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Netflix’s Ad-Supported Plan Could Launch By Year’s End
Christian Hetrick
Christian Hetrick is dot.LA's Entertainment Tech Reporter. He was formerly a business reporter for the Philadelphia Inquirer and reported on New Jersey politics for the Observer and the Press of Atlantic City.
Netflix’s promised ad-supported tier and crackdown on password sharing could launch by the end of this year, with the streaming giant reportedly accelerating its timeline on the moves after losing subscribers last quarter.
Executives at Netflix told staffers that they aim to introduce a cheaper subscription with ads during the final three months of 2022, according to the New York Times. The company plans to start restricting password sharing around that same time, the report added.
Bringing commercials to Netflix by year’s end would be a much faster timeline than company leaders have previously signaled. On the company’s first-quarter earnings call last month, co-CEO Reed Hastings told investors that advertising was something Netflix was “trying to figure out over the next year or two.”
That itself was a big deal, given Netflix’s long-standing opposition to ads. But the company’s streaming rivals have shown that customers are increasingly willing to sit through commercials if it means paying less per month in subscription fees. While competitors like HBO Max and Paramount Plus continued to grow their customer bases last quarter, Netfllix lost 200,000 subscribers and expects to lose 2 million more in the current quarter.
Netflix has also blamed password sharing for its sluggish growth, estimating that 100 million households may be using accounts without paying for them. (The company has 222 million paying customers globally.) In March, the company started testing extra charges for subscribers to share passwords outside of their households, initially rolling out the changes in Chile, Peru and Costa Rica.
Greg Peters, Netflix’s COO, said during the last month’s earnings call that the company would “go through a year or so of iterating” before deploying a password sharing plan. Now, according to the Times, Netflix wants to roll out the extra charges “in tandem” with the ad-supported tier it aims to launch later this year.
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Christian Hetrick
Christian Hetrick is dot.LA's Entertainment Tech Reporter. He was formerly a business reporter for the Philadelphia Inquirer and reported on New Jersey politics for the Observer and the Press of Atlantic City.
How a Text Helped California Dodge Rolling Blackouts
01:11 PM | September 07, 2022
Courtesy of Cedric Letsch on Unsplash
Yesterday afternoon millions Californians around the state received an emergency alert straight to their mobile phones asking them to conserve power as the electric grid teetered on edge of collapse. The move came as the state battles on through an historic heatwave that has laid bare the shortcoming of its infrastructure in the face of a new and hotter climate.
At around 5 p.m. yesterday, the Golden State grid saw a record-setting peak demand of 52,061 megawatts. At 5:17, grid operators triggered a level 3 energy emergency alert, which signals to utility providers to prepare for rotating blackouts.
“We were well into the reserve tank of the car,” said CAISO president Elliot Mainzer in a press conference this morning. “We were down to the last gallon there and dipping into our operating reserves.”
At 5:45 p.m., Governor Newsom authorized the use of the wireless emergency alert system, which sent the text urging Californians to conserve power. The impact was almost immediate.
“Within moments, we saw a significant amount of load reduction showing up to the tune of approximately 2000 megawatts,” said Mainzer. “That significant response from California consumers to the wireless emergency alert allowed us to restore our operating reserves and took us back from the edge of broader disturbance. As a result, we stayed in the first phase of the EAA three, and did not have to trigger rotating outages last night.”
Despite the CAISO’s adamance that it never called for rotating outages, the Northern California Power Agency did in fact cut the power for residents. Mainzer insists that the blackouts were likely the result of confusion between the two agencies.
“I don't know, honestly, this morning, exactly what happened there,” says Mainzer. “But we will be in touch and certainly really doubling down our communication with the utility to make sure that there is not a problem like that going forward.”
CAISO said that, even though the state was scrounging for every single megawatt it could find, the 45 megawatts saved from the communication snafu would not have made the difference to keep the lights on statewide.
Mainzer says the flex power gleaned from residents scaling back on power consumption–which totaled over 2,000 megawatts–was the key in bringing the grid back from the brink. But the agency is also aware that over-using the messaging system will likely decrease its effectiveness, as Californians become desensitized to repeated warnings.
“I think we need to be very careful not to just think that we can depend on that sort of a tool,” he said.
With temperature set to remain extremely high for at least several more days, CAISO is hoping that it won’t need the text warning again tonight, although there will still be a flex alert for this evening and citizens are still being asked to set thermostats to 78 degrees Fahrenheit, turn off unnecessary lights, and refrain from using appliances between the hours of 4 p.m. and 9 p.m.
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David Shultz
David Shultz reports on clean technology and electric vehicles, among other industries, for dot.LA. His writing has appeared in The Atlantic, Outside, Nautilus and many other publications.
Here's How To Get a Digital License Plate In California
03:49 PM | October 14, 2022
Photo by Clayton Cardinalli on Unsplash
Thanks to a new bill passed on October 5, California drivers now have the choice to chuck their traditional metal license plates and replace them with digital ones.
The plates are referred to as “Rplate” and were developed by Sacramento-based Reviver. A news release on Reviver’s website that accompanied the bill’s passage states that there are “two device options enabling vehicle owners to connect their vehicle with a suite of services including in-app registration renewal, visual personalization, vehicle location services and security features such as easily reporting a vehicle as stolen.”
Reviver Auto Current and Future CapabilitiesFrom Youtube
There are wired (connected to and powered by a vehicle’s electrical system) and battery-powered options, and drivers can choose to pay for their plates monthly or annually. Four-year agreements for battery-powered plates begin at $19.95 a month or $215.40 yearly. Commercial vehicles will pay $275.40 each year for wired plates. A two-year agreement for wired plates costs $24.95 per month. Drivers can choose to install their plates, but on its website, Reviver offers professional installation for $150.
A pilot digital plate program was launched in 2018, and according to the Los Angeles Times, there were 175,000 participants. The new bill ensures all 27 million California drivers can elect to get a digital plate of their own.
California is the third state after Arizona and Michigan to offer digital plates to all drivers, while Texas currently only provides the digital option for commercial vehicles. In July 2022, Deseret News reported that Colorado might also offer the option. They have several advantages over the classic metal plates as well—as the L.A. Times notes, digital plates will streamline registration renewals and reduce time spent at the DMV. They also have light and dark modes, according to Reviver’s website. Thanks to an accompanying app, they act as additional vehicle security, alerting drivers to unexpected vehicle movements and providing a method to report stolen vehicles.
As part of the new digital plate program, Reviver touts its products’ connectivity, stating that in addition to Bluetooth capabilities, digital plates have “national 5G network connectivity and stability.” But don’t worry—the same plates purportedly protect owner privacy with cloud support and encrypted software updates.
5 Reasons to avoid the digital license plate | Ride TechFrom Youtube
After the Rplate pilot program was announced four years ago, some raised questions about just how good an idea digital plates might be. Reviver and others who support switching to digital emphasize personalization, efficient DMV operations and connectivity. However, a 2018 post published by Sophos’s Naked Security blog pointed out that “the plates could be as susceptible to hacking as other wireless and IoT technologies,” noting that everyday “objects – things like kettles, TVs, and baby monitors – are getting connected to the internet with elementary security flaws still in place.”
To that end, a May 2018 syndicated New York Times news service article about digital plates quoted the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), which warned that such a device could be a “‘honeypot of data,’ recording the drivers’ trips to the grocery store, or to a protest, or to an abortion clinic.”
For now, Rplates are another option in addition to old-fashioned metal, and many are likely to opt out due to cost alone. If you decide to go the digital route, however, it helps if you know what you could be getting yourself into.
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Steve Huff
Steve Huff is an Editor and Reporter at dot.LA. Steve was previously managing editor for The Metaverse Post and before that deputy digital editor for Maxim magazine. He has written for Inside Hook, Observer and New York Mag. Steve is the author of two official tie-ins books for AMC’s hit “Breaking Bad” prequel, “Better Call Saul.” He’s also a classically-trained tenor and has performed with opera companies and orchestras all over the Eastern U.S. He lives in the greater Boston metro area with his wife, educator Dr. Dana Huff.
steve@dot.la
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