Netflix to Charge 1 US Dollar Extra for Blu-ray Rentals

Since the economy hasn't been doing so great lately, in the near future, people will most likely prefer to stay at home in order to watch a movie rather than spend good money on a theater ticket, popcorn and the gas required in order to drive to the cinema. For this reason, movie renting services have decided that perhaps it's a good idea to capitalize on this situation, the first one being Netflix, which, in a post on the company's blog, announced the fact that users who opt to rent Blu-ray flicks will have to cough up an extra dollar for their monthly subscriptions in order to be able to enjoy their favorite movies in full high-definition resolution.

As Jessie Teitz, VP of Marketing, states in the aforementioned blog post, the reason for this increase in the cost of the subscription is represented by the fact that Blu-ray discs are obviously more expensive than "classic" DVDs. For this reason, starting with November 5th, the price of the subscription required for renting BDs will go up a dollar.

As mentioned earlier, this increase applies solely to those users who have opted for Blu-ray access in their account. Users who are not willing to pay an extra dollar for this service can simply remove the Blu-ray access.

As in any situation, there are several angles from which Netflix's decision can be viewed. First of all, there's certainly the monetary problem, since the company most likely requires the respective amount (which is indeed relatively low). However, this move might actually affect Blu-ray renting (and sales), which aren't exactly thriving.

All in all, nobody likes to pay up an extra fee on a service that was previously free. Nevertheless, as in the case of most other increases of this type, there will probably be some people who will initially reject this claim, but who, at some point in the future, will end up actually coughing up this amount.

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