Netflix Loses 800,000 Subscribers After Price Hike, Qwikster Debacle

Primary source documenting the 2011 Netflix Qwikster crisis - 800,000 subscriber loss in Q3 2011 (24.6M to 23.8M), the first quarterly decline in years. Stock crashed from $300/share in July to under $80 by October (75% decline). This case study illustrates both the danger of ignoring customer signals and the power of rapid course correction.

Netflix's sensory system worked exactly as designed - every metric showed customers hated Qwikster. The failure was signal transduction speed: 60 days from announcement to reversal. But unlike Kodak (36 years), Netflix did reverse, demonstrating that feedback loops can close if organizations have the will to act.