Not so long ago, Netflix said that it will crack down all the individuals and accounts that were involved in password sharing so as to promote its subscription plan but went silent afterward.
But in its Q1 letter to shareholders timed with its earnings report, Netflix said it “shifted the timing” of the launch of paid sharing to Q2 from late Q1 due to tweaks it made to the program. Hence, the long-awaited password-sharing crackdown could be coming any day now.
“We’re pleased with the most recent launches of paid sharing, and while we could have launched broadly in Q1, we found opportunities to improve the experience for members. We learn more with each rollout, and we’ve incorporated the latest learnings, which we think will lead to even better results,” the company said.
Initially, Netflix claimed to launch its program “more broadly” in Q1 which terminated at the end of March. But after launching and testing it in several countries such as New Zealand, Canada, and Spain, it is now finally ready to be launched in this quarter as well which will begin at the start of April and will run until the end of June.
This password crackdown naturally has not been popular with customers and people are outraged. People claim that Netflix is by far the most expensive and isn’t worth its value. Hence, many people took to social media to announce that they’ll soon enough cancel their subscriptions following the new policy.
“You’re by far the most expensive streaming service w/o the value matching it. Sort your mess,” one tweet from a politician in Ohio read.
And the people aren’t quite far off with this as Netflix’s new “paid-sharing” policy states paying extra to share accounts with someone outside the household. Whereas in Canada, users now pay an additional fee of $CAD 7.99 per extra member.
Co-CEO of Netflix, Greg Peters, in January, did although point out that password sharing would not be a “universally popular move,” according to The Hollywood Reporter. And Netflix has already revealed that this is in fact true, as this policy has resulted in a “cancel reaction” from some customers in countries where this program was tested.