DVD Unwrapped

Just a few days after their almost all-day downtime, NetFlix has rolled out new site “enhancements” including several design changes. One of these design changes were for the Queue section where NetFlix lists all the movies you are waiting for as well as the movies you currently have out. My first thought, was that it looked pretty. And I like the addition of the Watch Instantly column which I assume will allow users to click on a link and start watching available movies in their Queue instead or in addition to renting them.

One feature they removed was the column that listed if you chose a DVD or Blu Ray movie. I can understand with HD DVD being phased out that there is less of a need for that option, but I thought it was really functional to be able to toggle from DVD to Blu Ray right in the queue. This was a very convenient feature that let me change selections without having to take the standard DVD out of the queue, then search for the Blu Ray and add it back to the queue. This may not seem like a big deal to most, but in my house, the Blu Ray player is off limits to the kids. Not to mention, I only have one Blu Ray player in the house and that is in the living room. So I have a need and desire to rent both Blu Ray and standard definition DVDs, sometimes both formats of the same movie. So this part of the redesign has really made the service less convenient.

(more…)