“I already pay for the Internet. The implication: why would I pay extra for the newspaper, movies or music? This is a feeling shared by a significant number of Internet users and which resurfaces now that it will no longer be possible to access Netflix from two different places from the same account.
“I already pay for the Internet” is a comment found on social networks under an advertisement for a subscription – at an otherwise very reasonable price – to your favorite daily newspaper. This was also said around the same time by several people who apparently access Netflix for free because a subscriber gave them their password.
Netflix has confirmed that starting February 21, its service will end this sharing of passwords. Too many of its subscribers give it away to friends or family so they can in turn watch whatever content they want without having to pay for it themselves. A privilege that has irritated Netflix executives for years.
And there, Netflix acts. At the mere possibility of having to pay for their own Netflix account, some subscribers are beside themselves. So much so that we seem to be witnessing an unprecedented movement of discontent on the Web these days.
After the great resignation, the great disconnection.
Will it really come true?
What has been surprising for two weeks is not Netflix’s implementation of this new restriction. After all, it was formally announced last year, alongside new, more affordable subscription plans. After a huge surge in subscriptions during the pandemic lockdown, newcomers to Netflix became scarce in the final quarters of 2022.
We will see in the quarterly results to come if this great disconnection really takes place. Some experts think so. Many others doubt it. If the subscribers who leave are those who do not pay, it will not change much in the financial balance sheet of the Californian giant.
What disconnect?
Netflix executives aren’t crazy. They have demonstrated in the past that they know how to analyze very finely the ton of data that they constantly accumulate on the use of their platform by their subscribers. So far, it has stimulated the production of content that targets very specific audiences. It hasn’t always been a success, let’s face it…
This time, it is the business model that is affected. The bet that Netflix is making is that “the great disconnect” will be much less important than outraged Internet users on social networks suggest. A bit like “the great resignation” which, analyzed closely, statistically only occurred in the United States, in April 2021. And, above all, she signaled a big movement of workers at the bottom of the pay scale to better jobs. They took advantage of the deconfinement to improve their conditions. In fact, the labor market has never been better in North America than it is right now.
No doubt that Netflix is preparing to see users leave, then return as members of its new basic plan with advertisements. While the average Quebec subscriber currently pays $16.49 per month to consult the Netflix catalog at will, newcomers will be able to do so by paying only $5.99 per month.
Outrage on the Internet, as we know, characterizes our time. Netflix hears internet users yapping. His bosses are convinced that they don’t bite.
Fix internet
Netflix finds itself in a position that is not extraordinary. It is the daily life of almost all digital media. For someone to say, “I’m already paying for the Internet,” that pretty much brought the music industry down twenty years ago during the heyday of Napster.
It’s a catchphrase that the news media hear every day.
Remitting a substantial amount of money each month to Bell or Videotron is enough, in the minds of many consumers, for them to be able to enjoy all the content on the network completely free of charge.
A decade ago, digital media was still doing quite well on ad revenue. Google, Facebook and others have caused this market to deteriorate rapidly from there. The music industry has found in the emergence of subscription services a balance that still eludes the news media, but it financially stifles its creators as the rebate they receive is so low.
The problem of the Great Disconnect is vast. It’s not episodic or unique to Netflix. It is a structural problem of the Internet and one that will resurface until we have resolved what is like squaring the circle: convincing people who are already paying a lot of money to access the network that the true value of the network is not fiber, cable or router.
The real value of the Internet is in its content.