I still don’t see the “theft” or “piracy” angle, though. Netflix decided this was the rate for this many screens. 
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I look at it more like buying in bulk. I could lend my Costco card to everyone in my neighborhood, but their rules typically frown upon that. They are still making money on each item someone buys though, so why should it matter? Netflix could make $20 on a 4 screen package or $30 on two 2 screen packages.
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Clearing the Atlantic’s cookies will usually reset it to “last free read”.
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Eh, that feels a bit closer, but still, Costco can’t or won’t stop you from buying there and giving to a homeless shelter or a neighbor.
I still think, I paid for access to this good or service.
If it “costs” netflix more to have more screens streaming (which, let’s be clear, it doesn’t, that burden is placed on our infrastructure) then they should charge the rate they see fit.
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Currently, the number of screens and the quality of stream are tied together. If you want 4K, you get 4 streams. I’m sure there are lots of people that want 4K, but don’t need 4 streams by themselves. It’s very easy for all of those people to share a password without ever running into too many concurrent streams.
They could have separated the the quality and stream counts. Reduced the Premium plan to 2 streams, keeping the current price. Think of it like a shrinkage price increase. Then, added new plans with 3, 4, or 5 streams for prices over $20. Say $25, $30, $35. Or, just made adding extra streams a $5 cost with some maximum support. (Even $8 if they really want to hit that price. For that matter reduce all current plans to 1 stream and make every extra ala cart.)
That would have a similar price increase impact to people. As people currently sharing because they have an over abundance of concurrent streams would be restricted and run into those errors with an easy way to buy out of that scenario.
It would still be a price increase, which everyone would dislike. But, at least it would be easy to understand and implement. The current process is going to break all kinds of stuff that should work but will not without jumping through artificial hoops.
If I’m traveling and blocked because to many streams are in use, that is easy to understand and fix. If I’m traveling and blocked because I didn’t do something before traveling to authenticate my phone as part of the household, that’s difficult or impossible to fix and breaks a supposedly supported use.
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College students officially are considered to reside at their family address as their ‘permanent’ address – for example, for IRS purposes – and Netflix has always said you can use your account when traveling.
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For movies your local library may have what you’re looking for, at a price that beats Netflix every time!
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Oh, yeah!
For your watching habits, @clintcarlson77 , you might really like Kanopy. Around here it’s a free thing with a library account, you get one free movie or series per month. Per person. And they have a lot of classics and documentaries I haven’t seen on Netflix or Amazon prime.
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This!!! One price to be a member, then add what you want as required. Could (should) be easily adjustable at any time; going away for a week and need more streams? Hop on the website when you get there and adjust as required.
Is it just habit that this stuff is still sold in “Packages”?
This stuff is all in the cloud, yo! Flip a bit here, update a database there. It’s not like Netflix has to roll a truck to have a tech install (or was it remove?) an RC filter in the local neighborhood distribution box.
Well, no. They make more money this way. Same reason cable channels were only sold in packages when literally nobody wanted that. They knew which three specialty channels everyone wanted and they put them in three separate packages that you had to pay separately for. Same reason that CDs cost $20 and had one good song on them that everyone wanted.
Capitalism never delivers what people want. It delivers whatever shitty approximation of our desires that we will grudgingly agree to that makes the most money for some billionaire. Same as it ever was.
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No paywall: https://archive.ph/TmbOs
The restrictions appear to only apply to televisions and not mobile devices for now. Once you are successfully logged in on a smartphone or tablet, you should be able stream on it from anywhere.
Possible workaround for sharing users: watch on a tablet or phone, or use a Chromecast and cast the tablet/phone to a TV. That method is apparently not (yet) blocked.
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That method also worked during the periods when Apple had a spat with Google so the YouTube app wasn’t on Apple TV, and then again when Amazon had a spat with Apple so the Prime Video app wasn’t on Apple TV. I airplayed from my iPad a lot during both corporate feuds.
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Cory has written about big tech enshittification, such as current Netflix changes being discussed, several times on his blog Pluralistic
https://pluralistic.net/tag/enshittification/
Archive link of the Atlantic article
https://archive.is/pIAep
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That’s how my cheerfully dumb TV is ensmartened anyhoo: one of those tiny Lenovo office PCs, that only LOOKS like the one work supplied me then replaced with a laptop, that I definitely gave them back.
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