Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
So Netflix says 222 million households are password sharing, against what I recently saw elsewhere as 231 million subscribers total. Seems pretty darn rampant. It's interesting they chose to ignore it for so long, almost as if they wanted to preserve a stash of revenue to unlock on some future rainy day.
 
Curious how this will work for me; I travel, and use my account outside my household on three different Apple TVs (2 at home, and one that I take with me). My Wife travels for work, and uses it. I use the account on two iPads, and three 'within the household' iPhones. then from time to time at work, I will have something streaming on my laptop for white noise. No account sharing outside of the persons of my household, so if Netflix deems I pay more, then I think they need to prove I'm sharing or at least have a process for me to make my case, not just make the assumption. Fees have already doubled since I created my account, and choice has shrunk.
 
  • Like
Reactions: strongy
I think Netflix would have been happy to continue the way things were but unfortunately Netflix users only have themselves to blame for abusing password sharing where it reached a point where it was out of control. Reddit, Facebook, Instagram and other social media platforms that allow communities to converse with one another all have posts where people have spoken about letting their friends, school, college and uni buddies, work collegues have their Netflix password. Some have mentioned about letting family members in other countries have the password. I have no doubt there are thousands upon thousands of college and uni students who have been given a netfilx password from a source not related to them and then it gets passed from friend to friend to friend.

You cannot blame Netflix for bringing in tighter controls on password sharing.
Netflix themselves encouraged this
 
Armchair market experts have been predicting the demise of Netflix for years. (similar to those claiming that Apple is on the verge of collapse)

This latest move by Netflix has been a clarion call for those "experts" once again. But how can this be? Weren't we told that the last move by Netflix would cause a mass exodus of customers resulting in its collapse? ;) And we're told that there's no compelling content and that the only reason people continue to subscribe is because they've forgotten that they have a subscription. 😅

ok, there IS some legitimacy to that last point since there are apps out there to help people manage their subscriptions.

We don't have the details on their customer data. They do. Netflix knows what they're doing. They know that for all of the harrumphing over this change, they'll lose a handful of subscribers, but pick more up. The net result will most likely be a net increase in revenue.
 
If Disney can offer 4K, 6 seats and better content at 1/2 the price so can Netflix.

Disney+ is one product among many income streams for Disney and they can afford to lose money or make less money from it. Netflix is entirely reliant on the margins for their subscriptions.

Disney+ is similar to how Apple can afford to make little money or lose money on Apple Music, while Spotify cannot.
 
  • Like
Reactions: icanhazmac
I'm kinda curious about this. My girlfriend has netflix. She's round my house more than hers at weekends so have her Netflix login on a couple of my things. Clearly these will be different IPs and my devices. So are they likely to suddenly stop us watching Netflix most weekends when its her watching still? 🤔

That will be interesting to see. If I am staying at a hotel, out of town, etc my IP will be different, but it is still my Netflix account. My guess is they are looking for regular use from various different IPs.

If they notice 3-4 times a week 4 different IPs are accessing the account, they probably flag it. I shockingly have faith their algorithms will manage this pretty well.
 
Just to be clear though, this is what you sign up for;
4 screens at a time in the same location.
This is what you haven't signed up for;
4 screens at a time in different locations.

Not that's because you have AGREED to use the product under THEIR terms of service. If you don't want to do this, don't take their money and if you do don't be butt hurt when they try to get you to do what you AGREED to do.
It seems people here are trying to justify theft. You say greed on the part of Netflix, but you forget or ignore the greed that leads to theft of the service.
Nope that is not what I signed up for.
Just to be clear though, this is what you sign up for;
4 screens at a time in the same location.
This is what you haven't signed up for;
4 screens at a time in different locations.

Not that's because you have AGREED to use the product under THEIR terms of service. If you don't want to do this, don't take their money and if you do don't be butt hurt when they try to get you to do what you AGREED to do.
It seems people here are trying to justify theft. You say greed on the part of Netflix, but you forget or ignore the greed that leads to theft of the service.
Have you actually read the Netflix terms of service? You should.

As of right now individuals in a household are absolutely allowed to watch 4 screens in different locations. It does not have to be 4 screens in the same physical house.
 
Good, pay their price for their service or unsubscribe but sharing with those outside your household is against the TOS and analogous to theft.



Simple as that.

Then why does no other streaming service care? Hulu maxes out at two streams. To a degree they don’t care where those two streams are. Give them ten more bucks a month and the streams become “unlimited.”

But, fair enough, it is against their dumb TOS. So you are correct, the right move is just to cancel.

Netflix and HBO both have made some bold moves lately of betting they can raise prices and squeeze more without people canceling. Let’s see if it pays off for them.
 
  • Like
Reactions: I7guy
I guess all those families with kids in College getting screwed! What if people travel a lot? They can't lack down to one IP address.
I wonder about this too with the IP address thing. We go a lot in our RV and have also set up our account on a beach house rental on many vacations.
I wonder if having the AppleTV I use for the camper and vacations being a "registered device" fixes that.
 
zzzzz If you post extra for 4 screens at a time, what difference does it make if 1 or 2 of them screens are located in a different house? So 4 people watching Netflix in the same house is fine but 2 in the same house and 2 elsewhere isn’t? Wow. This is just greed, greed that will backfire spectacularly as lord will just cancel. I cancelled my Netflix a while ago because of a few reasons, one the rumours of this happening. I refuse to hand over my money to ANY company that would do this.
That's not how terms and conditions work. The restrictions might be arbitrary to users but you agreed to it when you signed up for the service and they have every right to enforce their own policy. That said, I am also password sharing and I will be cancelling whenever they implement this new fee.
 
The amount of people bitching about Netflix cracking down on theft is pretty hilarious. You got free Netflix for a decade, and now you want to cry about ripping them off?

Sorry?
 
We don't have the details on their customer data. They do. Netflix knows what they're doing. They know that for all of the harrumphing over this change, they'll lose a handful of subscribers, but pick more up. The net result will most likely be a net increase in revenue.
This is a weird amount of confidence from someone who admits that we don't know anything. Given the recent stories coming out of Netflix, around stagnating and even declining user acquisition rates in the US and other countries, this is more than likely something of a hail mary to calm investors during a turbulent economic climate. I don't see that there is a guarantee that it will work, especially in a climate where Netflix is facing losing a lot of its legacy IP as older brands start their own streaming services. A lot of people are going to look at Netflix's offering and think that for the same price they can get Disney+ and Paramount+ which include lots of old franchises they know and love.
 
This is a weird amount of confidence from someone who admits that we don't know anything. Given the recent stories coming out of Netflix, around stagnating and even declining user acquisition rates in the US and other countries, this is more than likely something of a hail mary to calm investors during a turbulent economic climate. I don't see that there is a guarantee that it will work, especially in a climate where Netflix is facing losing a lot of its legacy IP as older brands start their own streaming services. A lot of people are going to look at Netflix's offering and think that for the same price they can get Disney+ and Paramount+ which include lots of old franchises they know and love.
My "confidence" is based on history. The doomsayers may one day be correct, but they're going to be wrong each and every time until they are. 😄
 
The terms of service that you agreed to when you subscribed. Simple.

Look, I agree that Netflix's tiers are horribly marketed as "screens" or by resolution but they are what they are, they own the content and can charge what they want. You are not entitled to make up your own rules to justify the cost or terms of service.
You keep saying this in message after message, but people here haven't been arguing that Netflix doesn't have the legal authority to enforce its TOS or change them as they see fit. The argument has been that this is a greedy, counterproductive move that is particularly crappy for single-person households who have utilized password sharing but who are now expected to pay more for what multi-person households already get: use of multiple screens simultaneously.
 
It's not that they're trying to save money. It's about not wanting to be defrauded by people violating the agreement they entered into.
no, it's always about money. That's why they never had a problem with it, even endorsed it, until things started going in the wrong direction financially.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: compwiz1202
I think the idea is, there is theoretical loss of revenue for Netflix from the people who would be paying for their own subscription if they are no longer able to get it for free through someone else’s account. So that theoretical lost money is the theft or damages or whatever.

As for whether or not that theoretical loss would be actual, I don’t think anyone can say for certain. It’s hard or maybe impossible to truly know how valuable something is to you until you really don’t have access to it without paying. Plus their catalogue could change.
The theoretical loss of income has been tried endlessly in relation to music piracy, or digital movie piracy, or video game piracy. It is not only impossible, but laughably optimistic to make the claim/assumption that a pirated copy of anything (or the sharing of a password to access a Netflix account) is equivalent to a lost sale.

At the end of the day, Netflix is well within their rights to enforce their TOS. I will not argue that by sharing my password with someone I'm somehow NOT breaking the TOS. Because I most certainly would be. But that is not equivalent to theft or any form of loss of potential income. Because the person with whom I share that password might never have spent the money on an account of their own.

Same applies to anyone who goes online and downloads a copy of an album, movie or game. If the option didn't exist, doesn't mean that person would have spent the money to get it legally. It's wishful thinking of the highest order.
 
  • Like
Reactions: strongy
Theft? 🤣

If I pay for their premium tier that allows me to "watch on 4 supported devices at a time" because I want Ultra HD video quality, but I'm just a 1 person household, then I should be allowed to use those other 3 streams however I see fit as I've already paid for them. I'm not using more than what I paid for.

Netflix is the one who's stealing from me if they charge me for the up to 4 simultaneous streams but I'm only able to use 1 at a time.

It's like renting a 7 seat passenger vehicle but if I'm a 1 person household I cannot use the other 6 seats to give other people outside my household rides even though I paid for them. It's ridiculous.

Netflix screwed up with their different video quality tiers.
Exactly if they pull this they need to separate the upcharges for res and number of streams. If they added a 4k 1 stream for a decent price, I might consider checking it out again after forever
 
My recent experience with Netflix has been a trend towards higher prices, lower quality, and less convenience. To which I can only say, "Yargh! It's driving me nuts!"
Yea wonder if they will pull the third one all the businesses are and cut portions by limiting bandwidth per month or charging for buckets of more
 
Theft? 🤣

If I pay for their premium tier that allows me to "watch on 4 supported devices at a time" because I want Ultra HD video quality, but I'm just a 1 person household, then I should be allowed to use those other 3 streams however I see fit as I've already paid for them. I'm not using more than what I paid for.


Netflix is the one who's stealing from me if they charge me for the up to 4 simultaneous streams but I'm only able to use 1 at a time.

It's like renting a 7 seat passenger vehicle but if I'm a 1 person household I cannot use the other 6 seats to give other people outside my household rides even though I paid for them. It's ridiculous.

Netflix screwed up with their different video quality tiers.

Yes theft.

You're violating the terms of the agreement you voluntarily agreed to.

Don't like Netflix's terms? Find another streaming service that has terms agreeable to sharing their service in the manner you wish. Easy.
 
Yes theft.

You're violating the terms of the agreement you voluntarily agreed to.

Don't like Netflix's terms? Find another streaming service that has terms agreeable to sharing their service in the manner you wish. Easy.
But the terms says you can watch four streams. I don't share but I want to watch when I'm on my mobile or vacation place. Or are we paying to watch from four different devices only at our main home? They need to clarify, because I will have to cancel if that's the case.
 
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.