Netflix Actually Listens To Customers, Drops ‘Qwikster’ Service

At least Netflix is doing one thing right now: it’s listening to their customer base.

Recently, Netflix has become the ire of most of the internet, first with its 50% price hike for DVD and streaming combination, and then with the PR nightmare of Qwikster. Qwikster, for those who haven’t heard, was the supposed product of a separation of the Netflix brand, with DVD services being delegated to Qwikster and streaming services being Netflix’s domain.

However, all that has changed, as Netflix CEO Reed Hastings has released a statement regarding the dissolving of the Qwikster brand:

“Consumers value the simplicity Netflix has always offered and we respect that. There is a difference between moving quickly — which Netflix has done very well for years — and moving too fast, which is what we did in this case.”

That’s a fair enough assessment, but Netflix has certainty been moving far too fast before this change for both its customers, and more importantly, its investors. On September 19th, Netflix’s stock crashed 19% in a single day after word got out that Netflix would reportedly lose one million more subscribers than previously thought. In total, the company’s stock has plunged 50% in the past month. In the midst of this, Amazon is planning massive streaming services of its own, which will tie into the upcoming Amazon tablet, and Hulu has received multi-billion dollar offers for acquisition from Dish, Yahoo, Amazon and Google. Additionally, Dish has bought up the wrecked assets of defunct Blockbuster, and plans to use the brand to offer its own competitive streaming service. And yes, even RedBox is getting in on the action, with yet another planned streaming service.

And all this within the last two months. Now my question is this: Is Netflix moving too quickly? Or are they to slow to keep up with the competition?

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