Shocker! Netflix requires members to plan their rentals!!!

It took Time Magazine's Richard Corliss 8-10 years to notice that Netflix doesn't work for spur of the moment movie rentals? HORROR! Yes, that's true, but that's basic logic behind a mail-through service. One can plan to acquire a given release within a few days or placing it in their queue, but they can't just toss a random film into their queue and expect instant gratification. That's why I use Blockbuster online, because I can also rent spur of the moment for free from their actual stores to supplement the mail-order requests. But if I were using Netflix, I sure wouldn't have the right to complain about spur of the moment movie choices. I can't vouch for Netflix aside from the couple times I've used them on a trial basis, but I've never ever gotten a wrong movie via mail from Blockbuster. And if Corliss misses the human interaction of video stores, then he can walk/drive to a local video store any darn time he wants. Corliss complains that Netflix "you surrender those basic American rights: impulse choice and instant gratification". Yet the Time Magazine critic's big complaint seems to be that he actually has to make the choice for himself as to whether to order a film from Netflix and wait a couple days, or venture out to a video store or a movie theater on his own whim. God forbid that he actually just do both. Use Netflix for convenient rentals that are not time-sensitive or spur-of-the moment, AND use standard video stores to feed the need for a random movie or human interaction for a Friday night. It seems that some people want Netflix to do it all. That's called laziness.

Scott Mendelson