Netflix has had “play now” capability for a while now. For anyone using Windows, that is. But they just announced a new beta program for Mac users.

What stinks is that Macs with a PowerPC chip (G4 or G5 Macs) will be left in the dark. It’s only for Intel-powered Macs. It’s not Netflix’s fault. It’s Microsoft’s fault. Netflix uses Microsoft’s Silverlight software to do DRM (something else I dislike). I guess it’s also Apple’s fault for building computers that last a long time and don’t need to be replaced in order to work with their latest operating system.

I have three Macs in this house. They all have at least one PowerPC chip in them. Macs last longer than PCs mostly because they’re built better and, quite frankly, people who buy them don’t see them merely as junk they need to replace every so often. I’m not going to replace any of mine anytime soon.

So for now I’ll use my junk Dell to watch Netflix and continue to enjoy this old but still fully functional PowerBook G4 for everything else.