Apparently, Blockbuster hasn't figured out the secret to competing in an open market. In an attempt to seize market share from NetFlix, they've decided that the best course of action would be to raise prices, rather than lower them. The higher prices come to the "Total Access Premium Plan," which that allows customers to have three DVDs sent to them at a time, and unlimited in-store exchanges.
They've decided to raise the price from $24.99 to $34.99, a price point that at NetFlix will get you double the number of DVDs checked out at once, and unlimited online streams.
This is actually pretty timely for me. I signed my wife and I up last night for NetFlix, and while we haven't had a chance to get our first discs in the mail yet, we did take advantage of the online streaming option, which worked surprisingly well on my $10 DSL.
Blockbuster has tried a number of things lately to achieve more relevance, and perhaps retake some of the market share from NetFlix, like joining Facebook's Project Bacn and launching the online release of Jackass 2.5. I personally remain doubtful on the eventual success of these moves, but time will tell.
[via Ars Technica]