Netflix's New Prices

Netflix announced today on their blog that they are going to be lowering their prices beginning in September.  Well, sort of.  It will be the most expensive price lowering I have ever heard of.















Netflix will be splitting their 'traditional' plan of 'unlimited streaming, 1 DVD out at a time' for $9.99/ month, to:

• Unlimited streaming (No DVD's) for $7.99/month
• 1 DVD out at a time (No Streaming) for $7.99/month
• 2 DVDs out at a time for $11.99/month
• Unlimited streaming, 1 DVD out at a time for $15.98 (both plans combined)

I use both features pretty regularly.  I use the unlimited streaming basically every day (watching TV shows on it),  especially nights when my wife works.  But the streaming doesn't have near the amount of titles as the DVD's- and so I use the DVD feature to help pick up where the streaming lacks.

But if you notice- there is no mention of expanding the unlimited streaming aspect to a larger range of titles.  There are plenty of great titles on streaming, but newer released titles are few and far between.  This means that people like me have a conundrum- lose the DVD feature, and access to 1,000s of titles; pay double the price to keep what I already have; or lose the DVD feature, and rent my physical DVD's from Blockbuster or Redbox (esp since Blockbuster changed their pricing plan to accommodate daily rentals (between $1-2/day)

Granted, if you rent between 3-7 movies (depending on release date/ price/etc), it would be cheaper for you to continue Netflix's combined plan.  And Netflix, or another mail-in company, will feature many more titles than even a Blockbuster or Redbox.  For example- I am watching the Mentalist series.  The Blockbuster near my house only has the first season, and so I rely on Netflix DVD by-mail to watch the rest.

What are your thoughts on the Netflix pricing change? Do you feel ripped off? Do you think this is fair to the customers? Do you foresee any backlash?