To: Mark Marcellus who wrote (44753 ) 10/2/2011 12:47:46 AM From: Jurgis Bekepuris Read Replies (1) | Respond to I also think the decision to split the business was right - creative destruction and all that. The split was inevitable in the long run ...From company standpoint : See Amazon analogy. The split of e-books from paper books is inevitable in the long run. They should split it now... Nah, it's stupid.From product acquisition standpoint : Acquiring DVDs and renting them was relatively straightforward. Acquiring streaming rights is totally dependent on the major content providers attitude on a given day. Becoming hugely dependent on your supplier goodwill is a very risky step.From the customer standpoint : Split just forces customers to rethink their decision to have the service. And it comes after a significant price raise. If Netflix did not split, the decision would be: keep Netflix, cancel Netflix or try to find two or more companies to replace a single convenient Netflix service. Netflix wins. Now the decision is: keep both services, keep Netflix (streaming), keep (Quickwhatever) DVD, switch one service, switch both, and so on. There are so many more variants and most of the non-Netflix-no-Quicksh become much more attractive. E.g. Amazon Prime with free streaming is a prime contender for me personally. (Ah yes the "stupid" Amazon that never split their books from their movies and is trying to bundle book delivery with free streaming - how could they compete with the genius Noflix CEO ;))). Although bundling is somewhat disgraced by the telcos/cablecos of the world, it makes huge sense for customers when the products are overlapping or practically the same.
