Netflix says its profits have soared in the first three months of this year, partly thanks to a crackdown on password sharing.
The streaming giant said it added 9.3 million customers in the first quarter, bringing its total number of subscribers to almost 270 million.
The company also said its profits in the first quarter jumped to more than $2.3bn (£1.85bn).
But the firm will stop reporting key subscriber numbers from next year.
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Some investors saw its unexpected decision to stop reporting subscriber numbers as a sign that Netflix’s wave of customer growth may be coming to an end.
Simon Gallagher, a former Netflix director and now principal of entertainment investment firm SPG Global, told the BBC’s Today programme that while the numbers indicated a “very, very strong performance” this might not last.
Ladies and gentlemen,
We have failed. We need to be better consumers, and do something about when businesses pull tricks like this. But we have failed to appropriately respond, and we will be paying a big price for this.
Now, every single subscription business and their mother will be cracking down on password sharing. It’ll be seen as guaranteed profit at the expense of our wallets and freedoms, and quickly ingrained into society.
I’m sorry, but you’re wrong. We didn’t fail. Netflix popularized a business model that most businesses would’ve cracked down on from the jump (password sharing) and then, once they controlled a sizable market of unique and desired IP, they did a rug pull. Blaming that on consumers is asinine. Everyone knew that the original practice was outside the norm and legally grey. And now your options are breaking the law or finally getting the subscription you probably would’ve been paying the whole time.
It’s part of enshittification. By offering more to a consumer than they’re used to from the jump, it builds a positive relationship, and then you undo the practice later to squeeze profit. Shaming the victims in the situation is a weird thing that a lot of people like to do.
True, businesses try to seize all the opportunity for themselves, which is why I think we should do the same. It’s why I left Reddit for Lemmy, I didn’t want to keep supporting a platform that wasn’t respecting me.
Or the third option which is to cancel Netflix even short term. I wasn’t password sharing, but when Netflix cracked down, we cancelled. We use the other services. I’m voting with my dollars.