The retreat announced Friday settles a lawsuit alleging Netflixs plans to release millions of movie-rental records that could have illegally exposed sensitive information about its subscribers tastes and lifestyles.
The Federal Trade Commission also had raised questions about the companys ability to protect customers privacy, Netflix disclosed Friday.
FTC spokeswoman Claudia Bourne Farrell declined to comment.
Netflix intended [...]
The 28-day rental moratorium on Warner Bros. newly released DVDs and Blu-ray discs is a first for Netflix, but it probably wont be the last. Netflix hopes to reach similar deals with other major movie studios later this year, using the Warner Bros. agreement announced Wednesday as a template.
Warner Bros. Home Entertainments scheduled Jan. 19 [...]
It was a close call, but BellKors Pragmatic Chaos narrowly beat out a rival group called the Ensemble for the Netflix Prize, the Los Gatos, Calif.-based company said at an awards ceremony in New York.
For those more excited by algorithms than touchdowns, following the Netflix Prize has been like the Super Bowl. And the winning [...]
The DVD rental company has not yet announced a winner for its first $1 million challenge to improve its system of recommending movies that subscribers may enjoy, but it is already indicating there will be a sequel.
In a post on the Web forum set up for the current Netflix prize, Netflix Inc.s chief product officer, [...]
Once just an incongruous experiment amid the burgers and fries at McDonalds restaurants, Redbox has emerged as the largest operator of DVD-rental kiosks, with more than 15,400 vending machines set up to dispense $1-per-day discs in supermarkets and discount stores.
With Redbox opening an average of one kiosk per hour to lure budget-conscious consumers, Hastings is [...]
But the performance didnt live up to the high hopes of investors, causing Netflixs recently high-flying stock to dive after the results were released Thursday.
The company added 920,000 customers during the first three months of the year, boosting its first-quarter profit 68 percent to $22.4 million, or 37 cents per share. That compared with $13.3 [...]
Netflix ended the period with 10.3 million subscribers, the Los Gatos, California-based company said yesterday in a statement. Some shareholders expected more, analysts said.
“Investors are nitpicking,” Michael Olson, an analyst for Piper Jaffray Cos. in Minneapolis, said in an interview. “The [...]
The new rates announced Monday are being driven by the growing appetite for the Blu-ray format among Netflixs more than 10 million subscribers.
About 1 million of the subscribers are requesting Blu-ray discs instead of standard DVDs, and Blu-ray discs cost about 30 percent more. That means Netflixs profit margins are being squeezed as it expands [...]
Blockbuster also will sell TiVos DVRs in stores and on its Web site, the companies said today in a statement. Financial terms werent disclosed. The Blockbuster On Demand service, offering film rentals and sales, will be available through TiVo devices in the second half of 2009, the companies said.
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Fourth-quarter shipments fell 32 percent in the U.S. and Canada to 453.6 million DVDs, according to Los Angeles-based Digital Entertainment Group. The drop is the biggest since the industry-funded researcher started keeping track in 1997.
The decline is being fueled by viewer [...]