- cross-posted to:
- hackernews@derp.foo
- cross-posted to:
- hackernews@derp.foo
200,000 users abandon Netflix after crackdown backfires::Aussies have spoken, and the results are not looking good for Netflix. A new report reveals why users are turning to streaming competitors.
You must log in or register to comment.
This article is specifically about Australia. Globally, Netflix added 5.9 million subscribers after their password-sharing crackdown.
I hate to say it, but the crackdown worked exactly as intended.
iirc, they launched in new countries at the same time, skewing the result quite a bit. Probably intentional to say “see? it worked”
Edit: can’t quite find a source for it. Might have been somthing I misread. Take with a grain of salt
Not to mention that they did start with the narrative that they start enforcing this on a certain date, but it took me 2 months over that to receive the warning/being locked out. I remember seeing people from Canada (one of the countries in the first wave) that still had not been forced off 4 months into the date they had set.
They appear to be taking it slow (not booting off everyone at the same time) to build this narrative that it’s working fantastically so to not get a massive drop off in users (stock price drop) and waiting out for their competition to also move forward with this change. All of this while also adding more markets, dropping the prices in others and removing the cheaper plans.
Yeah, it’s not like people quit because Netflix said they’ll crack down.
They’ll quit after Netflix hassles them a couple times for it.
I quit when they announced it, their announcement made me dust off my raspberry pi, got a 1tb SSD, and install Plex media server.
Their content has been in a free fall for ages, along with non stop price increases.
I only kept it because my mum and brother also used it, and it was convenient, now they just ask me to download the shows and movies they want and watch it from my Plex server.
Not everybody knows how to use a Pi+Plex or has a friendly familiy member who knows that and is willing to share.
So it makes sense that most people just kept hanging on until they got booted, rather than preemptivelly dusting off their old wooden leg and eye patch and once again hoisting the Jolly-Roger…
Yeah I get that, it’s a shame because it’s super cheap and the guides online make it easy as hell to set up. But I understand that terminal is scary for some
Yep. Plex (and Crunchyroll and Hidive) is basically all I need these days lol
They will quit when they notice it on their bills. I find it hard to believe most people will just eat the additional fees and do nothing about it.
I quit Netflix because all of the shows I wanted to watch left their service. I literally paid for the service to watch one show by the time i cancelled my subscription. Not worth it.
I cancelled pre-emptivly as soon as I heard. But I was probably too early to count since that was January. I also ticked the box for “too expensive” despite writing in the account sharing as the reason and now they keep emailing me about the ad supported plan.
deleted by creator
Can you share how they got around it? My dad shares my account and he just said it told him he couldn’t watch any more. I couldn’t get him to tell me what the screen said exactly so I could help.
deleted by creator
As far as I’m aware, our account for the notification once, my wife exited it without doing anything, and everyone is still able to access it to this day.
I vaguely remember seeing somewhere that Netflix will automatically charge you more if you keep using it in that way. But I could be misremembering. Double check your recent bills.
Nah, it’s been sitting at $21.09 for quite a long time now, and I’ve got a spending limit on that card to kill any attempts over $22 within a month.
It probably did work though. We had some relatives piggy-backing off of our top tier 20 year old account when we got shut down last August in what must have been beta testing for the program. We cancelled our account. I’m not sure how many of the relatives ended up getting their own accounts but the poorest and least able to afford an additional monthly charge went and signed right up, so they were at at least a net zero change in subs there (though they signed up for the cheapest option).
People are just disappointing.
There’s probably a reason they’re the poorest
I’m not sure why you’re being downvoted, because you’re not wrong. When you’re struggling with money monthly fluff should be one of the first things trimmed, not added.
I’ve found fedis to have some weird echo chamber opinions. With the trend of blaming the boomers for the economy (which I agree with, don’t get me wrong), many seem to think that it absolves them of any personal responsibility whatsoever for their own finances
Any forum can be an echo chamber; there’s nothing specific about the fediverse. For example: Reddit, Facebook groups, 4chan, etc.
Well, pretty sure 4chan is run mostly by the Russian FSB these days.
It’s so easy to manipulate when you don’t even have to fake a backstory for different users.
I was looking at sky sports in the UK and the majority of their packages had “free Netflix” offers included. I wonder if enough of those signs ups would have influenced the numbers?
I don’t know about launching in new countries, but a lot of the new subscribers were added in countries where Netflix is cheaper so while they did add a lot of subscribers the revenue increase wasn’t large.
And yet their stock dropped massively after revealing the 5 million gain because investors realize that it was a one time boost that won’t help them in the long run.
They essentially showed the market their firm cap for revenue, and the market was like ‘uhh thats it?’
None of that is based on reality anyways.
Dropped massively?
Are you looking at the gains in the past three years because what you’re saying versus reality isn’t true at all.
deleted by creator
“Yes, I’d love to pay even more money for even shittier service. Thank you!”
-People apparently
I live in multiple places with each stay lasting about three months. So far Netflix has not given me shit about it. It just asks me if I want to movey home address. As long as it continues to let me move around, we’re cool. The moment it decides that I have to open a separate account per home, I am out. I watch Paramount+ the most anyway.
EDIT: Honestly, the real conversation should be how mid Netflix original content is most of the time. Their best shit is stuff they import.
I have a similar lifestyle thanks to work and Netflix did exactly what will make you cancel. Whatever you do, don’t set it up on your home smart TV because that’s the thing that screwed up my account. Suddenly, I had to create new accounts for every random hotel I was living in for months at a time or go home every 30 days to reconnect to my home WiFi. I cancelled as soon as the account I paid for, that I didn’t share outside my household suddenly stopped working. As an aside, I wonder how this effects other traveling people: truckers, military families, traveling nurses, or air crew.
Every time Netflix was in the front page of reddit, I’d check my Netflix stock.
My Netflix stock keeps increasing. The first so called “massive exodus” took it from $140 to $220. It’s currently over $400.
So… Yeah.
I was going to post the same, thank you. I hate it but this has caused dramatically more signups
the ad supported subscription cost less, so I wonder if they are still making as much money
Supposedly, Netflix makes more from the ads tier:
In Q2, as in the previous quarter, Netflix’s advertising tier generated higher average revenue per user (ARPU) overall than the Standard ad-free plan ($15.49/month), implying more than $8.50/month in ad revenue per subscriber, Neumann said.
I wouldn’t be surprised if the ad supported tier made more money than the cheapest ad-free tier. Ads are a huge business.
Yes, and Disney+ said they will do the same
wow, surprising in a way but i guess people just want easy access to content to binge
It costs less to add a household than it does to have two subscriptions. Netflix was at least somewhat smart about it.
deleted by creator
Some people are motivated to help others.
Cable cost hundreds and still had ads, people won’t give a fuck over 20$ if that means relative ease of watching season 57 of Big Mouth
The only people down voting this are people who haven’t been on cable in years and have no idea how bad it is.
I hate to say it, but the crackdown worked exactly as intended.
Of course it did. Why wouldn’t it? It’s not like anyone is thinking “oh my grandson’s friend can’t use my account for free anymore, I’m going to cancel my subscription now!”. All while Netflix is dramatically reducing their server load costs.
Maybe. It’s just the start right? How many will keep those subscriptions? What about when they raise costs again? I’ve had a Netflix account for a really really long time. I was even grandfathered into a plan at one point. Eventually was forced into coughing up more and more money, getting less and less for it. It wasn’t just the password sharing. It was the way they keep running their business, and how it’s going across the whole streaming system. I cancelled my service a few days ago after over a decade of service.
On top of this all: 🤬 ads. I’m so sick of being bombarded literally everywhere. From Products I buy and bring home, to being outside of the house. I’m sick of being a cash cow and getting ’trickle down’ wages and dealing with inflation. So yeah. 🖕 Netflix.
Thanks for posting this. I almost forgot to cancel my subscription to Netflix. Thanks for the reminder 🙂
Yep, cancelled the subscription we shared among my dad, brother and I. Most outrageous fact was that I actually have two residential addresses (private and an apartment provided by my company near the office), and even as account owner I was being inconvenienced with the “are you travelling” bullshit.
That drove me nuts.
I used to use my dad’s account. Now I just don’t use Netflix. So far im not missing much.
I also use your Dad’s account tell him to stop messing up my Cuties re-watch.
Is that a lot? What %?
According to the same company (Telsyte) Netflix had about 6 Million subscribers in 2021. So that would make about 3% losses in subscribers.
I yin the 200k is just Aussie subscribers though? Or are you saying they also had 6 million new aussie ones?
The article isn’t 100% clear, but it says “get lost 200k”. They the next sentence “the first time they’ve lost aussie subscribers”
It is pretty clear the article is talking about Australian subscribers.
Oh my bad. I misread your comment as saying they gained 6 million.
Yeah that makes sense.
Removed by mod
Wtf. Netflix has 100s of millions of subscribers.
Subscriber count has been in slow decline since 2021.
In Australia.
deleted by creator
I don’t care about Netflix password sharing policies. But I do very care about their content policy. I don’t even start a new show until I know they finished it without cancelling it half way through. I also do care about the fragmentation in the streaming industry. I’m not willing to buy me in in 5 streaming services just to view 5 different shows.
Fuck you, I’ll go back to the bay.
Argh me hearty
I do the same.
I hate them both! I’m still not over the fact that they cancelled Inside Job. It’s just the latest in a long line of shows we’ll be forever left unsatisfied with no ending and I hate it.
We split an account between 4 households, paying a quarter each. When the crackdown happened, 2 including my house cancelled and the 3rd paid for the extra user. So they halved their users from our account, but increased revenue anyway. Seems like a win for them.
It’s only a short-time gain though. With a shared account between 4 households, chances that one of them is actively using the service is much higher than with only 2 users. If a service is used less and less, chances are increasing it’s going to get canceled (especially now that prices are soaring while wages are not increasing accordingly).
That’s my experience as well.
Do you mean they increased their revenue overall? Despite losing 2 households of viewers because of the increase in individuals paying for it outside of your 4 households?
Because you said 2 households dropped out and the other 2 paid more each. But that would still total to the same amount of money to netflix but a lower viewership, which affects their engagement stats and might get more netflix originals cancelled or other shows dropped.
All 4 were sharing one account originally
But they would have been paying for multiple screens, so it’s not one super cheap account
Sorry. Im sleep deprived brain forgot that the 2nd household would need to pay the fee for the 2nd household you can add on to your account or for a separate account entirely.
I canceled as soon as they said they were going to be cracking down, months ago. I pay for 4 screens, and on principle, I want to be allowed to use them without being nagged or scolded or banned. So if they don’t want my business on those terms, there are plenty of other streaming services with just as much content I like.
I cancelled too. Been wanting to for a while and this was the push I needed.
Same here. I was paying for four accounts, and it shouldn’t matter where they’re logged in. I haven’t missed it at all
Who are these 50% of Aussies who think we need more locally produced content on streaming services? Our content sucks, who’s actually watching these Aussie dramas / series
How very dare you do my girls Bluey and Bingo like that.
Bluey is on ABC iView. We get that for free.
Yeah I’m more responding to “Our content sucks, who’s actually watching these Aussie dramas / series.” Maybe it’s different for actual Aussies but as an American I know Bluey is a household favorite.
I really liked showing bluey to my kid, as in I enjoyed watching it, the kid doesn’t understand shit yet. But my SO started pointing out that the “morals” were a bit off sometimes, like the dad is always giving in to what the kids want, they get rewarded for being a bit nasty, etc etc. Have you ever felt that way?
Every day i wake up hoping this is not the day of playing the living statue. Again.
Deadloch would like to have a word.
But seriously, I can imagine 50% of people saying in the abstract they would like more locally produced content, though I’m not sure that it would actually affect purchasing behaviour.
Australian taskmaster is a treasure and there’s nothing you can say to convince me otherwise.
“We need more locally produced content, the stuff we have all sucks”
Modern Aussie dramas kinda suck, but for comedy we’ve made some absolute gems in the past like Rake, Kath and Kim, and All Aussie Adventures.
Also back in th day we made some solid dramas like Underbelly, and All Saints.
US resident here. I absolutely loved Glitch. The first season anyway
Everybody needs good neighbours.
I liked The Almighty Johnsons quite a bit
Probably the same kind of people who make similar arguments about CanCon.
There’s always been this tension between “We need a thriving TV and film industry in this country” and “Most of what we produce is garbage for the purpose of using government grants” here. Can’t help but wonder if it’s the same on your end of the planet (#justcommonwealththings).
At least there are always a couple diamonds in the sludge, though (here, Schitt’s Creek, TPB, and I’m sure some others even though the other ones I think of are looong over)
The Kettering Incident was great.
The “Bureau of Magical Things” got pretty good once it got going.
It is way better than the american stuff. we either look for BBC or Aussie productions for good acting and characters with depth.
My wife from the USA loves Aussie drama series
Utopia was so good.
Aye, I left when they started up their bs in Canada. I will very grudgingly turn it on once Three Body Problem is out and then turn it right back off. Or even, if I can buy TBP from another streamer or DVD , I’ll wait and do that. This greedy crap from Netflix is personal to me. So sick of greed.
Just pirate it off https://1337x.to when it comes out. People rip things pretty fast if they’re popular.
Thanks God! Keep up the good work
Ah, so he switched from smiting to torrenting. That explains a few things.
Their search function is terrible compared to TPB, which is saying a lot because TPB’s is also not very good.
You got me briefly wondering what Three-Body Problem’s search function meant.
I mean technically, search functions are a significant part of TBPs plot as the story advances. Just, you know, a very different kind of searching.
Aye, Thank you! I’m not that sophisticated with this stuff but I’ll snag that link!
They said they were in Canada and I assure you Canada doesn’t give a fuck about torrents. I’ve been torrenting copyrighted material for 15+ years now without a VPN, no issue. Like we are talking about tens of thousands of individual torrents for movies, shows, books and software.
Or if you’re not too picky about quality just stream it from movie-web.app
Public torrent sites like that sketch me out. I don’t like getting those funny/threatening emails from my ISP.
My ISP doesn’t give a fuck so I don’t use ISP-friendly tools. Not even a VPN. Only for geoblocking.
It’s not even greed. It’s horrible mismanagement. They dug themselves a whole bunch of financial holes based on a false belief that they could continue seeing the same subscription growth without stopping to consider the possibility that there was a point at which they would inevitably plateau. And now they are scrambling to find ways to make up the shortfalls in their goals now that the plateau is in sight. Some genius executive thought cracking down on shared accounts would fix that. 😂
Idk , I mean… unsustainable growth , to me, that’s the same thing as greed.
I am now happily sailing the seas. Guess who is the one that makes the content readily available
And here I was, thinking people are abandoning Netflix because they make bad shows.
62 per cent of those surveyed want production companies to compensate actors.
I’m so proud of everyone (not just fellow Aussies) for standing up for what’s right. 😊
Keep supporting the strike.
200K lost…but there was a gross subscriber increase of 2.6 million, so there will be no changing of the guard at Netflix anytime soon.
Well, if I couldn’t afford a subscription service before, now I absolutely can’t. Problem is I’m too much of a goody two-shoes and as a result I don’t pirate either - I genuinely haven’t seen a single TV series in almost a decade as a result, and at this point I’m scared of people expecting me to understand cultural references I can’t afford to legally learn
You’re gonna die some day. Just watch the shows you want, you’re not taking food out of a director’s mouth.
Subscriptions are there for those who can afford it. If you literally cannot, I don’t see the problem with sailing the seven seas until you can.
Eh… I’m not going to try to convince you that piracy is the answer, I’ll just mention that you’re already giving them as much as you’re willing to watch their content, why not just watch it anyway?
Funnily enough, we pay for most streaming services in our household, but I use Stremio and get my content off the high seas because it’s all contained in a single app, and doesn’t feed their analytics.
Not going to lie- while I do watch most of what interests me in a timely manner, I’ve found that any cultural references that I do miss are easily explained via memes.
deleted by creator
Honestly you’re probably better off and more interesting for your lack of pop culture knowledge.
Hahahahahahahaha. I was like that guy in my youth, not knowing what people were talking about was alienating. I was reading a lot of books instead and, of course, nobody understood the references too.
200,000 users is like a piss in the ocean for Netflix, especially when every other major streaming platform is also hiking prices, introducing ads and cracking down on account sharing.
We are still far from the days of cable.
Who does your post serve? It’s definitely meaningful, especially inn a relatively smaller population like Australia.
Your post smells like piss.
you ever talk to somebody who bought like 100 dollars of stock in a company? Not saying I know exactly what kind of piss this is, but I suspect this is the most common type of piss.
I had a friend who had been given microsoft stock in the 90s and he could not say anything negative about it.
The significance of this, in my opinion, isn’t that Netflix lost 200,000 users in Australia, but that for the first time Netflix has seen a decline of users in Australia. No more line goes up, oh no!
Either way, this is probably less from password crackdowns, more people jumping to alternative streaming platforms.
I certainly don’t know anyone here in Australia with a Netflix account any more. But I know several people with Disney or other alternative streaming platforms. So I’ll agree with that one: They chose a platform that suited them better, and don’t miss Netflix.
deleted by creator
And going back to the days of torrenting
