While streaming has made consuming movies and series better in many ways, including increasing the level of choice and the volume of programming, consumers are well aware of the many pain points. Most of which are perfectly summed up in Black Mirror‘s “Common People” episode.
The remainder of this article contains major episode spoilers for Netflix’s Black Mirror season 7, episode 1 “Common People.”
Black Mirror is back with a new six-episode series on Netflix. “Common People” is the first episode of the new season and tells the story of a couple who are forced to turn to life-saving technology offered by a company called Rivermind.
Similar to services like Netflix, Rivermind+ requires a monthly subscription.
The experience starts off well enough with Amanda and Mike reaping all the benefits of their new subscription. However, it doesn’t take long for the problems to mount, beginning with accessing the service while away from home.
Outside The Home Network
Over the past few years, we have a seen a steady increase in the number of streaming services making it harder for subscribers to access the service they pay for when away from home.
Amanda and Mike encounter their own version of this problem when they attempt to leave their ‘home’ county. In their case, not being able to access the service meant Amanda couldn’t function normally, rendering her unconscious.
While nowhere near as dramatic, streaming subscribers encounter this problem routinely nowadays, and most commonly with a warning message on the screen indicating that they are away from home or outside the home network.
Regardless of the exact message, the result is the same – the streaming service won’t function normally, becoming unusable on living room devices.
While this initially started as a problem for live TV services like Hulu Live TV and YouTube TV, many other streaming services have since introduced their own password-sharing rules and limitations. All of which makes it increasingly harder to stream content when not connected to the ‘home’ network.
This includes Netflix, which now charges an ‘extra member‘ fee for accessing the streaming service routinely in another household.
The Introduction Of A Premium Plan
Similar to password-sharing, the Home network issue Amanda and Mike faced isn’t actually a technical limitation. Instead, it is simply a way for the subscription company to generate more revenue by asking the subscribers to pay more to access the service in another area.
Unlike the ‘extra member‘ charge streaming services pass on to customers, the outside-network issue in Black Mirror was part of Rivermind’s plan to introduce a new Premium tier.
This is definitely something many streaming subscribers will be very familiar with, as there’s hardly any streaming services that don’t offer a Premium tier these days. While many services started out with just a single tier, that same tier has routinely been downgraded to a lesser product. In Black Mirror speak, one that’s for common people.
Although these Premium tiers unlock many additional benefits, including using the service outside the Home area, they also come at a much higher monthly price.
In Netflix’s case, its upgraded tier currently costs $17.99 a month, which is more than twice as much as the $7.99 common people plan. This upgraded tier is also required for those that want the option to add an extra member (household) to their account.
Ads, Ads and More Ads
In streaming, the introduction of any Premium tier isn’t just a way to unlock out-of-network access, it’s also a perfect opportunity to introduce ads, and that’s exactly what happens to Amanda and Mike.
As they haven’t upgraded to Premium, they soon find out that their tier now includes ads. In this case, ads that are read aloud by Amanda while in something of a trance-like state.
Trance aside, the introduction of ads is another change that’s become extremely common in streaming. Outside of a few exceptions, like Apple TV+ and Starz, most streaming services now offer an ad-supported tier.
Even Netflix, who not that long ago claimed to have no interest in ads, now offers a Standard with ads plan.
Generally, ad tiers are often introduced as a way to offer consumers the option to downgrade to a cheaper plan. This is also how Netflix originally introduced its ad-supported plan.
A notable exception here was Prime Video. When Amazon’s streaming service launched ads, all existing subscribers were immediately switched to the ad-supported plan.
This also meant that they had to upgrade their subscription and pay more each month to remove the ads again.
This is also how the process played out in “Common People’ with Amanda and Mike signing up to the service only to find out at a later time that their subscription is now an ad-supported plan, and they will need to pay more each month to remove the ads again.
The Introduction Of An Ultra-Premium Plan
So, you originally signed up to the service’s only plan only to find that there’s now a Premium plan offering more benefits, including an ad-free viewing experience. Fine, you eventually give in, upgrade, and pay the extra monthly fee.
All is good but then suddenly the service launches a new third tier. One that’s so Premium that the Premium plan can no longer be called Premium. Now, your premium plan is only a Standard plan.
Sounds familiar?
Well, that’s also exactly what happens to Amanda and Mike. Their premium subscription gets rebranded as a Standard plan, following the launch of a new Lux subscription tier.
While the Lux tier in “Common People” is a little unnecessary, as it more focuses on heightening existing feelings, it is a good representation of the Ultra plans we now see in streaming.
These streaming plans typically only add to the service by adding to the experience, through the unlocking of support for ultra-premium features like 4K, Spatial Audio, and so on.
While nice features to have, and ones that do improve the streaming experience, many of them are unnecessary. After all, they don’t unlock more content, they just heighten the experience of existing content, as is the case with the Lux plan in the episode.
Naturally, with a ultra-premium plan comes an ultra-premium price, and this is another change we are seeing routinely in streaming. Netflix’s Premium plan, for example, costs $24.99 a month. That’s $7 more than the Standard plan, and about three times more than the common people Standard with ads plan.
Similar to Lux in the episode, we largely consider Netflix’s most expensive plan to be one more of luxury than necessity. You won’t get access to any more content, just an improvement to the way you experience the same content.
A Reflection of Streaming Services, Especially Netflix
While the subject matter in this episode is evidently far more serious than a streaming subscription, and as much of a reflection on healthcare than anything else, the subscription-based nature of Rivermind+ perfectly highlights many of the changes consumers now hate about streaming – reliance on a home network, the introduction of ads, multiple tiers, and price increases.
A real Black Mirror element here is that all of these problems have been experienced by Netflix subscribers in the past. While Netflix also started life with one plan, that plan has since expanded to three plans, with password-sharing, ad-free streaming, and unnecessary premium features the main differences.
Interestingly, in an interview with Netflix’s Tudum, Black Mirror‘s Charlie Brooker explained that the goal wasn’t for the episode to be so bleak. Instead, it was supposed to be more of a light-hearted take on subscriptions.
And that’s possible the most Black Mirror thing overall, as the more consumers delve into the streaming subscription sector, the bleaker many of them are finding the experience to be.
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