We've made the switch...

to Netflix, that is. For anyone who is unfamiliar with the two main rivals of intermail movie delivery, here is how they work:

Blockbuster online - You pay about $20/month for three movies at a time, and get 5 "in-store" exchanges. That means that 5 times a month, instead of returning your dvd by popping it into the mail, you bring it to the store and exchange it for a movie in the store. It's still like returning the movie by mail, except they acknowledge receipt as soon as the clerk checks it in, saving you a day.

The benefit to this was mostly that we had an excuse to leave our home to exchange and then return movies. (An underestimated perk for law students). This was also good for us, because $20/month would be less than the $50/month it would cost to have basic cable. We mostly rented TV shows anyway. Getting movies at the store was not so great, because the store makes it a point to only stock the absolute worst movies ever made.

Netflix - has the same mail delivery dvd system, except that it is cheaper, has better movies available, does not lie and say that it has a movie and then not deliver it to you for a year, does not send you broken dvds several times in a row, and has an easy-to-find number to call. Oh, and you can download some movies onto your computer for no extra charge!

So what was the last straw that made us switch? BB changed its in-store exchange policy, without telling us in any way, so that now when you return a movie to the store and take out new movies, you have to drive back to the store and return those movies before they will send you new ones!

Needless to say, once we realized what was going on, Dreamboat sent them a short email canceling our service. I think he signed off with "See you in bankruptcy court."

Sometimes I don't know why I didn't go into business.