Kyle Brady: Blog » Feature Request

Netflix Shipping Change [Self]

Kyle Brady — Sun, 28 Dec 2008 19:44:16 +0000

Imagine my surprise today, when I saw that Netflix has updated their shipping rules to adapt to locally unavailable DVDs.

Why am I surprised?

Because, not long ago, I had an issue with this and made a suggestion along the lines that they implemented.

Hooray for my awesomeness.

The iPod’s Future Killer Feature… From Space [Old Content]

Kyle Brady — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 17:50:02 +0000

Remember when people got excited about the newest edition of the iPod? "OH MY GOD! COLOR!" (the Photo) or "OH COOL, IT CAN FIT IN MY MOUTH!" (the Shuffle) Well, I believe those days have passed, and been succeeded by iPhone excitement.

But all that can change, for the low, low price of Apple listening to me.

The iPod Now

Today's iPod comes in two variants: "Classic" and "Touch". The only major differences are the Touch's ability to be the iPhone without the phone part, but they collectively range anywhere between 8GB and 120GB.

Feature list includes:

Music

Video

Podcasts

Color screen

Sweet interface

Everything you'd expect from an iPod, right?

Wrong.

Microsoft Beats You At This, Apple

The Zune, Microsoft's mostly failed attempt at an iPod competitor, has something very basic that Apple has chosen to ignore: an FM tuner. I'm not going to say that FM radio is a great feature, but at this point all it takes to have radio built-in to your device is a very small chip.

No wires. No mess. No antennae.

GPS? Check.

The iPhone uses some sort of magic spaceman technology called "GPS". Ever heard of it? It's probably in your brand new Porsche. And your cell phone. And maybe even that cup of coffee you bought an hour ago at Starbucks.

Just kidding on that last one.

Anyways, think for a second about what GPS really is: a connection between an Earth-based device and an orbiting satellite, sending data, at a minimum, in one direction, that allows your device to determine your current location.

So This "Future Killer Feature"...?

Satellite radio.

If the iPhone can handle communication with satellites already (the GPS), why can't it just take the next leap? I'm not familiar with the intricacies of satellite radio, but I'm fairly confident that it can't be too much more difficult than GPS, especially since the GPS is already interpreting data beamed to it from a satellite... one-way communication, just like satellite radio.

I'm suggesting that Apple partner with XM/Sirius and help move the modern world into the next wave of "radio". Why? Three major reasons.

Satellite radio is a great idea, but it's been slow to go mainstream, due to the necessary equipment. "In my car? Great, but what about while I'm running?" / "Well, you need another device for that, and maybe even another subscription." / *customer leaves*

Additionally, satellite radio needs to grow its customer base in order to survive, and soon. By tapping into the Apple market, they have a built-in success factor of 9000. Or 100%. Whichever you prefer.

Apple is running out of options for what other kinds of media they can put on a mobile device, and so they're going to (maybe) start seeing their competitors play less "catch up" and more "we're even now, man". They're obviously going to need an edge to stay competitive, and that edge does not include the App Store.

Imagine The Submarine

Try and picture having satellite radio on your iPod or iPhone: you're tired of listening to Prince for the last three days, and want some new music, but don't feel like poking around to find new music. So you sign up for XM/Sirius service for $X/mth, and have access to all the music you can handle.

Doesn't that sound great?

It's technically feasible, so go on, spread the word. I want to listen to 24hrs of European Trance straight from the Eastern Bloc, so let's get busy... besides, I already can do that with iTunes, just make it mobile!

It's the iPod's future killer feature... from space. And I'm willing to bet it's already "in the works".

Netflix Feature Request: “Follow” [Self]

Kyle Brady — Sun, 19 Oct 2008 22:37:16 +0000

Netflix, oh Netflix. Will I ever stop loving thee?

As I've mentioned before, I not only love Netflix, but I also have what many would probably call an "obsession" with certain actors or directors... I'd prefer to call it "extreme favoritism for the individual in question's genius", but whatever. Because of this "obsession" I have a habit of adding all the movies from the actor/director's cinematic history, and brings me to the point...

If you're like me and love how Sylvester Stallone plays the same role in all his movies, and want to see every one... you've added all his movies to your Queue. But what if he comes out with a new movie, and you don't keep an ear close enough to the ground to hear about it?

Stallone is a bad example, because his modern movies tend to have astronomical amounts of marketing behind them, but the principle is the same. It can be very difficult to keep track of what movies your favorite actor, actress, or director is involved with, especially if they keep themselves very busy.

The idea comes from Hulu's "Subscribe" option, where you automatically get the newest releases from any given show added to your Hulu Queue. Programatically, it shouldn't be difficult. Either there's a nightly "oh crap, any new movies with [x]?" CRON Job that runs across the whole site, or a special script is run individually whenever new content is added.

For example, I only found out that Brad Pitt is in "Burn After Reading" a few days before it opened in theaters, and even then only because I keep an eye on a large number of blogs. Not having TV and not going to the movies very often make finding information like this difficult, and I feel that this feature would be very useful to a large part of the Netflix customer base, given my previous thoughts.

This could work for directors, like Guillermo del Toro, or anyone else who makes it in the "Netflix name box" (see below).

So, Netflix, please, pretty please, will you implement this feature?

I asked nicely!

Netflix: Two Feature Requests [Self]

Kyle Brady — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 01:45:08 +0000

I've said it before in my rants/observations/whatever: I really love Netflix. Not a teenager-and-it's-summer kind of "love", or a we-met-in-Cancun-a-week-ago-then-got-married kind of "love"... but it's still love all the same.

Anyways, besides the obvious need for "Watch Now" to work on Linux, I think there's two things that they should throw in...

User-Rating Feed

In this lovely era of Web 2.0 (note the sarcasm?), not having APIs and Feeds is akin to being a data mongerer. While I don't necessarily agree with that, I'd love for a way to automagically say "yeah, here's all the movies I rated as 4 or 5 stars... great movies!", like, say, for use in an open-standards profile.

Stars are important. Not these though.

Netflix, you come so close to doing this that I've gotten my hopes up many times. Hoping that maybe you changed something, or momentarily forgetting it's not what I think... you have feeds for "Recently Activity", "Queue", "Movies at Home", "Movie Reviews", and "Recomendations". You'd think "Movie Reviews" would have it... right?

Nope. Apparently it's only for if you actually write a review. To me, it would make sense to include at least the rating you give a movie (since that is a review in itself)... even if there's no writeup associated with it. But a "filterable" method for pure star-ratings would be best.

Insta-Ship

Sometimes, you just want a movie sooner than you know you'll get it. One of the things that has always frustrated me about Netflix has nothing to do with them: the USPS.

The mail service is so inconsistent and incompetent that I tend to get my movies a day later than Netflix thinks I should, and it takes 3 days for Netflix to receive them. What happened to "Next-Day"?

This baby loved his insta-shipped movie!

But I have a solution. Ship the next queued movie as soon as the customer rates one in their "At Home" category, on the assumption that they'll be shipping the old one within 24 hours, instead of shipping on receipt. Keep track of a user's "karma"... if they typically hold on to 3 movies at once when they have a 2 movie plan, stop rating-shipping them and flip back to receipt-shipping.

This would not only be awesome, but it'd be a smarter and more efficient way to deliver rental DVDs by mail... also eliminating most of the excuses "brick and mortar" stores have given for why people shouldn't use your service.

Different Packaging

sweet a bonus third suggestion!

I can't help but feel that I'm killing the environment while using Netflix. Yes, I recycle the rip-open covers. Yes, I realize you probably reuse the envelopes, to a certain extent, whether through recycling or magically adding new covers... but still.

Why not ship it in a lockable flat DVD case? The kind that's something like 1/4" thick. It would almost always get returned to you, because the system won't change.

Don't make the trees hurt you!

I realize it might be a few cents more expensive to ship it... but if you reuse one box 1000 times, how many envelopes does that save? How many DVDs don't get broken because they aren't in a paper envelope? How much money is saved from not making new envelopes?

It might even make your customers feel better. Feel more "green".