Comments on: Crunching Feedflix Stats for Netflix Trends

By: Ivan Y

Ivan Y — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 18:56:41 +0000

This is a very good article! So the average price per DVD is $2-3? Makes me feel better about paying $3-4 for SD rental on Vudu (HD rental prices hurt though).

Personally, I only had trials from Netflix as I live next to Blockbuster store and — when I used my Blockbuster Online actively — could get a lot more rentals by returning 3 movies to the store, renting 3 for free, and getting 3 shipped out to me. Although, now the regular plans aren’t as generous (I kept my old one but froze it for now).

By: Dave Zatz

Dave Zatz — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 15:19:20 +0000

Feedflix does ask you to confirm what they guess your rate plan is. Mine was right but I just upgraded.

As far as Blockbuster, I haven’t been in at least 3 years – possibly longer. I’ve been using Netflix on and off since 1999 or 2000. Back then, tracking down DVDs was hard. When I got my first player in 1998, the major rental stores had no movies and the local one only had a select few. Though it was pretty cool in some ways – I’d tell them what to buy for their collection (like Criterion Silence of the Lambs) and then I’d rent it when they got it (single copy!) in.

By: tivoboy

tivoboy — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 15:08:00 +0000

A couple of things that could throw off the calculations. A LOT of people are still on older rate plans, people who have sub’d for 5+ years (myself included 8+) and have 2+ (2 @AT unlimited) and pay 12.99$. There have also been rumours that NFLX likes to amp free membership programs DURING the quarter, to help pop the subs EOQ. (they have been dinged before I think for including FREE subs in TOTAL SUBS, but maybe they have at least started booking an expense – which they should)

Another point is, that even though it is 2+, one can often have 2+2, and even those on 2-3 limited plans, can have 2-3+ results. This would skew the numbers of DVD’s per monthly fee, but the FEEDFLIX stats SHOULD incorporate that into the amount.

I figure I’m paying WELL under 2$, more like 1.5$ at most for the DVD’s I’m getting monthly. (and most are now BRDVD which would make it even a bit more worthwhile.

Needless to say, I can count the number of times I have been in a blockbuster store in the past several years, on one hand with three fingers broken off. :j

By: Dave Zatz

Dave Zatz — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 14:25:11 +0000

Very cool! But definitely need a few grains of salt here… If they automatically scraped *all* Netflix feeds, it’d be more telling. I suspect the folks using this site are the more dedicated customers who probably watch more flicks (relative to their plan). Also, this doesn’t appear to take into account Watch Instantly. Example: For about 3 months I was on the unlimited 1-out plan – while only watching stuff online or Roku, and not sending the disc back. But just a week ago I bumped my plan and have been having The Wire discs shipped/returned in rapid succession.