The little-known practice, called “throttling” by critics, means Netflix customers who pay the same price for the same service are often treated differently, depending on their rental patterns.
Wired News: Netflix Critics Slam ‘Throttling’
Always suspected they were throttling, but never thought they’d just blatantly add it to their TOS:
In determining priority for shipping and inventory allocation, we give priority to those members who receive the fewest DVDs through our service. As a result, those subscribers who receive the most movies may experience that (i) the shipment of their next available DVD occurs at least one business day following return of their previously viewed movie, (ii) delivery takes longer, as the shipments may not be processed from their local distribution center and (iii) they receive movies lower in their queue more often than our other subscribers. Other factors that may affect delivery times, include, but are not limited to, (i) the distance between the distribution center from which your DVD was shipped and your delivery address, (ii) the timing of your placement or adjustment of movies in your queue and (iii) circumstances impacting delivery by the U.S. Postal Service.
So much for giving Netflix subscriptions as gifts. A change in TOS notification would’ve been nice. Still better than renting at the local Blockbuster or Hollywood video.
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