Disney+ cancellation page crashes as customers rush to quit

https://creators.yahoo.com/lifestyle/story/disney-cancellation-page-crashes-as-customers-rush-to-quit-after-kimmel-suspension-033512277.html

by anderber • 10 months ago

401 265 10 months ago

creators.yahoo.com

leakycap9• 10 months ago

I'm sure it's an accident and not intentional! A big corporation would never, ever do something like cause a delay so people cool off and don't bother actually canceling later.

ethagnawl• 10 months ago

It's possible but I think Hanlon's Razor is more likely. I saw this happen myself and the form submission was successful on the second attempt. I just don't think they had the capacity to handle this surge of traffic to this endpoint/service.

AndyKelley2• 10 months ago

It can be a mixture of both. It's extremely easy to Cover Your Ass while intentionally dragging your feet when a bug works in your favor. The manager simply has to decide that other tasks are higher priority.

nerdponx3• 10 months ago

I've often advocated for inverting Hanlon's razor whenever money is involved. The more money is at stake, the more likely it is in fact due to malice.

vlovich1232• 10 months ago

That’s the trick with capacity planning around cancellation. You can always deprioritize it because any improvement increases the speed with which revenue decreases (not valuable to the business) and customer satisfaction with this flow generally doesn’t matter since you’re losing their business. The only negative risk factor is CC chargebacks which will cost you some money but at scale most people generally don’t deal with that hassle vs just trying to cancel a few times.

dawnerd• 10 months ago

Anyone that’s used any of Disneys sites know they break at random on a good day. Just look how many people complain about the DCL site having issues.

Terr_2• 10 months ago

I considered that, but there's a very real risk that the bad-press of it crashing will have an even bigger financial effect.

SoftTalker3• 10 months ago

These protest boycotts never last very long. There are many large brand names that have been boycotted over the years and they are all still in business and mostly bigger than ever.

I believe Disney has been subjected to several.

blindriver• 10 months ago

Load shedding

is_true• 10 months ago

I've used Disney+ and I think I never used the app without experiencing some kind of issue.

arduanika• 10 months ago

A good webpage should not crash upon mouse over.

thrill• 10 months ago

Bravo sir, bravo.

disney_ta_2025• 10 months ago

Big corporations are made of people, some who post here.

Disney's internal systems for something like this are a hodgepodge of the Hulu, D+/Bamtech, old corporate disney, and some bits sent out to SaaS. There's been multiple layers of layoffs and service ownership changes since the pandemic. I don't think the org would be able to rate limit by faking crashes if it tried.

What is happening is that routes and systems that normally have little and predictable traffic now are getting exercised... a lot harder (the exact numbers are for management to explain). Most things are going to be very resilient to this, as it's not THAT much traffic: It's still a small fraction vs resubscriptions and logins, but not everything is. Since the unsubscribe flows are never going to be anyone's top priority, this things happen.

You don't have to believe me, but I tell you it's incompetence, not malice.

leakycap9• 10 months ago

I appreciate this peek behind the curtain but don't share your cheer that humans being involved in the process somehow means it should get the benefit of the doubt when things like this happen.

MonkeyIsNull• 10 months ago

“Never attribute to malice what you can attribute to incompetence”

bdcravens• 10 months ago

As you acquire properties, it's almost never possible to rebuild the systems from scratch, and instead it's becomes layers upon layers of patches and quick fixes.

A fun one lately has been AT&T. We have streaming with DirecTV, and they of course share authentication with the parent AT&T. So whenever I try to login to AT&T's website to manage my wireless or fiber, it redirects and logs me into DirecTV, everytime. The only way I can manage my service is to use AT&T's mobile app.

makeitdouble3• 10 months ago

Since the unsubscribe flows are never going to be anyone's top priority, this things happen.

This in itself makes the situation intentional.

JBlue42• 10 months ago

Hulu had some major problems during the broadcast of the Oscars so I was surprised but not surprised to hear about the issues with this.

Disney's internal systems for something like this are a hodgepodge of the Hulu, D+/Bamtech, old corporate disney, and some bits sent out to SaaS. There's been multiple layers of layoffs and service ownership changes since the pandemic. I don't think the org would be able to rate limit by faking crashes if it tried.

Finance bros and execs love M&A because they can hire a consultant to do all the hard work and get a nice paycheck yet they really suck for the little people and those trying to keep the lights on. Good luck out there.

Maybe one day we'll figure out this anti-trust thing.

adrr3• 10 months ago

It would be hard to keep a secret. Someone would leak it. When i worked a for a social network, we were accused of censorship during a presidential election campaign. People were sharing and posting a clip of text in support of a candidate. It triggered the spam system which categorized it as bot spam and deleted all the posts because all the posts were identical.

rdtsc21• 10 months ago

A big corporation would never, ever do something like cause a delay so people cool off and don't bother actually canceling later.

They better be sure there are no disgruntled or unhappy employees and no layoffs coming up, otherwise that slack or email message will come out and it will just make things worse.

ajkjk• 10 months ago

this is probably the case, not sarcastically

duxup2• 10 months ago

A website or service unable to handle traffic is still a thing in this day and age.

luxuryballs• 10 months ago

“we have yet to prioritize scaling out the cancellation service”

nabla92• 10 months ago

I hope people realize that paying for streaming is optional.

vpn is all you need to pay for.

pleasecloselid• 10 months ago

Have you tried using a VPN? I installed the free ProtonVPN I got with protonmail and half the internet stops working. VPNs look like bots with high exit traffic so they are blocked. Plus countries are cracking down on exit nodes.

gibspaulding• 10 months ago

As long as there’s a tpb mirror in the working half the point stands.

nabla92• 10 months ago

I actually have ProtonVPN works fine. But if that's problem for you:

1. You can use VPN only when you need to use it.

2. "split tunnening" You can configure VPN to be used only for some programs, like those you use torrenting programs.

3. You can build your own mini-PC/RasPi "TV box" with VPN, storage for programming, connected to television. I wonder if there is not already ready software package for that.

femto• 10 months ago

Better to just not view it.

Best thing for a copyright holder is if people pay for their stuff. Next best is if people consume it but don't pay for it, as that at least preserves their relevance. Worst is to be ignored and become irrelevant/forgotten.

autoexec3• 10 months ago

I think they'd much prefer people not watch than see people enjoying the content without giving them money (often while seeding the shows to other people in the process).

If nobody watches the shows they can blame the content. If everyone clearly loves the content but refuses to give ABC/Disney/ESPN/FX their business it means the company is the problem (although that wont stop them from falling back on the lie that piracy is all about greedy people who just want everything for free)

soared• 10 months ago

What do you use with your vpn? Every since popcorn time stopped existing, I haven’t been able to find something with good ux

asdff• 10 months ago

Popcorn time still exists and works. Latest commit was two days ago. Torrent sites still exist too.

Aeolun• 10 months ago

What about what he said was so controversial? It seems entirely in line with everything else I’ve seen happen on these kinds of shows.

slumpt_• 10 months ago

It criticized the potus, and threat of his ire is enough to scare corporations in 2025. A fairly concerning development

c420• 10 months ago

To those that are interpreting his comments in a certain way, the implication that Robinson is maga is highly offensive and textbook "misinformation".

Edit: there's clearly several ways to interpret what he said. I'm not making any kind of argument here, just answering op's question.

rogerrogerr• 10 months ago

Not so much offensive, as utterly puzzling given the information we had on him by Monday night.

Not a fan of Trump or Jimmy, and I don’t think this is a proportional or good response. I’m pretty stunned that there was actually momentum enough to take him off the air. I also don’t understand why he left that little dig in his monologue.

gruez5• 10 months ago

You don't exactly need to be MAGA to think that Kimmel's remarks were incorrect. From the economist:

After the assassination Jimmy Kimmel, a comedian on abc, suggested erroneously that Kirk had been killed by a maga fan. Brendan Carr, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, which regulates broadcasters, threatened consequences: “We can do this the easy way or the hard way.” Within hours abc took Mr Kimmel off the air indefinitely. Mr Carr then said all broadcasters should ease up on the “progressive foie gras”.

https://archive.is/ze4pD

You can check the other articles in the same issue and see they're not exactly cheerleaders for the Trump administration.

That said, the FTC shouldn't be in the business of strongarming critics, even if they're wrong.

tanduv• 10 months ago

ummm First amendment? Its not the first time misinformation has been broadcasted on air, why does the FCC need to get involved in this one. Would they have gotten involved if the implication was that he was a liberal?

aisengard• 10 months ago

As opposed to the implication that Robinson is somehow a leftwing activist, confidently claimed by every GOP politician from coast to coast?

Also, even if it were, as you say, "misinformation", that is now somehow taboo on television? A sacred line none must dare cross?

thrance2• 10 months ago

So when a talk show host vaguely on the left implies something that might not be true it is ground enough to disregard the fucking first amendment and use the power of the state to censor him. But when the entire GOP, including the president, all fabricate obvious lies about the shooter being successively trans, then antifa and then a radical leftist, it's fine. The double standards are fucking crazy.

djohnston2• 10 months ago

I suspect they were looking for an excuse to axe and found one. It was all milquetoast, and that entire format of television is dead and the networks know they need to pivot somewhere.

gruez5• 10 months ago

It was all milquetoast,

???

It was a very obvious dig at the president. There's still not good justification for the government to step in, but claiming it's "milquetoast" is baffling.

epistasis6• 10 months ago

The FCC chair threatening your broadcast license is a pretty good "excuse". There wasn't a public outcry, it was a government outcry along with threats along multiple lines of leverage.

1oooqooq• 10 months ago

having experience with a dictatorship first hand, all a censor does is veto milquetoast stuff.

esalman• 10 months ago

networks know they need to pivot somewhere.

Please don't say the pivot is podcasts.

autoexec3• 10 months ago

Honestly, I thought it was way more tame than I'd expect for comedy these days, but it's also been a long time since I watched a late night talk show and traditionally the ones on the old networks tended to have much more mild and lighthearted comedy compared to the more biting/edgy stuff you'd get on cable.

nerdponx3• 10 months ago

It wasn't controversial, but this is literally the textbook Manufacturing Consent model. The small number of people in positions of power at the network are either overtly aligned with the president that he just talked bad about, or want to stay or get on the president's good side. He doesn't even need to pick up the phone or post anything on social media, they know what they need to do.

christophilus• 10 months ago

Unless everyone at the top has been fired, ABC and Disney are not remotely aligned with the president. A short while ago, they were boycotted by the right for their slanted debate hosting and woke children’s programming.

kevin_thibedeau• 10 months ago

It's more that ABC/Disney is beholden to two right-leaning broadcasters who are colluding with threats to assist in their prohibited merger that will be approved now because they just gave the felon a successful hand job. There is no indication that the ABC execs are anything more than spineless, unprincipled cowards who cave in a light breeze.

yieldcrv2• 10 months ago

I think most commenters are missing that a local broadcaster monopoly used their own freedom of association to drop the show

The FCC and Trump merely dogpiled on this

For Disney, they need to court the broadcaster monopoly as a key stakeholder to their revenue, this is all private sector and not a constitutional issue

But when Disney is getting kicked and then an expensive fight with the government looms while their revenue is already threatened and would be expensive to resolve with the government , they buckled

Thats the calculus here

but because they buckled, now their customers are using their own freedom of association to disassociate, hampering Disney’s revenue more from that angle

Press F to Pay Respects

digitaltrees4• 10 months ago

To be fair to the executives. The main regulator that could essentially issue the corporate death penalty, the FCC chairman that can revoke their license to operate, literally said “we can do this the easy way or the hard way”. That’s a Dirty Harry or goodfellas quote. So much for “government shouldn’t pick winners and losers in the economy”.

option• 10 months ago

Nothing. But wannabe dictator got offended

mingus88• 10 months ago

This is their Horst Wessel moment. It doesn’t matter what actually happened, it’s just the minimal cover to do what they always planned on doing.

Don’t believe me? Trump literally announced his plans months ago to take down these talk show hosts who were so mean to him

Poor guy :(

al_borland3• 10 months ago

He said the guy who shot Charlie Kirk was MAGA, which isn’t true, according to the information that has come out from those actually working on the case in the various press conferences, and from the evidence that’s been made public.

It wasn’t meaningful to the joke he was looking to set up, it was just misinformation for misinformation’s sake. At least it came off that way.

Add to that high emotions from people coping with a murder, and there you have it.

superultra3• 10 months ago

He did not say that the kid was MAGA, or at least not exactly. Here’s all he said about it:

We hit some new lows over the weekend, with the MAGA gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them and doing everything they can to score political points from it.
In between the finger pointing there was grieving. On Friday, the White House flew the flags at half-staff, which got some criticism, but on a human level you can see how hard the President is taking this.

He then played a clip where a reporter asked Trump how he was doing. Trump said good and immediately started talking about his new ballroom.

What about any of that is misinformation? Given how they were certain the shooter was trans because he used arrows on the bullet - which were helldiver 2 codes - it did seem like people were trying to make it seem like the kid wasn’t MAGA.

Turns out the kid is neither, or both, and was just terminally online, which none of us want to admit is the real problem because we’re all also terminally online.

pacomerh3• 10 months ago

nothing of what he said was controversial, Im convinced they were just waiting for the next joke to do it anyways.

gamblor956• 10 months ago

The owner of the Sinclair Broadcasting group (the company that owns the ABC stations that started this) is a far-right ideologue that has been trying to drag ABC into News Nation territory for the past decade or so.

Nothing Kimmel said was controversial. It was just being used as a false flag to justify other things.

sixtyj• 10 months ago

And the second wave of subscription cancellations will be from people who are upset with Disney+ decision… Smart move of executive :) /s

tempodox• 10 months ago

He dared to ridicule uncle Donald and his gang. That’s more than enough.

myvoiceismypass2• 10 months ago

It hurt the feelings of the "fuck your feelings" crowd, who started frothing at the mouth before even thinking about what was actually said.

duxup2• 10 months ago

Honestly I think most of the actually angry people only heard "about it". It was a very mild commentary.

The commentary about what Kimmel said was disconnected from what he said, hell the demand he give money seemed more like a criminal shakedown.

I think Trump's statement about going after anyone who has anything negative to say about them, that's the real goal / point. Doesn't even have anything to do with Kirk.

belter• 10 months ago

https://youtu.be/7vRX-BQAjeE?t=16

vharuck• 10 months ago

Cancellation page worked fine for me around 11:30 EST. And here I thought I'd be late to the cancelling wave.

itake2• 10 months ago

EST or EDT?

burnt-resistor2• 10 months ago

Give them a break, they're living in the future without DST.

stogot• 10 months ago

Wonder if you or others here are cancelling Apple too? For Tim Cook giving the president a gold icon and bowing before him?

ir77• 10 months ago

just cancelled my hulu/disney bundle and requested to delete my disney account which was processed immediately and was very easy to find.

deleting the hulu account took me effort, had to search for it and log into a special site and only a submit request to yet to be processed.

so actually props to disney for not being user hostile.

deeg• 10 months ago

I had to go through a number of "are you sure?!" pages but I was surprised at how easy it was

pacomerh3• 10 months ago

Im glad people are actually following through and actually canceling, this is how you send a message.

jeffhollon• 10 months ago

Can we cancel 2025?

adrr3• 10 months ago

I wonder how much money Disney is going to lose off the cancellations for all of Disney’s streaming. Let say it’s 10%, that’s $2.4b. Linear revenue which includes cable and broadcast is only $2.7b. So even if Trump pulls their broadcast license, they’ll lose more money from this boycott not including boycotts of their movies and theme parks.

Sanzig• 10 months ago

The broadcast license is also strictly speaking only necessary for over the air stations, it does not apply to cable. Cable providers get ABC for cheap due to Section 111 compulsory licensing (short version: a cable provider can retransmit an OTA station for only a small royalty), but there's nothing stopping Disney from offering ABC to cable providers for a similar cost if their license is pulled.

So, the impact at the end of the day is just lost revenue from antenna users. Cable and satellite would be unaffected. That's got to be a relatively small number in the grand scheme of things.

zeroonetwothree• 10 months ago

It’s hard to imagine even 1% let alone 10%. Disney is too powerful a brand and when people get bored and move on to the next news cycle they will come back.

adrr3• 10 months ago

Target is still hurting from their DEI roll back. 4% drop in sales 20% drop in net income. That was more niche than an attack on our 1st amendment right.

stelliosk• 10 months ago

Even if you're not planning to cancel, if you cancel chances are you'll get an "offer" for the next few months.

pacomerh3• 10 months ago

and the point is not to take that offer right

rchaud• 10 months ago

I remember the HP website crashing in 2011 when they cancelled the PalmOS device line and slashed the price of the HP Touchpad tablet from $500 to $99. I had to call their 1800 number and wait 45 minutes to place my order with a sales rep. I wonder if Disney+ even has a phone number alternative to cancel with now that call centers are considered cost centers.

khy• 10 months ago

All The Simpsons episodes are on my YouTube TV DVR, along with a lot of the shows my kids like (although really what they care about is a couple channels on YouTube proper), so even before this I was wondering why I was paying for Disney+ at all.

keernan• 10 months ago

My daughter is cancelling a one week Disneyworld vacation for 4 (w+h+2children).

catlikesshrimp• 10 months ago

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45282482

Previous thread, with a better reference.

tibbydudeza• 10 months ago

I cancelled mine and I am not even in the US.

burnt-resistor2• 10 months ago

Can't say anything about the past or future, but it's working now:

https://auth.hbomax.com/cancel

https://secure.hulu.com/account

https://www.disneyplus.com/account

Disney+ cancellation page crashes as customers rush to quit

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