Thousands upon thousands of outraged customers (and newly former customers) have , accusing the company of money-grubbing, promising mass defections and dissing the service in general. By this afternoon, the Web will likely agree that Netflix is at fault for the federal deficit.

The vitriol is all because of the company's announcement yesterday of a . People like me (and apparently there are a lot of them) who pay $10 a month to have one disc at a time and stream as much video as they want will now have to pay $16 a month for the same level of service. Of course, if you're like me and you seldom get around to watching - or returning - your one physical disc and mostly stream video instead, you can switch to a streaming-only plan and actually save a couple bucks a month.

But let's say you're not like me and you want to stick with both streaming video and getting discs in the mail. Yes, you'll end up paying significantly more - maybe too much (I wouldn't be surprised if Netflix bows to the pressure soon and amends this plan). But I think it's clear that even if this increase is too much, Netflix doesn't deserve the hostility it's receiving.

First off, let's remember why so many people are Netflix customers to begin with. The company literally freed us from the oppressive tyranny of video late fees. Speaking of six bucks, how many times before Netflix's arrival did you pay Blockbuster six bucks because you forgot for a couple of days that "Weekend at Bernie's" was on the backseat of your car?