If you're going to be abandoning Netflix, what service are you switching to?

I don’t need to abandon Netflix. I’ve used Family Video for the past 15 years and will continue using them until they are no longer available.

I’m aware I’m probably not the typical DVD rental spokesperson

My girlfriend decided to abandon the Netflix due to its split situation. I’m honestly just flabbergasted for the next step?

I won’t be jumping ship. I really only watch their streaming anyway so I am going to save money. My subscription will go down from $14.99 to 7.99 a month. Plus I only just found out they have all 7 seasons of Star Trek Voyager streaming so for the first time I can watch them all, in the correct order, and I’m only on episode 3 of season 1. Can’t cancel now.

I really don’t see the big deal here, I’m sorry. Lots of costumers have been hurt by the price increase yet I was expecting that years ago. Maybe it just so happened Netflix’s service perfectly matched my needs. It was easy to change from 1 or 2 or 3 DVD’s per delivery depending on my whim and the price was reasonable for the service they provide and also taking into consideration the cost of doing their business.

I’ve never paid more than 18 (?) a bucks since Netflix started and again, loved the option of dialing it down to 15 to 12 to 8 bucks a month. And I’ve watched not just movies but docus and foreign films…I mean it’s really worth it, more than even.

Then the streaming services came. No one could come close to Netflix when it comes to DVD and now streaming. And they are making sure no one catches up to them. I’ve followed and bought stocks of some companies that are providing the digital highways that enable companies like Netflix to stream movies.

All these tech are costly and It’s clear to me why Netflix will surely charge more as they improve the speed and quality of the streaming. It’s also obvious that they are going to phase out the DVD service probably in the next five years. That’s unfortunate but if they keep increasing their instant play list, maybe it would catch up eventually and I won’t yearn for DVD’s anymore.

Overall, the pricing they have now isn’t going to break the bank. I won’t easily go to another service unless they match exactly the quality of Netflix services and then offer a much lower price which I think is nearly impossible at this time.

I’m not abandoning as we mainly use instant viewing, Netflix has been great for our household.

I’m actually signing back up (again) for the mail service. The streaming doesn’t have any selection, but the DVDs I like, and Netflix still has the best service of all the options. And really, Qwikster is too foul a name, but Netflix isn’t?

Maybe Qwikflix would have worked better?

We’re abandoning Netflix. We’ve used them for years, and just made the decision to cut them this week.

We pay $79.00 for an annual Amazon Prime Membership. Amazon includes free streaming for no additional cost. We stream through our BluRay player the same as we did for much of our Netflix picks.

Prime also includes free 2-day shipping + I can ship to anyone’s address for free + they now have streaming of Star Trek (which was a must for my husband)

I don’t know what I’m switching to.

I wrote a reply to that Netflix email, explaining various lamenesses, and it bounced. I then looked on their site for a way to send them text feedback – there does not seem to be one. Wow.

There still isn’t a great alternative that I’ve found yet. I’m using the DVDs and streaming just enough to justify staying on board, so I’ll probably stick with it for a while longer.

My biggest disappointment is the separating of the lists and recommendations (if it happens)—that was such a valuable piece of the service. I think they’re fools if they truly divide all that data between Netflix and Qwikster. But for now, I’ll wait and see how it shakes out.

@lillycoyote Voyager is on Amazon, too

@SpatzieLover But I would need to subscribe to the Amazon Prime Directive service. :-)

Since there’s not much of interest to us on the streaming side, we’ll probably just drop streaming and stick with the really poorly named Qwikster. That “w” annoys me. It’s not like it’s any quicker to type a “w” than a “u”, so it’s just trying to be cute or something. At least dropping the “c” has the ‘quicker’ excuse, but still. Ugh.

Edit: Since it was on my mind, I just went and changed our plan. We were on the unlimited streaming / 2 DVDs at a time plan, for about $20 a month, and I switched to no streaming / 3 DVDs at a time, for about $16 a month. That works for me, I suppose. More DVDs, lower price.

Great Caesar’s ghost, I guess I am still on the bubble about that. Been going over it again, and again in my mind. Since I started I might have only used the mail-in part maybe three times, I find myself using the streaming part to catch up on shows that I missed or want to see again. However, not only are all the titles not available for streaming, many they don’t provide. I guess if they upped the amount of shows I could stream I would definitely keep that. The only counter for their weak library was having the mail-in part. Even that was not as impressive as I hoped because of the movies they didn’t have, or recent movies I missed at the box office 6 months ago. The only counter to that, was the online streaming, like the two negative cancelling each other out. If they come up with more titles that can be streamed and newer series and shows to boot, I might keep that and chuck the rest. If they don’t, I might seek other alternatives all together.

I have not abandoned it – yet. If i keep it, it will only keep the streaming.

I don’t have cable and use a roof antenna with a converter box. I have a Roku box so I can watch hundreds of channels for free.

I refuse to spend my money on TV. It’s a waste of time. It causes brain mush, wide butts, and promotes mental decay. (Gee….Want to know how I really feel about it?)

@worriedguy So, you watch streaming (enough to pay some amount), and have some set up so you can watch hundreds of channels for free, but then claim tv rots your brain? Am I missing something here?

@worriedguy You use a Roku box so you can watch hundreds of channels for free? So… just to be clear, it is the paying for TV that causes “brain mush, wide butts, and promotes mental decay” rather than that actual watching of TV that causes these pathologies? :-)

@lillycoyote and @SpatzieLover ; Voyager is at my house, too! Come on over, we’ll Trek on down!

@JilltheTooth Be careful what you wish for because I’m on my way. But I will be bringing a case of Dogfishead Pumpkin beer with me, fresh from the brewery in Delaware. It’s in season and it’s uber delicious.

And snacks! Bring snacks, too! The beer sounds yummy!

Tortilla chips, queso and salsa sound o.k.? At least to start? You do have grocery stores and restaurants where you live, right? In case we have to make a midnight run between episodes?

I’m so hard-core I have a replicator. Bring specs…

We didn’t abandon Netflix, we just dropped the DVD portion and will only do streaming.

What I am going to do very soon is drop cable TV. We’re going to get a Roku box for each TV (there are only two in our house), use that with Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Prime. We can get the Roku boxes for about $70 each, and after that many of the streaming channels are free. We just pay for those three services I mentioned above (and we already do Netflix and Amazon). This will save us quite a bit of money each month, and the only drawback will be waiting one day to watch the very few TV shows we like. Most of the time we use OnDemand for that anyway, so it really won’t be a big deal.

Blockbuster…. We can swap videos at the store if we don’t want to wait for the mail and they will be introducing streaming in the near future.

It seems confusing, but I’m not going to “abandon ship” yet, because Criterion DVDs are extremely expensive (even used ones in Amazon!).

@lillycoyote For the same amount as Netflix, but get much more service ;)

Actually, Netflix wasn’t responding quick enough whenever we’d have trouble w/streaming, either. So far no such trouble w/Amazon…but then their customer service answers the phone

You ladies need to invite my husband…he’s the Trekkie, not me. ;P

This question really isn’t relevant to me as I’ve never used Netflix, but I suggest the local library to anyone here looking for an alternative. My library sucks but I still manage to get pretty much anything I want to watch, including TV series. Why pay for what you can get free? And legally no less?

Here’s an update on the Netflix situation.

@Jeruba I’m so glad we won’t have to live with that awful name. And it’s hilarious that they misspelled it!