Several months ago Netflix released an announcement they were dividing the company into two divisions: Netflix, which would handle the streaming division, and Qwikster, which would handle the traditional and ultimately dying business of hard DVD shipments.  I remember thinking, "That is a stupid idea."  And I didn't like the price increase that would come with such a change.

The New York Times just posted <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/25/technology/netflix-lost-800000-members-with-price-rise-and-split-plan.html" target="_blank">a rather ironic and telling story</a> of the ego that often defaults companies.
<blockquote>Reed Hastings was soaking in a hot tub with a friend last month when he shared a secret: his company, <a title="More information about Netflix Inc" href="http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/netflix-inc/index.html?inline=nyt-org">Netflix</a>, was about to announce a plan to divide its movie rental service into two — one offering streaming movies over the Internet, the other offering old-fashioned DVDs in the mail.

“That is awful,” the friend, who was also a Netflix subscriber, told him under a starry sky in the Bay Area, according to Mr. Hastings. “I don’t want to deal with two accounts.”

Mr. Hastings ignored the warning, believing that chief executives should generally discount what their friends say.</blockquote>
The rest they say is history.  The press and the public crucified Netflix on every major bulletin board and turns out they left in

I wonder how many companies would still be around if the owner/President would have just listened to a good friend.