Netflix ads for sale on eBay

At first, I was excited to see this auction for "Casino Royale 007 Trade Ad for Netflix" on eBay Express, because I thought it was the original advertisement artwork, but imagine my disappointment when I saw that the auction is for the ad on the Netflix envelope flap. I already have several. Netflix must have mailed out millions of them. An example of one man's trash is another man's treasure, if it sells. The "Buy It Now" price is $.99, but shipping is an outrageous $5.00, since it cost Netflix just $.39 to send it to the seller. The same seller has an ad for Deja Vu for sale also.

The Jacket

I bought a used Netflix jacket on eBay, and whenever I wear it, I attract alot of attention. I don't know if it's officially licensed merchandise or not. It's not well designed, because the embroidered Netflix logo is hidden by the hood hanging in the back. But it's Netflix red, so I think it's beautiful.

When they see my jacket, people I had no idea were Netflix subscribers come up to me to tell me how much they love Netflix, like they have no idea what a fan I am. I thought I was famous for being a Netflix evangelist here in my real life, so how could there be folks who don't already know I love Netflix? How could I know people who joined Netflix without finding out about it from me first? I must be slacking off. :)

I especially love wearing my jacket when I go to theaters, which is twice a week. I want movie fans and theater staff to know that Netflix is not a threat to my movie attendance, but rather increases my love of movies.

AMC Theatres Best Picture showcase

If you haven't seen all of the Oscar nominated films, now is your chance. AMC Theatres is having a marathon of all the best pictures on February 24. For $30, you can watch all five films back to back in one day, with free large popcorn and large drink and a collectible pass. You can come and go as you please all day, and you get free refills on popcorn and drink.

Babel 11:00 a.m.
The Queen 1:45 p.m.
The Departed 3:45 p.m.
Letters From Iwo Jima 7:00 p.m.
Little Miss Sunshine 9:45 p.m.

Go to the Oscar Showcase Web site to find out if a theatre near you is participating. The closest to me is Charlotte, NC, but I've already seen all the films.

Awarding winning animation

Guy 101 won the British Academy award for best animated short. You can watch it here. It may never be available on Netflix, so this might be your only chance to see it.

Top and bottom ten of 2006

Of the movies I have seen which came out in 2006, these are my best and least best lists. I didn't see any real stinkers, but the least best movies were the ones that made me regret spending the money to see them in the theatre, which is what I did for all of these movies. I think you should see all the movies on the Best list, and avoid the least best, or at least wait for the video.

Best:

Little Miss Sunshine (2006)
Pan's Labyrinth (2006)
Water (2005)
Queen, The (2006)
Children of Men (2006)
Facing the Giants (2006)
The Pursuit of Happyness (2006)
Stranger Than Fiction (2006)
Babel (2006)
The Prestige (2006)

Least best:

Black Dahlia (2006)
Cars (2006)
Hollywoodland (2006)
Let's Go to Prison (2006)
One Night With The King (2006)
Pirates of the Caribbean 2: Dead Man's Chest (2006)
X-Men 3: The Last Stand (2006)
You, Me and Dupree (2006)
Poseidon (2006)
Ice Age: The Meltdown (2006)

Rumors of my Netflix addiction are greatly exaggerated

Some folks are addicted to Netflix. Thank goodness I'm not that bad. I can understand why some people become addicts, because Netflix makes it too easy. For example, before Netflix, I rented maybe two movies a month, and went to the theatre about once a month. Now I'm renting three a week and going to the theatre twice a week.

I used to have 500 in my queue, but that was in 2004. Now it's down to 55. See? I'm getting better. I have it under control. I promise I'll stop once I've watched 62 more movies. Besides, now is not a good time to quit Netflix, when I'm so close to finishing the 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die.

I just use Netflix to relax at the end of a hard day. If you knew what a hard life I've had, you'd use Netflix too. I'm certainly not as bad as these pathetic people who post comments on Hacking Netflix.

If I didn't have this blog about Netflix, I could easily give it up, no problem.

My similiarity is different from yours

Beano is a longtime Netflix Fan friend. He says he's my number one Netflix Friend, at 82% similarity. The problem is, on my Netflix Friends page, I have no friends with that level of similarity. The highest on my end is 77%. I think Netflix is figuring similarity based on different factors for Beano and me. It could be a ratio of ratings in common to movies in common, or something like that. How does Netflix calculate similarity? To find the answer, I plugged the word "similarity" into the Netflix Help Center Quick search:

Q: What does the Friends “% Similarity” number mean?
A: Based on the movies you and your Friends have watched and rated, Netflix calculates the similarity in how you rate, and the movies you select.

The calculation takes into consideration many factors, including the relative number of movies each of you have seen and for which you overlap (for instance, if you’ve rated 20 movies and overlap on them all, that is “more similar” than if you’ve rated 2000 movies and only overlap on 20), as well as the obscurity of the overlapping titles (if you both like the same rare film, that is “more similar” than if you both like a top 10 movie).

Based on these factors, you can accurately compare yourself to each of your Friends. This value will change over time as one or both of you rate more movies, and as the overlapping movies you’ve seen increases.

Netflix blanket part of charity auction: UPDATED

You can bid for a Netflix blanket which comes in a a Sundance swag bag donated by Billy Baldwin to support the Carol M. Baldwin Breast Cancer Research Fund. The swag bag contains other goodies too.

UPDATE: There's another charity auction by Six Degrees for a Sundance swag bag signed by Kevin Bacon and Kyra Sedgewick which contains a one-year Netflix subscription.

My new Netflix profile nickname

Hey y'all, I lied. I just tried to change my profile from RosieCotton to NetflixFan, and it worked! I could swear I'd tried it before, and it wouldn't let me use the word "Netflix" in my nickname.

Oldest Netflix queue possible

Although commenters Vince, Dave, Christopher have all been members since 1999, I'm afraid I can't declare a winner to the "oldest queue" contest, but I can say that the oldest Netflix membership you can have is from September 1999, which is when Netflix rolled out the Marquee plan, the first version of the subscription model. That was the first Netflix deal which involved having a queue. It wasn't until 2000 that they did away with the a la carte rental option and the Marquee plan went unlimited. I think that's when Netflix As We Know It began. They had just a few hundred thousand members, and only 7000 titles. 97% of us have joined since then. I can't believe it took me so many years to become a convert!

If you Google "Netflix Profile", you might run across a link to DW from MO, who has has been a Netflix member since Sept 1999, has rated 3305 movies, and written 230 reviews.

Even though Google indexes them, it looks like the Netflix Profile links aren't really public. I had to sign into my Netflix account to see FW from Garland, TX, aka spindaddydad.

Longest Netflix turnaround?

Netflix Fan Elmer Gantry says he lives in Northeast Tennessee, and he has to wait 12 days for his Netflix discs to arrive. That's just wrong. I suspect that somewhere between his mailbox and Netflix, someone is "borrowing" them.

Linking to your Netflix profile page

In soliciting links to whoever has the oldest Netflix membership, I failed to point out how to link to your profile page in order to share it with others, without having to give away account information.

There is a link on the Browse menu, which is on the right side of your Netflix member home page, under guides, called "your reviews and lists." Clicking on that will take you to the version of your profile which you can edit. To get to the version the public can see, click on "public" in your profile's privacy settings, and then click on "view page." That's the link I want you to post in the comments, if you have a long-running membership.

Longest Netflix membership?

When I blogged about my three-year anniversary with Netflix, tedder commented that they've been a member since April 2000. Can you beat that? I'd love to know who has had the longest continuous membership with Netflix. It's probably someone who works for them. If you've been a member since before April 2000, send me a link to your Netflix profile page to prove it. Thanks!

Blockbuster Total Access problems

Blogger Wesley Novack has been experiencing Blockbuster Total Access problems. He says the stores aren't returning DVDs immediately, so that he's had to wait a week for Blockbuster Online to check them in, contrary to what they promise.

Happy Netflix anniversary to me!

I have been a member of Netflix for three years! I joined in January 2004 and never quit. Netflix has sent me 544 titles, which is an average of 15 titles per month. My plan has been mostly 3-out. I took a brief foray into the 5-out and 8-out plans, in 2005, but I got way behind in watching them.

I've rated over 2,200 titles, but written only 11 reviews on Netflix. Here's a link to my Netflix Profile page, where you can see my reviews and lists. My profile nickname is RosieCotton. They wouldn't let me be Netflix Fan. Go figure.

I've seen 923 of the 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die.

Because Netflix provides me with so much entertainment at such a great price, I quit cable in 2004. So this is also my Happy No-Cable anniversary day!

Netflix return envelopes on eBay

If you live in the Houston, TX area, and you don't own a black marker, you can buy some Netflix return envelopes on eBay in order to avoid sending your returns to a far distant Netflix distribution center.

Defeat long-distance Netflix returns

If you have a Netflix return envelope with a far-away distribution center address on it, you don't have to return your disc there. You can simply mark out that address with a black marker, leaving nothing but the words "nearest Netflix distribution center" and the Postal Service will drop it in the local Netflix bin to be picked up by the Netflix truck. This will speed up your turnaround times.

This advice came to me via Netflix Fan Elmer Gantry, who received it from a Netflix customer service rep.

Netflix Fan wins (and loses) Instant Watching lottery

Hacking Netflix has instructions for how to enter the Netflix Instant Watching lottery. I followed the instructions just for fun, and I "won"! I clicked on the help link on the Netflix home page and searched for "instant watching". I clicked on one of the questions, and it contained a link to instant watching, where I saw the Netflix WatchNow home page which told me I could "start now". So I clicked on Start Now, and got the above message.

Only a few members can try this method each day, so some unlucky person must have been robbed of a chance to watch Netflix movies on his PC tonight, because of me.

Ironic, isn't it?

Pan's Labyrinth (2006)

Depending on your tolerance for weirdness and violence, you must see Pan's Labyrinth, a strange combination of war movie, fantasy, and political statement. It's about a young girl who lives in Spain in 1944, right after the Fascists won the civil war, who discovers a fantasy world. It's a great movie. But, please, parents, don't take your kids. This is not a kids' movie. Pan's Labyrinth is a dark fantasy, but not dark like Lord of the Rings dark. I mean dark like Schindler's List-dark.

Watch Netflix Now: movie downloads come to Netflix

Hacking NetFlix reveals Netflix's new "Watch Now" movie download feature.

Good news: for no additional cost, you can watch Netflix movies on your PC.

Bad news: you can watch Netflix movies ONLY on your Windows PC.

More bad news: only a select few subscribers can see the "Watch Now" tab on their Netflix home page.

Check out Hacking Netflix's video demo of the new feature.

Read the official press release from Netflix.

P.S. The Netflix Fan blog is written on a Mac, so I'm shut out of watching anything now.