Netflix to settle in "throttling" case

If you listen to the Stomp Tokyo podcast you might have heard us talk about Netflix's practice of "throttling," or delaying shipments of DVDs to customers who habitually rent large numbers of discs each month. Netflix does this, obviously, to protect its profit margins, but the recent class-action lawsuit against the company claims that it did so while promising "unlimited" DVD rentals.

This San Francisco Chronicle article details the latest developments in Netflix's attempt to settle the case.

With the settlement, Netflix will not change its business practices. But it did retool the fine print in its user agreement and will offer former customers free service for a month and current customers a free one-month upgrade, so that instead of renting one video at a time, for instance, they can get two.

[via Hacking Netflix]