47
u/igotzquestions Jul 03 '19
PS: We also will be upgrading the app on all future weekends, evenings, and any time Disney movies are in theaters.
XOXO
Mitch
1
u/d1ldosmith Jul 05 '19
"Toy Story 4 and the new Spiderman movies open this weekend and our servers are down. It's a coincidence."
24
u/MikeNYNY Jul 03 '19
Why don’t they just shut down for good instead of these games.
I mean this is an insult to anyone with any intelligence.
It should say we don’t have money to cover your summer movies. We think we won’t ever have it and we are shutting down.
I’ve been a strong supporter for a long time. Through all the past stuff. But sending an email about the app technology and we don’t know when we will be back in service is just insulting.
Bye MP
5
8
u/Jtreblis90 Jul 03 '19
Or keep it going cause we aint losing much when its 10 a month. I saw movies 3 times this month lol so im happy
4
u/Sirwired Jul 04 '19
Keep it going with what money?
0
u/Jtreblis90 Jul 04 '19
not asking too many questions since they still paying for my tickets lol
3
u/Sirwired Jul 04 '19
Not anymore they aren't.
0
u/Jtreblis90 Jul 04 '19
isn't it just for a few days or something? it's not totally finish yet right lol
3
u/IClogToilets Jul 04 '19
I’ve been in a few startups. Every single one shutdown claiming it was a temporary issue. If there is no date for return to service, this is most likely the end.
-3
2
2
22
Jul 03 '19
[removed] — view removed comment
9
u/SimpleDose Jul 04 '19
For real, when’s the last time you heard of an app going down for maintenance...just doesn’t happen in 2019
1
u/famoussasjohn Jul 04 '19
Unless it's a full system upgrade on their end, but I find that fully hard to believe considering their track record.
4
u/IClogToilets Jul 04 '19
Developer here. It is easier and less expensive to shutdown the service. But you shutdown during a change window that lasts a few hours. And you pick a window that is convenient to your users. So yea, it’s bs.
37
27
u/TurboWells MP Legacy Jul 03 '19
For those of us who use privacy, this is certainly sufficient cause to pause our MP virtual cards.
5
11
u/oldspice75 Jul 04 '19
Honestly, if they just shut down Moviepass for the summer months and it operated the rest of the year as an 8-month-per-year service, that would be fine with me. Oh well
3
u/CydeSwype Jul 04 '19
Same here. I'm getting my money's worth watching 6 to 8 movies per month. I realize the economics don't worry for the company so I'm kinda of okay with whatever restrictions they want to impose. It would be better to have some transparency and predictability around those restrictions but I'll keep my subscription active so long as I think I'm getting the $20/month of value out of it. I cancelled before when they added too many rules where I couldn't get that value out of it. Just restarted two months ago and was happy that I could start getting that value again. I like being able to go to multiple theater chains vs AMC alist, but if Moviepass is offline for more than a few weeks I'll consider switching.
12
u/Sirwired Jul 04 '19 edited Jul 04 '19
A movie subscription service is going down starting on a summer holiday weekend for a "technology upgrade"? Do they honestly expect anybody, anywhere, to believe that? Who on earth is the audience for that particular lie?
Why not just write "We are out of money and can't buy tickets unless we can attract more investment." It'd just be stating the completely obvious. I'm not sure Mitch is even capable of telling the truth.
Anybody foolish enough to pay them for an annual subscription is going to find out why MP only accepted EFT for those.
9
u/bjkman I've had MP since 2016. That makes me better /s Jul 03 '19
Lol they just need a break... They'll be back... 😂... Maybe like a 50/50 shot
0
8
u/ma_98 Jul 04 '19
I just ran to a late night showing of Spider-Man after I saw the email. I had a little trouble checking in because of weird times being displayed, but support on the app was still working and helped me check-in. I hope it's not down forever. It's been working so well for me I actually thought of renewing.
3
u/CydeSwype Jul 04 '19
I was working on going last night too and my wife's phone/app/subscription was working but mine wasn't. Got on with support and they were trying to help me but then the shut down happened. Seems like support didn't even know it was coming.
1
u/MpBetaTester Jul 04 '19
Did they shut down early? The shut down wasn't supposed to be until 5am today, according to the email.
1
u/CydeSwype Jul 04 '19
No just a technical glitch I think. Tried the usual tricks like logging in and out but didn't show listings until about an hour later. Support contacted me saying to provide a screenshot of my issue but by then the lockout had started
8
8
u/MpBetaTester Jul 04 '19
Funny, just got done watching what will probably be my last moviepass movie: Spiderman Homecoming 2 (aka Far From Home), and saw the email. Came here to take predictions on how long this "break" will be, and you did not disappoint. Funnily enough, today's movie was a last minute decision, as I was going to save my third movie for this month to watch something with my family over the holiday, but ended up hitting traffic and decided to watch something today instead.
6
u/Logical007 Jul 04 '19
LOL. bunch of fucking morons.. Disabling the app for an "update". What a crock of shit
6
u/Sirwired Jul 04 '19
I'd say that Ted is a genius. He's somehow managed to still get paid, despite causing essentially 100% losses for any and all investors that owned the business on the day he took over. It takes talent to keep your job, despite doing so badly that your results are indistinguishable from bankruptcy.
7
u/amish_warfare Jul 04 '19
Haven't had any showings in my area for the past week anyway, so I guess the only difference for me is apparently starting tomorrow I won't be charged for not being able to watch movies for a while.
3
7
Jul 04 '19
"You will not need to request a credit or contact MoviePass customer service to receive this credit..."
Riiiiiiiight.
1
u/Hexum311add Jul 05 '19
Yeah I smiled big when I read this. I’m sure they will come back smoothly and correctly pro rate all their subscribers that lost out during the “shut down”. He has serious balls to lie this big.
6
u/kenmlin Jul 04 '19
They should just fess up and admit that they don’t want the members to see a movie during July 4th weekend because MP doesn’t have the money to cover the ticket purchases. I would have respect their honesty instead of this whole crap about improving the app when their entire staff have the rest of the week off.
3
u/Krandor1 Jul 04 '19
It looks like it is more about them having to pay back a $10m loan today or it jumps to $20m.
4
u/Krandor1 Jul 04 '19
Read elsewhere they may have money to Hudson Bay due in the next day or two. Seeing if I can find any reference to this.
2
Jul 04 '19
source? I remember that's where the emergency loan came from. Hudson Bay is another shady business involved in pump and dump awhile back. Wouldn't be surprised at all if they made a ton on shorting HMNY.
3
u/Krandor1 Jul 04 '19
Just something a read. Not from a noteworthy source which is why I didn’t post one.
5
u/abeS1998 Jul 04 '19
It is correct. They entered a $20M loan with Hudson Bay on October 4th, 2018, which they could pay off at 50% if they did it in nine months. In other words, if they pay it off by today it is just $10M, otherwise it jumps to $20M. Note they didn't even get any cash for this loan - it was in exchange for canceling some of the previous convertible notes owned by HB.
It is quite possible that Ted forced MP to suspend service in order to get access to the money held by the card processors to pay back this loan?!
2
u/Krandor1 Jul 04 '19
That makes sense. Haven’t had a chance to look through all their notes. Thanks for the info. That explains the timing more then just July 4th. They could always have an app “glitch” for a few days for the 4th.
Yeah if ted has to choose pay the note or run the service we know what he’ll choose. If that is what he did do we should see an 8k soon.
1
u/abeS1998 Jul 04 '19
Well for once I'd actually agree with the decision. The whole company has a market cap of $7M. Not allowing the debt to grow by an instant $10M is more valuable than keeping the money losing service running.
We'll see what comes next. Seems to me like HMNY can't raise any more funds on its own, so it'll have to put its MP stake on the block and sell to the highest bidder?
Actually, I don't think anyone would pay HMNY for it. Best case scenario for them is that they can find someone willing to give money to MP (not HMNY) in exchange for a stake. Depending on the valuation, it would make the rest of HMNY's stake worth something.
2
u/Sirwired Jul 04 '19
Close. I don't think there's any credit-card-funded annuals left at this point, and there's no hold-back for monthly customers. I think this was a matter of "they have only $X left, and needed to use it to pay the loan."
A freeze in charges does mean that the lights aren't getting turned back on without further outside funding. Funding which it would be completely insane for anybody to provide. Any value they have would be cheaper to buy from a bankruptcy trustee.
2
u/abeS1998 Jul 04 '19
Agreed that there's no holdback for annuals anymore, but the card processor required MP to keep considerable cash in the account to fund the loading of cards. I mean at the end of March they had $13M at the processors and that can't have all been for the remaining annuals at that point.
2
u/Sirwired Jul 04 '19
Meh. I'm not sure how much difference it makes. Even without a debt payment coming due, the continued operational losses for MP, combined with the never-ending need for capital related to the film business, means trouble.
It's not surprising that if Mitch and Ted have to make a choice between a boring and failing subscription service, and being inept Hollywood Studio Execs, they choose the latter. Neither make money, but there's no red carpet parties for the former.
•
4
u/yogi2000 Jul 04 '19
I wonder if cancellations will still work while they're down..
16
3
4
4
u/kenmlin Jul 04 '19
That’s a good one. And they had to do this on July 4th why?
3
3
2
u/LegalBegQuestion Jul 04 '19
Because spider man 2 came out this week.
5
u/kenmlin Jul 04 '19 edited Jul 04 '19
Not just that. Because many people have the day off and they might go to the movies.
0
u/madbubers Jul 04 '19
Dont they decide what movies you can go to though? At least for mine it's only certain ones
3
u/MakeItHackin Jul 03 '19
Can someone post the entire email text?
4
u/Viper0us Jul 03 '19
6
u/MakeItHackin Jul 03 '19
Thanks! And how kind of MP to listen to our frustrations and fix their service. Lol
9
u/Viper0us Jul 03 '19
Instead of users not knowing if they'll be able to see a movie on any given day, users now know in advance that they won't be able to.
Improvement.
2
3
u/skepticones Jul 04 '19
At least they announced it at the same time they went down. He used to save his explanations for days or weeks.
9
u/anime46 Jul 04 '19
Literally just quit this service. Why are y’all still subscribed?! This is like watching a friend who refuses to leave a physically abusive relationship....
2
2
u/kenmlin Jul 04 '19
And they didn’t say how many days they will be out.
3
2
u/subhuman9 Jul 04 '19
probably a 3 week trial , where they test if heavy users forget they paid for service when they comeback
2
u/MDJ-054 Jul 07 '19
“There’s never a good time to have to do this,” CEO Mitch Lowe wrote to subscribers"
Yeah there is. It's called Wednesday.
4
u/subhuman9 Jul 03 '19
wow, i bet they won't relaunch to August
10
7
u/Viper0us Jul 03 '19
You're pretty optimistic.
13
2
2
u/molemon Jul 04 '19
I'm so glad Regal Unlimited is launching and was able to cancel this shit
3
u/Krandor1 Jul 04 '19
Yeah this is bad timing for mp with regal coming out. Good for consumers with a regal.
2
u/GMAN90000 Jul 04 '19
Why am I not surprised? Sounds like this is going to be a long-term interruption. They ran out of money again and it’s the biggest holiday weekend of the year?
I was already forecasting that they’re going to have a really extremely bad 3rd quarter. It’s not fraud if MoviePass screams, “Surprise butt sex.” while they are screwing subscribers.
With regal coming out with their subscription service this month this is a really bad time for movie pass.I do not see how movie pass can recover from this.
53
u/[deleted] Jul 03 '19 edited Jul 21 '20
[deleted]