You figure since customers will be moving to streaming only, they'd work on making it more robust.
Why? What are the customers going to do, go to one of Netflix's many viable competitors?
There's no way they would have done such an outrageous hike if they didn't have to.
While I am absolutely certain that studio fees played a part in this, I think it's a little ridiculous to claim Netflix would never have raised its prices under any other circumstances.
Remember the last time they hiked the rates by 11%? You should; it was five months ago.
The price is still fucktastic (you get 4 months for about the same cost as buying the latest LotR release) but I kind of wish they had built up to this gradually instead of "SURPRISE! We're taking more money now."
My account page says it doesn't take effect until the beginning of September, but maybe it varies depending on your billing period.
So here's something baffling... According to my "PRICE GOIN' UP" E-mail, the change is to better reflect the costs of the plans. The breakdown shows streaming alone hasn't changed in price, but that adding a DVD is no longer subsidized by the streaming (the first DVD used to be half-off) and is now subject to the 50-60% markup.
Used to be $8 for streaming plus $2 for DVD's; now it's $8 for streaming plus $8 for DVD's.
We'll be canceling our DVD's come September. If I were the one paying for it I'd cancel the whole thing and send a polite but colorful E-Mail telling them what I thought of the rate hike. But my girlfriend would rather pay $8 a month than learn to use Bittorrent, so we're just canceling the DVD's.