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Netflix is now worth more than Comcast

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Re: Netflix is now worth more than Comcast

#111

Post by ocdtrekkie »

seanp2k2 wrote: post #107
rhizome wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You still end up paying $60 a month, but now you get six channels instead of 100. And 94% of Comcast channels are trash. I have no problems with people who subscribe to Comcast based on the number of channels they carry, though. Personally, I don't need hardly any of them.

There’s also the difference of OTT services showing less ads, letting you watch what you want when you want, and having much more variety than a single channel. It’s not a valid comparison.

This isn't really true at all. When I had Comcast, I used their streaming website, which provided on demand access to any channel on their lineup you were subscribed to. Ad content was about on par with other online services.

My new ISP relies more heavily on individual channel streaming sites rather than hosting their own central portal for it, but again, the on demand experience is more or less the same I was familiar with from Hulu, CBS All Access, and other online sites I've used.

In fact, if there is any issues with the comparison, it'd be that a real TV service will let you watch things live if you want to, whereas streaming sites often won't carry something until the day after. And if you get a DVR, you can hold live TV almost indefinitely, whereas on demand services tend to expire shows after several weeks.

Re: Netflix is now worth more than Comcast

#112

Post by scarface74 »

Retric wrote: post #74
scarface74 wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The idea that cable providers can raise prices to compensate for lost TV revenue is predicated on the assumption that there are no alternatives. That assumption ignores just how much bandwidth 5G gives you to play with. All of the major cell carriers are already offering unlimited internet with SD video streaming. My older son doesn't have home internet service at all. He streams everything either from his phone or h…

70 + 35 + 12 = 120/ month that's much cheaper than cable + internet. A 1 GB connection is also overkill for just about anyone.

Yes 1Gbps up and down is overkill. In the real world, (outside of speed tests) the best I was able to get was around 100Mbps u/d when connecting to my company's colo via VPN after business hours. Even Amazon limits my connection to my AWS resources to around 70Mbps.

WiFi the best I can get is around 400/400 when standing right by the router on either my phone or laptops.

Video needs at most 20Mbps and I don't know how much bandwidth that my son's PS4 or Xbox can't take advantage of.

Every bedroom in our house, the living room, the gym, and my office are wired. But my 3rd Gen AppleTVs only have 100Mbps connections, my Roku sticks/TVs are WiFi and only the game systems, my computers in the office and my one 4th Gen AppleTV actually have wired gig-e connections.

On the other hand, the gigabit plan is the only one that doesn't have a cap.

But if I had XFinity (thank God I don't) even thier gigabit Service is limited to 35Mbps upload.

Re: Netflix is now worth more than Comcast

#113

Post by maxsilver »

stcredzero wrote: post #93
wufufufu wrote: post #10

What's more shocking to me is that Netflix is worth more than Disney. Just look at the list of Disney subsidiaries[1], then look at how bad the average Netflix original movie is and then tell me if the market caps makes any sense at all. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_assets_owned_by_Disney

What's more shocking to me is that Netflix is worth more than Disney. What is the chance that Disney can execute implementing its own Netflix? What is Disney's batting average on projects like that?

> What is the chance that Disney can execute implementing its own Netflix?

Disney effectively owns Hulu, which was already the #2 or #3 competitor to Netflix in the US for many years.

Disney may not need to execute implementing anything, since they already own a fully-operational and fairly successful one of their own.

Re: Netflix is now worth more than Comcast

#114

Post by niftich »

stcredzero wrote: post #93
wufufufu wrote: post #10

What's more shocking to me is that Netflix is worth more than Disney. Just look at the list of Disney subsidiaries[1], then look at how bad the average Netflix original movie is and then tell me if the market caps makes any sense at all. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_assets_owned_by_Disney

What's more shocking to me is that Netflix is worth more than Disney. What is the chance that Disney can execute implementing its own Netflix? What is Disney's batting average on projects like that?

"The Walt Disney Company to Acquire Majority Ownership of BAMTech" [1].

"The company's major clients include the NHL, HBO (for its HBO Now service), the PGA Tour, Riot Games, WatchESPN, PlayStation Vue, WWE Network and TheBlaze." [2]

"Marvel, Star Wars films to ditch Netflix for Disney service" [3]

I'd say they have both the content, technical expertise, and tenacity and perseverance to pull it off.

[1] https://www.thewaltdisneycompany.com/walt-disney-company-acq... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BAMTech [3] https://www.cnet.com/news/marvel-and-star-wars-films-will-di...

Re: Netflix is now worth more than Comcast

#115

Post by scarface74 »

lallysingh wrote: post #88
scarface74 wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would think delivering content over the internet point to point would be more expensive than cable since cable is multicast. Netflix has higher marginal cost and Comcast has higher fixed costs that can be spread among more customers.

Comcast has to constantly transmit all the channels, no matter who's watching. And their fixed costs are rather large. How many thousands of $$ does it cost to put up & maintain a single street's worth of cable? And how much can you recoup from that, especially when you have a massively variable amount of money coming from each customer (including 0 for those on the street who don't subscribe). Plus the license fees…

In even a moderately lower middle class neighborhood, I would think that the majority of people have cable or internet. It's not like thier is much competition.

Some apartment complexes and even HOAs force all of the tenants/homeowners to pay for internet + TV.

When I stayed in an apartment part of the lease agreement was that you had to pay $100 for a cable + Internet package and then had to pay more for extra boxes, etc. the complex racked on the minimum payment as part of rent then you paid any overage to Comcast.

We had a 300MB cap and the only way we could get internet without a cap when they first started was to get a business account. But you still had to pay the mandated $100 for cable to the apartment complex and then had to pay extra for the business account. We moved shortly afterward.

One of the requirements when we were looking for a house was that Comcast was not the only option.

http://www.condoassociation.com/blog/is-cable-tv-contract-wi...

http://articles.orlandosentinel.com/2010-08-19/business/os-c...

Re: Netflix is now worth more than Comcast

#116

Post by stcredzero »

toephu2 wrote: post #109
stcredzero wrote: post #95

In 2018, why the heck is it that I can't click on something to indicate, "I want to watch this," then I get a notification when it airs, and have a list of shows/events now available to watch? If media companies want their advertisements to be worthwhile, why don't they get their act together and do this? The answer is that they will try to implement this only for their own company, and this will fail. Such a thing c…

It is the year 2018, and indeed most DVRs do already provide this functionality...

Sure, but the fact that I have to be tethered to an expensive optional device my living room, subject to a particular walled garden to get not even the full range of this functionality is pretty backwards. Why can't I just see a random ad or review somewhere on a web browser or on my phone and have that? The fact that I'd need a DVR and that it would only work for one company's systems is backwards considering the wealth of infrastructure that already exists.

Re: Netflix is now worth more than Comcast

#117

Post by syedkarim »

karpodiem wrote: post #72
rayiner wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The whole idea of "cord cutting" hurting cable is insane. If you don't subscribe to cable and you subscribe to internet based streaming services, you're still getting content delivered to your home via either a cable "cord" or the phone company. Right now, people pay $150+ for a package with all the TV channels, while you can get the broadband for $50 or so. Cable companies could dramatically raise prices on the ba…

Comcast has hiked standalone broadband to $75 - http://stopthecap.com/2017/12/21/75-month-broadband-pricing-... Interestingly, you can get a cheaper promotional rate if you bundle local TV channels (cheaper than $75/month for both internet + tv) so Comcast can inflate its video subscriber (to boost their stock price) amount and they hope you forget you're on a promotional rate your bill jumps $30-40 after you drop of…

I currently pay Comcast $35/month in suburban Chicago for 25/4 (down/up). This is without a contract. With 12-month contract is $25/month.

Re: Netflix is now worth more than Comcast

#118

Post by mmanfrin »

thisisit wrote: post #3

Comcast has 15 billion in net income last quarter whereas Netflix had 185 million. And PE ratio of comccast is 19 whereas Netflix is 188. In the future where the cord cutting trend continues and Netflix gains tons of subscribers the valuation might make sense. But for now, I feel this looks like very overvalued.

Netflix's quarterly revenue was $3.7bil representing a 40% YoY growth, and $400mil more than their previous quarter. Additionally, their net income last quarter was $290mil, not $185mil (that was the quarter previous).

Also you seem to have cherry picked quarters to compare, as last quarter Comcast actually had a net income of $3.12bil. The quarter previous was $15bil and the quarter before $2.9bil. I'm unsure what accounts for that single quarter spike, but using it as synecdochic of the whole is disingenuous at best.

Re: Netflix is now worth more than Comcast

#119

Post by rayiner »

seanp2k2 wrote: post #102
rayiner wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Comcast will continue to jack up standalone broadband prices to hedge against fleeing video subscribers. Why? Because they can, and have very little competition in most markets. That's coming from the perspective of an HN reader, for whom wireless isn't "competition." (I get it, I've got two fiber lines to my house; 3 gigabits total. My daughter uses it to stream Magic Schoolbus.) But for the typical user, 5G wirel…

My Comcast went down yesterday for about 18 hours (I have zero other options at my apartment for high speed Internet) and I tried tethering on Verizon LTE to play some games. Latency was between 60ms and ~900ms with some random disconnects. This is in TF2, which runs on the Source engine. Anything above about 400ms is pretty unplayable. Bandwidth caps are yet another issue. 4G is NOT a suitable alternative for me tod…

There is aggregated data on this, based on millions of data points: https://opensignal.com/reports/2018/01/usa/state-of-the-mobi.... Average latency for all four carriers is under 70 ms.

As to bandwidth caps: for $100 including fees, you get unlimited on Verizon, which has a 22 GB soft cap per line (in practice, you can use way beyond that).

Your point about duopoly is completely divorced from facts. The cell carriers are in a market with four competitors, and invest massively in infrastructure (tens of billions of dollars a year). Cellular has improve way faster than many other areas of technology over the last decade. 10 years ago, I had a Core 2 polycarbonate Macbook and AT&T 3G service. The former is still a perfectly serviceable computer (the new Macbook is maybe twice as fast). But my Verizon LTE is probably 10-20 times faster than my 3G service.

What else do you use that is 10 times better than it was a decade ago? Google Search? Gmail? Facebook? iOS?

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