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- andjuan, on 06/19/2008, -2/+360"While it may be disappointing to see Profiles go away, this change will help us continue to improve the Netflix website for all our customers."
I don't see how taking away features from me improves the service. - healsdata, on 06/19/2008, -0/+211This change will, apparently, "improve the Netflix website for all our customers."
Personally, the website will be much less useful for me. The multiple profile feature allows my wife and I to maintain our own queues, but more importantly, our own ratings. That way, when Netflix is recommending new movies, it is based on our individual tastes and not some crazy admixture of both. We also lose our individual friends lists -- now I'll have to take a ribbing from the guys at work when my wife watches something like Sex and the City. Although it doesn't affect me directly, this also sucks for parents who could, hitherto, create a profile for their child(ren) and set a maturity level to dictate what movies they could rent.
It seems odd to me, that in a day of social networking sites, where individual settings and preferences are key, a company would go out of its way to remove a feature that allowed for customization. The only real motivation I can see here is that Netflix hopes users have become so accustomed to having their own profile that they will sign up for their own account. - svanes, on 06/19/2008, -0/+164this news actually saddens me. i have multiple profiles on netflix, for multiple users in my household, so i found this feature very useful.
- apathetic13, on 06/19/2008, -0/+116I want to hear that they are significantly lowering the monthly prices just to adjust for the loss of this feature! Doubt it though...
http://www.netflix.com/Suggest
suggest they keep profiles! - CP173, on 06/19/2008, -1/+98I called Netflix' customer service group and was told that this change is being done to correct some back-end issues that complicated product fulfillment, and only affects 2% of their members. (This is approximately 160,000 households based on their last quarterly report.)
It is remarkable that a public company that operates in a highly competitive environment would decide that incremental operational efficiencies are worth risking 2% of its client base. If we assume each account generates about $20 of monthly revenue for Netflix, they are putting over $38M per year at risk. I've run IT organizations for more than 20 years, and I think it's a good business investment to hire a couple extra programmers to protect $38M in sales.
There's a trusted axiom in retail that a customer who has a good experience will tell 5 people, but one that has a bad experience will tell 20. The potential negative word-of-mouth of this decision is quite significant.
I'm so glad to not be a Netflix shareholder right now. - isomorf, on 06/19/2008, -1/+87Even more unbelievable than getting rid of a feature that is so useful is the way they are getting rid of it.
Their advice for merging all of your queues into the main queue before the others are deleted: print out all your other queues and enter each movie one at a time.
Their advice for keeping the thousands of movie ratings that you've added in various profiles: sorry, we can't be bothered to think about the issue or implement a migration tool, so we're just going to delete your data.
I've been a Netflix customer since 2003 and am looking for another company soon. I can't believe that they would get rid of such a useful feature in such an unprofessional, half-assed way and then have the gall to say the reason they're doing it is to improve the "user experience" and save DISK SPACE. (HELLO NETFLIX, DO YOU KNOW HOW CHEAP DISK SPACE IS?) - grangerfx, on 06/19/2008, -0/+73Removal of profiles will mean:
I am going to have to manually move all of my queue over to my wife's main account queue (that's over 150 dvs). There is no automatic way to do this.
After spending all that time, money and PR bragging about how great their movie suggestion software is, they are going to destroy it by merging multiple users into one account. From now on I am going to be seeing recomendations for emotional chick flicks and my wife is going to see recomendations of the latest Jackass movie. Sweet.
There is no option to split the account into multiple accounts. Making another account will just cost the user money because they lose their multiple DVD discount. Netflix does not even want users to do this because there is no way to move a profile to a new account.
This is all after learning that early adopters will now have to pay a premium for blue ray movies.
Oh and did you hear that internet providers are going to start charging for excess internet usage and watching just one Netflix movie on demand will put some users over the limit?
Their new company slogan should be:
Netflix: It just gets worse and worse. - mrdlcastle, on 06/19/2008, -0/+64I also believe this to be a mistake. Not only was this one of the only distinguishing features that set Netflix above the rest, but in my mind one of the most important ones.
Not only was this beneficial to families, but also to individuals who wanted to keep movies flowing. I myself used it to ensure DVDs that were part of a series did not interfere with other films of interest. I truly hope they reconsider. - AlphaBronco, on 01/25/2009, -4/+65Aye...talk about Orwellian doublethink.
- loki1584, on 06/19/2008, -6/+55WTF?
- bbatsell, on 06/19/2008, -0/+42Here's Netflix's snotty, condescending, ultimately vacuous response, as sent to the popular Hacking Netflix blog:
Update: Netflix spokesperson Steve Swasey said that the decision to eliminate Profiles is a "final decision." Swasey also had the following to say:
Netflix is a dynamic company that continues to evolve and grow while consistently giving members to best online movie rental experience.
Think of where we were when I joined a little more than three years ago. Then, we had 2.6 million members and 35,000 titles on DVD. Today, 8.2 million members, more than 100,000 titles on DVD and more than 10,000 choices of movies and TV episodes to watch instantly on the PC and the TV.
With such dramatic growth and site and service improvements comes the occasional adjustment.
While discontinuing the Profiles feature is not desirable for the passionate folks who use it, the decision will ultimately benefit all Netflix members. By discontinuing the feature, we will be able to put more focus and resources site and service improvements that benefit everyone, consistent to how we have grown the service over the years. - DooM, on 06/19/2008, -0/+42Seriously. I don't even use profiles anymore since my wife lost interest, but the wording in the email kind of ruffled me a little. I sent an email off to them asking exactly how this improves the site - I'd recommend everyone do the same. The thing that's irking me is that Netflix has always seemed to be a different kind of company and this smacks of the usual ***** you get from corporate idiots.
- itchy92, on 06/19/2008, -7/+43tell you to get a life?
- svanes, on 06/19/2008, -0/+35yeah, i sent out a letter of complaint (as a user suggestion)... i think netflix is making a mistake, and i've asked them to reconsider. i don't quite understand how eliminating this feature improves their service, nor do i understand how this feature is a burden for netflix. doesn't amazon allow the use of multiple profiles via the amazon prime service? if they can do it, why can't netflix?
- bmooney, on 06/19/2008, -3/+37Such a horrible mistake.... Downgrading my account immediately in protest, and will be calling and emailing Netflix to complain.
- florin, on 06/19/2008, -2/+36Translation: their code base is so f***ed up they can't fix it, what with the recent outages, and regular midnight reboots and all that crap. Somebody at the top blew a gasket and shouted "you either wipe out the whole f***ing thing (the feature that was causing problems), or I'm gonna have your head on a platter".
Since nobody wants their head on a platter, the feature must go.
Of course, better programmers could either fix it, or never implement it to begin with. But it's not like Netflix has the talent pool of a nice area like the Silicon Valley at their disposal, or anything like that...
...oh wait.
(crickets chirping) - pcmcg, on 06/19/2008, -0/+30Wow, netflix is really out of touch. Probably time to start shorting the stock. This has got to be one of the biggest shoot-yourself-in-the-foot moves ever.
- Merlin8000, on 06/19/2008, -0/+30Funny coincidence - their CEO just exercised his options.
Personally it looks like I'm canceling my account, I'm sure they're doing this in favor of their on-demand device, but I have TiVo and can live with Amazon Unbox until they have a subscription available. - Maskatron, on 06/19/2008, -1/+31So what are they planning to do about the 500 movie queue limit now that I can't use the Profiles feature as a workaround?
- inactive, on 06/19/2008, -0/+28So, which useful features will they remove after this to further "improve" the experience?
And if they're eliminating it because they have something better in the pipeline than this, they need to communicate it to their users. - ordendelfai, on 06/19/2008, -0/+27Here is my post to them on the Yahoo finance boards. Investors need to sound off, this is INSANE.
http://messages.finance.yahoo.com/Stocks_%28A_to_Z ... - btschul, on 06/19/2008, -2/+27dude, even if blockbuster has profiles, it is not worth switching
- Jareth86, on 06/19/2008, -1/+25I called them about this a few days ago when I noticed I could not add another new profile. They told me that they were "removing the feature because almost no one uses it".
Are you ***** kidding me?! - ryankeefe, on 06/19/2008, -0/+24What I don't understand is how does this help Netflix in any way? I can only see this hurting them since it will frustrate the many customers who use this feature. As a 16 year old, it was so much easier to keep my profile separate from my parents' and my sister's. Now everything is going to be mixed and will likely cause a lot of arguments.
- Soniti, on 06/19/2008, -1/+24Suggestion sent:
What the hell? Why are you getting rid of profiles? That is a huge feature to many who use your service, and "rolling back" to pre-profiles seems like a huge step backwards.
We pay you well, even though you don't always deliver on time, are prone to "shipping mishaps", and often times the disc arrives in unplayable condition. Don't add insult to injury; in short, don't be idiots. - UnknownX11, on 06/19/2008, -0/+22Stupid move Netflix. What are you thinking?
Everyone needs to send them a suggestion to not make this change. - niksa, on 06/19/2008, -0/+22According to their official FAQ about it on their webpage, you can't even transfer your profile into a separate account. I share a netflix account with my sister, and honestly, I'd rather split the account than merge it.
- crash331, on 06/19/2008, -2/+24If you watch so many movies that you have to keep a queue longer than 500 movies then maybe you need to go outside more.
Assuming each movie is 1.5 hours, that's 31 straight days of movie watching with no stops for pissing or sleeping. - mamasfinds, on 06/19/2008, -1/+23I'm beyond upset!
- damstou, on 06/19/2008, -0/+21Seeing an official say that this is a "final decision" means they couldn't care less how people feel about this. I have just canceled my account.
- GruntboyX, on 06/19/2008, -0/+21Does Blockbuster online have profiles? Seriously, because i would switch in a heart beat, plus i can rent movies in the store
- mentalfoto, on 06/19/2008, -0/+21I don't use the feature, though I can imagine how it would be useful in a multi-viewer household.
However I would NEVER, EVER go back to Blockbuster as long as I live to give them one dime of money. Not after all the years of having them be the only game in town and how they used to rape us over late charges and bogus fees for tapes they'd claim you'd never returned when you in fact had.
I think once Netflix gets an earful of the ***** they've stirred they'll backpedal on this policy. - DooM, on 06/19/2008, -0/+21They must hire really ***** developers if profiles are taking up THAT much of their time.
- inactive, on 06/19/2008, -1/+21A real protest would be not giving them ANY money.
- isomorf, on 06/19/2008, -1/+20Haha, that's funny that it's now only "2%" of their customers who use the feature. Earlier this evening customer service was saying "only 1%" of their customers use it.
I think though that "2%" is too low if you look at how many users have already complained on many, many different websites, and all of this within a few hours of the emails going out.
Keep up with the corporate lies, Netflix, and you will lose all credibility! - dohidied, on 06/19/2008, -2/+21Wow, ***** Netflix.
- florin, on 06/19/2008, -0/+18Also, they said they may charge extra if you're renting Blu-Ray.
I used to really like Netflix a lot. :-( - Yarnage, on 06/19/2008, -4/+22My girlfriend and I use this feature to separate our movie queues. Now we will have to manually (and constantly) re-order our queue to make sure we each get a movie each week.
Very disappointing. I use Netflix because it's easy and quick so I may end up canceling and moving to Amazon's video rental feature or possibly Blockbuster if they offer profiles (do they?).
One can hope they will change their minds but since they've already sent out an e-mail to all of their customers, they must have already weighted the good and bad and decided to just not care. Honestly, the excuse "this change will help us to continue to improve the Netflix website for all our customers." is just that; an excuse. There is absolutely no reason why they can't improve their website (which already works very well, IMO) and include profiles. - exomni, on 06/19/2008, -2/+20If they delete my profile without giving me any option to migrate my ratings, reviews and such to a new paying profile, I'm never going to use Netflix again. ***** them, I'll deal with a company that doesn't treat their loyal customers like *****.
- jyrinx, on 06/19/2008, -0/+18I think that's probably about right.
Though I wouldn't necessarily blame the programmers (speaking as one) - companies very often refuse to invest in regular code maintenance and cleanup because there's no immediate ROI, so the code just gets crappier and crappier over time. By the time it's really hurting, you need to dedicate months to refactoring, and nobody likes to hear that they're going to have to spend two months not developing anything new and shiny. - mparker7410, on 06/19/2008, -1/+19Me eliminating Netflix.
- CTK14A, on 06/19/2008, -0/+18You have a lot of time on your hands, don't you?
- CTK14A, on 06/19/2008, -4/+21Doesn't this mean that the other users will now have to sign up (i.e. pay) for their own account, ensuring an exponential profit increase?
Well, of course it's an improvement! Profits = improvement of service. Just think, now your DVDs will arrive in an envelope far superior to the existing envelope. Today's envelope technology will pale in comparison to the Netflix envelopes of the future! - inactive, on 06/19/2008, -0/+17wtf are they idiots? this feature does nothing to "improve the Netflix website for all our customers"
- tibs, on 06/19/2008, -0/+17Great, next they will make me view my queue in that damn slide show style that they have for new releases.
Why do all of their "improvements" mean losing functionality? - Redredding, on 06/19/2008, -0/+16Does Blockbuster have profiles? If not, it'd be a good time for to consider adding them.
- itsme92, on 06/19/2008, -1/+17this is *****
- cjmal, on 06/19/2008, -0/+16Downgrading your account? Oh you rebel!
- johnpspeno, on 06/19/2008, -0/+15I'm disappointed by this also. It seems like a bad decision. I'm happy I have time to wean my family off of Netflix before they kill this useful feature.
- JayKeaton, on 06/19/2008, -1/+16The solution to your problem is easy. You currently have multiple profiles for your household, lets say you have 4 profiles set up. To solve this problem all you have to do is sign up three more accounts. Sure it is four times the cost, but your helping Netflix out by paying four times as much for the same experience, thanks to your efforts the Netflix bosses will be able to drive their kids to soccer practice in a Ferrari instead of just a mere Mercedes.
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