Let’s start by saying that this is an idea I’ve had, and not something actually proposed. But how about we walk through it.
Instead of the current model, in which you pay per month, the new idea is to have them pay by the hour.
The current plans are:
-$8/month – SD video – 1 screen at a time
-$10/month – HD video – 2 screens at a time
-$12/month – Ultra HD Video – 4 screens at a time
My idea:
$10 – 60 hours
$15 – 120 hours
etc.
And you’d have to add hours to your account at least once every 12 months, with the remaining hours rolling over, or else you lose what you have. Similar to most of the prepaid cell phone plans.
This would cut down on how many people use an account, which Netflix has a hard time cracking down on.
This would also allow people who use Netflix rarely, to get more for their dollar. If say you only watch House of Cards, and you spread it out over two months, instead of paying $20, you’d only end up paying $10.
Regular/typical users, who do binge a lot throughout the month, but likely don’t eclipse the 60/hr mark, will still end up paying approximately $10/month.
And for those that just rip video files from all the Netflix shows, for use on their own time, they’d get hit with the video limits more often, which would help Netflix.
Of course I think that Netflix should also incorporate the “Offline Mode” that Amazon Instant Video offers, allowing you to watch videos when you aren’t connected to the internet.
And similar to how Spotify works, users would be required to reconnect to a internet connection every XX amount of days, and it would tally the “Watched hours” at that point (allowing you to download, without committing to using the hours until you actually watch it).
Aviously 