First of all, that kind of tone is not appreciated here.
But beyond your tone, why do you think right now "staying alive" means that a business should be collecting an extra $5 per person, instead of it staying with people?
Considering the difficulties many people are going to have making rent etc... it seems like the default sympathetic position here should lie with the customer, not the business. To me, that's "getting your head straight." Siding with the common person over a corporation.
It baffles me how anyone could defend the current situation as an opportunity for more profits that customers should just shut up about.
I don't mean to strawman but are you saying luxury businesses should be able to get away with not delivering on what their customers pay for because we are in an unexpected situation?
Yes because the luxury business customer's wants to have the UHD they paid a small sum for do not trump other people's needs to be able to work from home in order to eat and keep the real economy working because of a pandemic.
I'm not claiming that Netflix and other services shouldn't help out the ISPs, because you're right that WFH > Netflix, but if they can't deliver what their customers paid for, they should be sending partial refunds.
It's really the issue on the part of the ISPs for not being able to provide enough service to support everyone's internet activity.
If Netflix wants to help them out with that issue they also have to bear the cost of helping them out with that issue.
If a university closes because of the pandemic they sure as hell won't charge room/board, and (if they're kind) won't charge as much for online courses.
The price factor is irrelevant ("a small sum"), and if it is, Netflix should have no problem refunding "a small sum".
But this is a completely unnecessary measure. Most ISPs in the EU don't have any problems keeping up with the increased demand. To make matters worse most Netflix content is served directly from the ISPs network.
This is a retarded symbolic policy to make it seem like a certain EU politician is doing something, when in fact it makes no difference what so ever.
How about next Monday, when all of the EU are trying to remote-school and remote-work simultaneously. Will there still be bandwidth to spare? (genuine question, I don't know the answer)
Can I use this argument to the people/corporations I owe? "Oh just get over it and accept things, it's not yesterday anymore you can't just expect delivery on contracts!"
That's exactly what a force majeure is. It depends on the specific contract and the jurisdiction whether a pandemic counts as one but it very well could.
Agreeing: If a pandemic isn't a force majeure then wtf is?
Perhaps if you signed up last week, then you could argue they should have foreseen the current situation from then. Prior to that, then it seems "best effort" is all one could or should expect. Perhaps with a monetary credit/refund if the mitigation is less costly than normal service.
Really? ISP's don't seem to be having issues with bandwidth anywhere, the only party which might be affected by this is Netflix itself since it's costs have likely skyrocketed since the quarantine and self-isolation began.
So companies can charge for products they can't deliver? Why should consumers bear the full brunt of the contractual price and not receive promised goods? It's not like we are stealing refunds from ordinary folks, these are heartless corporations (in USA) who squeeze every dime they can.
This is a fake problem, as evidenced by many network operators commenting on Twitter that traffic is only slightly higher. If people are having problems, it’s because their ISP has oversubscribed the last mile and are defrauding customers.
