Netflix made a decision over the weekend that has caused much outcry among its user base. While it seems like a small change, it definitely hurts the end-user experience, making it more difficult for customers, and the reasoning seems somewhat confusing.Netflix said it was removing the “Add to DVD Queue” option from streaming devices. The is the “Add to DVD Queue” button that appears on the streaming versions of Netflix, such as gaming consoles (PS3, Xbox 360, Wii), mobile devices and set-top boxes, when a movie isn’t available for streaming.
Netflix said the reasons were because:
We’re doing this so we can concentrate on offering you the titles that are available to watch instantly. Further, providing the option to add a DVD to your Queue from a streaming device complicates the instant watching experience and ties up resources that are better used to improve the overall streaming functionality.It's unclear to many why a simple button complicates the watching experience. The note about resources grates to many who ask, like this comment:
Right. And how many "resources" do these transactions tie up? At least an order of magnitude less than actual streaming. There's something else in play here.It was difficult, if not impossible, to find a single comment that was positive. One response noted, he didn't want to have to "get up and log into my computer to add it to my queue."
The titles available on Netflix's streaming service are still very limited. Some have accused the company of pushing subscribers away from physical media and to streaming. In November, Netflix announced a lower-cost streaming only-plan, but at the same time raised the prices of most of its DVD plans.
Netflix responded by saying its streaming service works on more than 250 devices, and that it wants to focus on streaming. It's still unclear how many resources are expended by adding a button as its mobile offerings, since 250 devices is not the same as 250 platforms.
It's also clear that 300 comments out of Netflix's entire subscriber base isn't exactly an uprising. However, it's also true that most people don't tend to comment on blog posts by companies.
At any rate, the best thing Netflix can do to calm the anger is to increase the number of titles in its streaming service, and reduce the number that hop from "Available" to "Not Available." If that's what the resources expended are working on, most will end up being just fine with it.
