In a move that marks Netflix's yet another deviation from its roots in DVD rentals by mail, the Los Gatos, California-based movie rental company Monday introduced a new subscription plan which allows customers to watch movies only online.

This notable shift to online streaming comes with financial benefits for Netflix, since streaming video is much more cost-effective than operating huge distribution centers and mailing millions of DVDs.

The newly-introduced plan includes an $8-per-month subscription for providing unlimited access to Netflix's library of streaming movies and TV shows. Netflix already offers unlimited streaming as part of its DVD-by-mail service.

In an attempt to encourage subscribers to shift to the new plan, Netflix has also increased the cost of its different DVD plans by $1; thus bringing them to same cost as the $8 subscription for the new plan.

With Netflix having said that its 16.9 million subscribers already view more movies and TV shows online than on DVDs, ThinkEquity analyst Atul Bagga noted: "Eventually you will see more and more people moving from the DVD plan to streaming."

Describing Netflix as "primarily a streaming video company," the company's CEO Reed Hastings said in a Monday press release that the new plan is the company's response to customer requests as well as the success of a similar, September-launched, online-only service in Canada.