APRIL 28, 2011 • Netflix is now the largest provider of online subscription video content in the U.S. Thanks to its increasingly popular video streaming service, Netflix saw its global subscriber base increase 70% to 23.6 million during the past year. In the process, Netflix jumped ahead of Comcast in the U.S. with more than 7% of Americans now subscribing to Netflix.
Impact: Cable television executives take note… the same conditions that led consumers to embrace music downloads are catching up with pay television carriers. Monthly bills in the $100-plus category makes a cheap streaming option like what Netflix offers very appealing. The game industry is seeing the same factors at work making monthly MMO subscriptions less and less appealing compared to the free-to-play MMO model. These trends will only accelerate.
