that all three services, Netflix, Hulu/Hulu Plus and Amazon VOD/Prime are all services that are available on my Roku set-top box. Stay with Netflix, add Hulu Plus or dump them all. Any way I go, I’m covered. That’s refreshing not having to change out boxes and cables behind the entertainment center.
Meanwhile, I’m not making any decisions until August 31, 2011. At that time I’ll cancel the DVD service. Until that time though, I’m going to go on a DVD binge and catch up on the top 20 movies in my DVD queue.
I’ve been doing a “burn-n-turn” on the DVDs for a little while. You can get about 3 a week. I rip them to a network drive and we can play them back later. Rip, lather, rinse repeat.
I did that for a little while (SSHHH!) but disks became problematic to rip. Either copy protection or my DVD drive. I don’t know. That’s a lot of disks on the server in a month and a half though. Maybe time to resurrect that project.