Topic: Survey Teases Netflix Instant Streaming Disc for Wii

[Flames_of_chaos]

http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/blogArt.cfm?artid=17999

 

The Netflix streaming service premiered for consoles on the Xbox 360 when Microsoft rolled out their New Xbox Experience firmware upgrade. It seems like Netflix is planning on expanding this service to the Wii with a disc.    

A recent survey revealed that Netflix is looking into creating a Netflix instant streaming disc for Wii. The survey states that the disc will be priced at either $9.99 or  $2.99. A Netflix subscription is required to use the service, and the disc has to be in the Wii whenever the user wants to watch a movie. And of course, the Wii has to be connected online in order to stream the movie.

[Jonnyboy117]

Not sure if I would bother with this, since I have it on X360.  However, for anyone who doesn't own a 360 or doesn't have Xbox Live Gold, this would be a wonderful offering.  Everything about Netflix is pretty much wonderful, and the instant viewing service is great and getting better all the time.

[Flames_of_chaos]

Even though I do have a 360, I currently have silver and don't plan on upgrading to gold any time soon since I didn't use xbox live enough last year to justify throwing down money for another year. However if Netflix actually goes through with this, it will be an awesome thing for Wii owners since the price is really cheap for the disc and given the fact that there are a lot of Wiis in people's homes this could be an attractive thing to the majority of the Wii's audience. Also I have a feeling that Netflix would be in a great position to sell a lot of streaming software.

[Jonnyboy117]

I doubt they would be making much on the discs themselves, especially if priced at $2.99.  Netflix is in it for the subscribers.

[Flames_of_chaos]

Well of course and since Wii doesn't have the ability to play movies normally, it will be an easy sell for netflix to offer this alternative.

[Stratos]

I like the sound of this. My roommate and I used Netflix in the dorms three years ago. This would be pretty neat to do the streaming as opposed to waiting for a disk in the mail. It's also nice to see different companies get creative in working around some of the Wii's numskull design choices.
This and the SD-work that Harmonix and Vicarious Visions did on the music games have been pretty creative and successful efforts.

[MegaByte]

A disc doesn't make any sense, especially considering its purpose.  This should be WiiWare.

[Mop it up]

If this offered games instead of movies I might have actually been interested in it.
Netflix should really expand to include games because I haven't heard anything good about GameFly...

[Stratos]

If this offered games instead of movies I might have actually been interested in it.
Netflix should really expand to include games because I haven't heard anything good about GameFly...

The only thing I've heard about Gamefly is that shipping is slow. They seem to be working on that as a company so it depends on how urgently you need you games or value the convenience of shipping. Games would be a great area of expansion for Netflix though I'm not sure the would want to expand into that area right now as a company. The may the economy is it might be too much of a financial risk for them to be comfortable taking.

[Bayou]

Well I am excited about having this feature, as I have no way of connecting my comp to my plasma TV and I probably wont be able to afford a new comp anytime soon so I will definitely be using this feuture, (though I am kinda dissapointed it isnt an online upgrade in the WIIware), not to mention the selection of VOD movies provided by my cable provider, well sucks and their is no video store near me on top of this (other then a DVD rental kiosk that doesnt have much better selection then my cables VOD).

[NinGurl69 *huggles]

I can expect the video/audio quality through this service to be arse-awful.

Just sayin'.

[ShyGuy]

This peaks my interest.... how much 480p video could the Wii buffer?

[Plugabugz]

Traffic shaping, bandwidth throttling and charging the earth for excess fees kills this idea dead (even though i'm not affected).

http://www.ispreview.co.uk/story/2009/03/16/another-vodafone-user-hit-by-22k-mobile-broadband-bill.html LOLz

That said i would be interested in seeing this here. If iPlayer can do it via the internet channel why not?

[Flames_of_chaos]

Traffic shaping, bandwidth throttling and charging the earth for excess fees kills this idea dead (even though i'm not affected).

http://www.ispreview.co.uk/story/2009/03/16/another-vodafone-user-hit-by-22k-mobile-broadband-bill.html LOLz

That said i would be interested in seeing this here. If iPlayer can do it via the internet channel why not?

You do realize that is with mobile broadband via a cellphone right? Traditional ISPs and cellphone companies charge different rates for broadband especially if the cellphone user is roaming while he is using Vodafone's cellular broadband, roaming rates especially if the user is out of the country is insane, sounds like they never bothered reading the fine print.

EDIT: Oh it's a USB dongle,  but those use a cellular broadband connection which is the same thing as broadband internet on cellular phones, so the rates could be the same exact thing and roaming using those type of internet connections never have a pretty bill.

[MegaByte]

For those worried about quality, there is no reason that there couldn't be good quality on the system.  Several homebrew solutions already work great, and XBMC has shown what can be done on an even weaker system.  Now, what Netflix will actually provide is another question altogether.

[Plugabugz]

I know it's mobile oriented, but here we have ISP's that provide the same principle to home connections.

I know of one that you pay x amount for 5gb/month, which is just a few movies streamed. The point overall im making is that while i like the idea it all ultimately depends on what kind of connection you're using.

[Jonnyboy117]

5 GB a month is extremely low usage; that might be okay for my mom.

Netflix Instant is already used by millions of people (on PC, 360, and other devices) who aren't getting hit with crazy bandwidth fees.  And the video quality is scaled from YouTube-levels up to 720p or so, depending on your connection speed.  The service auto-selects the quality so that your buffer can keep up with the movie.  It's not perfect, though -- I'm always getting a message that my "connection has slowed", and I have to wait a minute while they rebuffer a lower quality stream.

[DAaaMan64]

I can expect the video/audio quality through this service to be arse-awful.

Just sayin'.

It's pretty good on XBLA

[TJ Spyke]

Does anybody here use Netflix instant streaming? Last time I had Netflix and used it (which was last March), it was basically worthless. I have a pretty good broadband connection but it took about 30 minutes to to the first bit of buffering, then about 30 minutes halfway into the movie, and about another 15 minutes near the end. That meant a 90 minute movie could take about 3 hours to watch with instant streaming. Maybe it has improved though. The video quality was decent enough (not as good as watching with a real DVD though).

[Kairon]

Netflix streaming is one of the few things I envy XBox 360 owners immensely for.

I use netflix streaming all the time. My mom and dad do too.

[Morari]

I have this thing called an HDMI cable. It runs from my computer to my television in the other room. I can stream my NetFlix picks to the television anytime I want. Of course it's usually quicker, easier, and better looking to just pirate the stuff instead. Ultimately the streaming aspect is just a nice extra that comes with the real NetFlix experience: quickly copying films and mailing them back the very day they arrive!

Traffic shaping, bandwidth throttling and charging the earth for excess fees kills this idea dead (even though i'm not affected).

http://www.ispreview.co.uk/story/2009/03/16/another-vodafone-user-hit-by-22k-mobile-broadband-bill.html LOLz

That said i would be interested in seeing this here. If iPlayer can do it via the internet channel why not?

That's what Net Neutrality is for! Don't buy into the propaganda that the telecoms and the cable companies spew. We really do need an internet free of restrictions and corporate interests. Luckily, Obama does seem to be working toward that goal in a lot of his plans. Some of the folks he put in the FCC show that if nothing else.


User has been warned by stuffy moderators for promoting piracy in a joking manner and bringing up the factual statement that could easily be mistaken for politics ~Flames_of_chaos

[Stratos]

I have this thing called an HDMI cable. It runs from my computer to my television in the other room. I can stream my NetFlix picks to the television anytime I want. Of course it's usually quicker, easier, and better looking to just pirate the stuff instead. Ultimately the streaming aspect is just a nice extra that comes with the real NetFlix experience: quickly copying films and mailing them back the very day they arrive!

Traffic shaping, bandwidth throttling and charging the earth for excess fees kills this idea dead (even though i'm not affected).

http://www.ispreview.co.uk/story/2009/03/16/another-vodafone-user-hit-by-22k-mobile-broadband-bill.html LOLz

That said i would be interested in seeing this here. If iPlayer can do it via the internet channel why not?

That's what Net Neutrality is for! Don't buy into the propaganda that the telecoms and the cable companies spew. We really do need an internet free of restrictions and corporate interests. Luckily, Obama does seem to be working toward that goal in a lot of his plans. Some of the folks he put in the FCC show that if nothing else.

That's nice to hear about the Net Neutrality. I personally think it's a pretty important thing.

How long is your HDMI cable that you run from your computer? I've thought about doing that once I get an HDTV but my computer is in another room from the TV.

[BlackNMild2k1]

5 GB a month is extremely low usage; that might be okay for my mom.

Netflix Instant is already used by millions of people (on PC, 360, and other devices) who aren't getting hit with crazy bandwidth fees.  And the video quality is scaled from YouTube-levels up to 720p or so, depending on your connection speed.  The service auto-selects the quality so that your buffer can keep up with the movie.  It's not perfect, though -- I'm always getting a message that my "connection has slowed", and I have to wait a minute while they rebuffer a lower quality stream.

I love my Netflix Streaming. I've never really had a problem with it until recently.
it used to be that I click on a movie and open it in my IE tab in FF, and it starts almost immediately and there is usually no interruption in the stream until the movie is done (usually watch after 8pm though). Today I was forced into downloading MS Silver Light Player, and ZI had to stop every 20-30 minutes because "my connection slowed" and buffer for anywhere from 5-10minutes before the movie started again.
I don't know if its a daytime interference on my wireless connection or the new Silver Light player, but I'm gonna watch another movie later tonite to find out.

Good thing about the Silverlight player though is that I can play it in FF w/o the ie tab extension.

[MegaByte]

I've seen a ton of complaints of reduced quality and reliability when using the Silverlight player.

[Jonnyboy117]

I used Netflix streaming on my PC, back before any of this Silverlight crap.  Since the New Xbox Experience launched, I've used it even more.  I watched tons of The Office and 30 Rock over the service, plus a lot of documentaries and various random movies.  The selection is getting noticeably better lately.