Audio Video News

Even while Netflix has passed the 20 million mark in subscribers, some Netflixers are pleading for a disc-only rental plan.

"If you don't want instant gratification, then there should be an option -- call it the slow lane, if you like," said a blogger quoted in Home Media Magazine. In the wake of recent Netflix disc-rental price increases, an online poll showed 10 percent threatening to ax their membership. That probably won't cut much ice with Netflix, which sees its future in streaming, even to the point of removing "Add to DVD Queue" from its streaming interface.

Meanwhile, Engadget has taken a look at Netflix's fourth-quarter 2010 report. Subscribers now number 20 million, or two and a half times the population of, say, Los Angeles or New York. The 7.2 million added in 2010 far outpace the 2.9 million added the previous year. Predictably, Netflix calls the FCC's first stab at net neutrality rules "a step in the right direction" while the threats of ISPs to charge more for Netflix traffic, as they groan under the evening streaming load, is "inappropriate." We'll go out on a limb and predict the latter is probably the factor most likely to influence Netflix fourth-quarter results for 2011.