Just last week I was hipped to the new Hulu plan in which you can pay a few extra dollars per month and have virtually no commercials while watching on any device. “Now there’s some wonderful innovation for which I will gladly pay extra,” I exclaimed. No more ads between segments of The Daily Show with Trevor Noah? Uninterrupted time spent watching The Flash or laughing through Brooklyn Nine Nine? Yes, please.
Now this week we’re finding out that Netflix is also offering a higher priced plan to its consumers. The catch is that they aren’t offering anything new. They are just raising prices.
Bloomberg reported this week that Netflix has increased the price of their most popular plan, which allows users to watch programming in HD on two screens at once, has been raised from $8.99 to $9.99 per month. This isn’t so bad, but it does call into question some of the statements made by Netflix CEO Reed Hastings over the summer, when he promised that the prices of current subscriptions wouldn’t go up in the current quarter and that any price increase would happen very gradually over the course of 10-years.
In the end, we’re talking about $1 here. For a service that already offers commercial-free viewing of a very wide selection of TV shows and movies. Not to mention an ever-growing assortment of excellent original content that includes House of Cards, several Marvel productions, Orange is the New Black, Narcos, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt and BoJack Horseman. Someone has to pay for these shows and that someone is you, sacrificing one less cheeseburger per month from the dollar menu.
Here’s the question we must ask ourselves in passing judgment over this Netflix price hike: Is Netflix getting better? Personally, I’m finding myself living less of the ‘Netflix and chill’ lifestyle and more of the ‘Hulu during lunch’ plan. The new Hulu plan with no commercials is excellent. And for the most part, my viewing habits lean toward current content, something that Netflix only offers with its originals. If either of them can license The Late Show with Stephen Colbert for next-day viewing, I’ll pay another dollar extra so that I don’t have to stay up so late at night. With Netflix, the question is always going to be whether or not their original content is enough. Other streaming services are bringing shows and movies to market just as fast, if not faster. And with the new Apple TV and its App Store due out later this month, it’s likely that Netflix will begin to see wider competition from niche streaming services like Mubi, Fandor and Shudder. Movie studios are starting to get in the game, as well, like when Paramount put a bunch of old movies on YouTube earlier this week.
The world of streaming content is becoming more dense and diverse. The big question for Netflix is how much further its subscriber base will let this go. How much higher of a price will be acceptable for a month of Netflix?
That’s a question for all of you: Does Netflix raising prices bother you? How much higher would you be willing to go in order to watch season 2 of Daredevil?
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