And having just watched the trailer, that’s actually how I feel. Cool shots of space and drama in space, but nothing amazing. And the slow reveal of Prometheus was actually distracting from the images themselves.

Because of them, I feel so hungry for this film. OVER AND OVER AND OVER AGAIN.

They get overlooked by the likes of Linkin Park; you won’t see any of their albums or songs on recent lists from Rolling Stone, for example.  But they’re not interested in gauging the expression of the pulse of a generation; I take it that they’re more trying to point out interesting artistic developments, even if they’re from not-very-mainstream bands like Wilco or the Yeah Yeah Yeahs.  But just look at how many views Linkin Park has on YouTube, and you can figure out whom Gen-Y-ers are viewing. 

Of course, many of the things they watch on YouTube are rather shitty or sensational, from Justin Bieber to Rebecca Black.  But with Linkin Park there is truly something that expresses the heart of a generation.  Cynicism, frustration, angst, but activism and awareness.

Paul, my friend and I were listening to the radio and talking on the phone one night when my mom called for dinner. I thought the song that was playing was awesome and asked my friend to tell me what it was the next day. I saw him that morning and he started laughing in my face. That song was DC Talk’s “Jesus Freak”.

You get their business position. But obviously a lot of people don’t. That’s why they had to shut down their blog after immediately getting 5000 angry commenters. That’s why their stock dropped 5% today. And that’s why I think they’re about to lose a large amount of subscribers over a PR nightmare. You’re totally right on the hard economics of what’s a bargain and what’s not, but the perception is unmistakably “Netflix is screwing their customers”. I don’t see them doing anything to counter this.

Also, I know they’re in a precarious position, but I haven’t seen such horrible negotiators since Obama folded on health care reform. Every market analyst agrees that they grossly overpaid for the Epix catalog ($1 billion for outdated Viacom titles). They grossly overpaid for the Fincher/Spacey series. They grossly overpaid for Starz content, where they just doubled how much they were paying and lost a lot of content (including all original series). They grossly overpaid for NBC Universal content, where they just doubled how much they were paying and lost a lot of content (including all original series). They rolled over on the 28 day window delaying new titles, something none of their other competitors have done. This is why prices just went up.

By every indicator, Netflix is being run badly.

Yes, they’re venturing into new areas (I agree with you on the series, by the way) and incurring more operating costs, and yes, they need the extra cash, but that’s a part of doing business. How else are they supposed to grow? The home video industry is changing in some incredible ways and I see it as Netflix doing what they can to not become the next Blockbuster.

And is the Netflix service really that bad? So you had an anomalous experience, but how many discs have you checked out since you joined? What’s the ratio there? With a service that ships thin plastic discs in paper sleeves through the postal service, I’m surprised they actually managed to turn that into a business, much less make it work for over a dozen years now. Before I went streaming-only, I had bum discs turn up in the past but hardly felt like it was ever a monumental disservice. I suspect that goes for most people.

On the other hand, the complaint about the selection of streaming content is something that comes up over and over. Now, if people don’t think it’s worth their money, they won’t have to pay for it at all and can receive only discs instead. Where’s the downside to that?

Obviously they need more subscriber cash to finance these ventures, but they’ve handled it in such a sloppy way with such bad public reasoning behind it that I’m betting they lose 10% or more of their subscribers. People are increasingly frustrated with their Netflix service (lack of Blu-ray availability, long waits for new titles, I recently got the same cracked disc after sending it back FOUR TIMES), and now they’re telling their subscribers to pay quite a bit more for service they were already pissy about. After putting Blockbuster out of business, it looks like Netflix is starting to make the same arrogant, monopolistic moves that sunk them.