Putting the business savvy of Reed Hastings’ decision to spin off Netflix’s DVD-by-mail business into Qwikster aside — and there is a lot to debate about this — the way all of this came about makes me think that it was a decision made in the middle of the night by a panicked executive on a weekend bender. Namely (no pun intended), the name: Qwikster. Nevermind that just about everything on the web with a name ending in “ster” has ultimately failed (Friendster, Napster), but the company didn’t secure the @qwikster domain from Twitter prior to unveiling the new business unit.
Even worse, the person currently in possession of @qwikster — some random dude named Jason Castillo — is a guy with a penchant for tweets some might find mildly offensive who has a stoner Elmo (pictured at right) as his avatar.
The whole debacle Netflix has fallen into in the past few weeks is yet another not-so-subtle reminder of the stunning speed in which things can rise and fall on the web. People create things that come out of nowhere and take off like rockets launching into the sky, only to come crashing back down to earth shortly thereafter. And the people who create those things go from being hailed as geniuses to idiots in lightning speed, as their triumphs and failings are talked about and dissected on all corners of the web.
It wasn’t that long ago that Reed Hastings was hailed as such a genius, someone who revolutionized an entire industry and slayed well-established corporate giants virtually overnight, and today he is almost universally being derided as a blithering idiot who has no idea what he’s doing with his company. In the “old days” people built businesses and the industries in which those businesses existed remained largely unchanged for decades, thus there was never the need to evolve too frequently and so rapidly. (Oh you developed webbed feet because your world flooded and you needed to be able to swim faster than your predators? Well the water has already receded and now you better be able to run faster than your predators. Good luck with that, Mr. Webbed Feet!)
So much for all that. It’s the reality of the world we all now exist in, and in this case it makes me kind of sad because I love Netflix. LOVE. It provides a service that I treasure and frankly would be willing to pay more for if they asked me to and I believe the company was taken to the woodshed and suffered unjustly when they announced their rate increase a few weeks ago and now, in an apparent effort to make it up to the cry-babies it pissed off, is panicked and making questionable decisions.
I really hope they make it. But the pounding they’re taking today is, frankly, well-deserved.
Meanwhile, I’m guessing Jason Castillo’s net worth is about to expand exponentially?
![[avatar]](http://p.uproxxcdn.com/photo/41/thumb)
![[image]](http://cdn.uproxx.com/wp-content/thumbnails/130/110/2013/05/arrested-development-netflix1-150x150.jpg)
![[image]](http://cdn.uproxx.com/wp-content/thumbnails/130/110/2013/05/Screen-Shot-2013-05-21-at-10.21.50-AM-150x150.png)
![[image]](http://cdn.uproxx.com/wp-content/thumbnails/130/110/2013/05/netflix-uproxx-150x150.jpg)
![[image]](http://cdn.uproxx.com/wp-content/thumbnails/130/110/2013/05/arrested-development-best-of-fan-made-tobias-funke-insert-me-anywhere1-150x150.jpg)
Actually, this is well-thought-out: they’re prepping to dump sending DVDs through the mail altogether. Considering that A) DVD is a dying format and B) the Post Office is about to make your Netflix turnaround absolute crap by either dying or eliminating pretty much all of its services, you can’t blame them for trying to get ahead of the problem.
@Dan…If they are planning to do that — and the thought did cross my mind that the “ster” thing was intentional because its being created basically to be killed, like Jesus — they need to expand the offerings available for streaming ASAP, because what’s available now is just crappy. Most of the movies I really want to see aren’t available through streaming. I’d say one out of every five or six if I had to guess.
@DS & @CB: That’s my question. Streaming is great and all but the selection is dogsh*t. What’s the timeframe for expanding the offering to new releases? Don’t studios stand in the way of that?
@Maske…As I understand it, the studios stand in the way BIG TIME.
@CB: Exactly. That’s why I’m having a tough time getting my head around Netflix’s reasoning here. Unless, of course, DVD-by-mail just isn’t a viable business model anymore. In which case it sucks that my local Blockbuster is now a vacant eyesore.
If they are planning to eliminate the DVD portion of the business, why bother adding video games when gamefly already has a steady foothold on it?
@Maske:
I get my head around it: They want more money, so they effectively doubled the subscription cost to consumers while revoking half of the reason what you’re paying for (DVD-by-mail) PLUS stripping a bunch of channels (Starz).
@LOL: Glad you’re enlightened but I plan to cancel altogether when I can’t access new releases, which I imagine many, many others will do. Short-term, sure, revs are up. Long-term it doesn’t make sense to me.
Ah for crying out loud! Netflix didn’t “strip” Starz or the other movies they had. Netflix had to walk away from an offer to renew that attempted to make up for the uninformed deal Starz made 3 years ago.The studios can’t figure out how to make money on the internet, but they see that Netflix has, so they want to grab every last penny they can get, plus some. This is reflected in the licensing fees that people used to getting everything for free on the internet forget actually exist in the real world.
One might say that Netflix is a current victim of their initial success. I’m guessing that the whole Quikster thing is being packaged to sell TO Gamefly, or a similar service looking to diversify their offerings with the shadow of Steam and Apple’s App Store looming over them.