Netflix Is Why AT&T bought Time Warner, and Comcast and Disney want Fox • Hacker News Board

Re: Netflix Is Why AT&T bought Time Warner, and Comcast and Disney want Fox

#71

Post by Thriptic » Sun, Jun 17, 2018, 9:17 PM UTC

friedman23 wrote: post #59

Thriptic wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most of these services are the same a la carte premium channels that already existed 10 years ago for roughly the same price (HBO, Starz, Cinemax, and Showtime). Little has changed except the content delivery mechanism and availability of content on demand.

> Little has changed except the content delivery mechanism and availability of content on demand. What? You don't need to pay $100 for cable anymore, how is it that nothing has changed? Anyway, I think arguing with you is pointless, pirates will always find a way to justify their behavior.

A. I've never advocated for piracy anywhere here, so I'm very confused as to where you got that from. If my intent was to pirate, why would I even be a part of this discussion? Please engage in honest discourse or don't bother posting.

B. If I have to pay for a live sports package and 5 streaming networks to watch what I want, then I'm not really saving much money (if any). A move to a la carte content should result in a substantial cost savings, not a marginal cost savings. Netflix has set the bar at $10 per month for access to a massive catalog of content across networks. By default, this means no one (except maybe HBO) should be charging anywhere near this amount of money for access to their content library which is not nearly as deep or as high quality.

Re: Netflix Is Why AT&T bought Time Warner, and Comcast and Disney want Fox

#72

Post by Latteland » Sun, Jun 17, 2018, 9:21 PM UTC

tzs wrote: post #47

MisterTea wrote: post #3

These companies are obsessed with fragmenting the market for the sake of owning content from production to delivery. I have bad news for them: you're going to lose. People don't want to go back to paying $100/month for a dozen streaming "channels" with one or two good shows and a the same crap the rest of the other "channels" have. We want an on-demand nexus. A single hub. Just the other day I had the urge to watch g…

> Just the other day I had the urge to watch ghost in the shell. Not available on any of the major streaming sites (Netflix, Hulu, Prime) but available on stars via prime ... Off to a torrent site or asking around to see if someone has rips or a box set. I have better things to do with $7 like buy dinner Or you could have rented the Blu-ray at Redbox for $2 (or streamed it from Redbox for $5).

Or signed up for a temporary membership to stars. That's my go to method of seeing things I want. It's gotten so that I have had so many temporary membership I have to keep track of them in a spreadsheet.

Re: Netflix Is Why AT&T bought Time Warner, and Comcast and Disney want Fox

#73

Post by goodmattg » Sun, Jun 17, 2018, 9:23 PM UTC

majani wrote: post #68

makecheck wrote: post #61

Companies focus on buying content while ignoring the quality of the broadcast experience. I am tired of competitors that skimp on this. Netflix doesn’t shove ads in your face, works on every platform and almost never has mysterious transmission failures. And now they have excellent content too. They have figured out so much more than some of the last-century providers.

and yet they still make mind boggling losses with no end in sight. I think in the next 10 years Netflix will serve as a reality check that shows why content creators have had to resort to their ugly business practices.

"no end in sight" is false. It took ~5 seconds to Google this.

https://www.barrons.com/articles/netflix-will-be-cash-flow-p...

Re: Netflix Is Why AT&T bought Time Warner, and Comcast and Disney want Fox

#74

Post by always_good » Sun, Jun 17, 2018, 9:24 PM UTC

MisterTea wrote: post #3

These companies are obsessed with fragmenting the market for the sake of owning content from production to delivery. I have bad news for them: you're going to lose. People don't want to go back to paying $100/month for a dozen streaming "channels" with one or two good shows and a the same crap the rest of the other "channels" have. We want an on-demand nexus. A single hub. Just the other day I had the urge to watch g…

> We want an on-demand nexus.

Ah right, the utopia of extreme centralization I keep hearing HNers rave about.

Re: Netflix Is Why AT&T bought Time Warner, and Comcast and Disney want Fox

#75

Post by always_good » Sun, Jun 17, 2018, 9:26 PM UTC

reubenmorais wrote: post #17

bootlooped wrote: post #10

I think maybe the title could use some punctuation or reworking > Netflix Is Why AT&T bought Time Warner... Ok, yes, they bought Time Warner > Netflix Is Why AT&T bought Time Warner and Comcast... They bought Comcast too? > Netflix Is Why AT&T bought Time Warner and Comcast and Disney... And Disney!? > Netflix Is Why AT&T bought Time Warner and Comcast and Disney want Fox AT&T bought Time Warner and Comcast; Disney w…

"Want" disambiguates to plural subject, so it can only be "Comcast and Disney want Fox".

But Disney can be plural the same way some people will write sentences like "Radiohead are awesome".

It's ambiguous. There's no reason not to punctuate here.

Re: Netflix Is Why AT&T bought Time Warner, and Comcast and Disney want Fox

#76

Post by axaxs » Sun, Jun 17, 2018, 9:28 PM UTC

MisterTea wrote: post #3

These companies are obsessed with fragmenting the market for the sake of owning content from production to delivery. I have bad news for them: you're going to lose. People don't want to go back to paying $100/month for a dozen streaming "channels" with one or two good shows and a the same crap the rest of the other "channels" have. We want an on-demand nexus. A single hub. Just the other day I had the urge to watch g…

Agreed. TV for me is a nicety, I enjoy it from time to time. I'm already a bit putoff from having both Netflix and Hulu, forgetting which show is on which, two apps, etc. I have a feeling we're heading towards each player making their own ecosystem, apps, monthly charges. If/when that happens, I'll either not watch TV at all, or use the 'free' options widely available. I want to give them money, but not if it makes my life more of a hassle.

Re: Netflix Is Why AT&T bought Time Warner, and Comcast and Disney want Fox

#77

Post by freehunter » Sun, Jun 17, 2018, 9:29 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #49

sosborn wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Off to a torrent site or asking around to see if someone has rips or a box set. The other option is to just not watch it.

The down voting you’re getting is emblematic of the entitlement mentality among tech folks when it comes to content. There is no right to consume entertainment someone else produced for free. If you don’t like the terms on which they’re selling the fruits of their labor, don’t buy it.

Completely playing devil's advocate here, but why should the companies feel entitled to money? If someone is going to go out of their way to pirate something, they're not spending money on it any anyway. So the company is spending their own money and time coming up with ways to prevent people from accessing their content which the other person wouldn't have paid for in the first place, then using that to show how much money they've lost.

Think about it like this: a comedian tells a joke that offends someone. But the people who get offended aren't the audience of that comedian, and wouldn't have seen the comedian's show anyway. Should the comedian worry at all about these people boycotting the show if they never have and never will buy tickets anyway?

Ending the devil's advocate, if these companies want to completely control popular culture and change the definition of society, they have to understand that memes (not the Internet kind, the real life kind) spread until they are pervasive. There's a limit to how much Disney can force Avengers into our cultural identity then demand payment for it. Either Avengers becomes a cultural meme and spreads virally, or you can keep people from seeing it unless you control the experience end-to-end and only have it become a moderate success and only make a moderate amount of money.

Re: Netflix Is Why AT&T bought Time Warner, and Comcast and Disney want Fox

#78

Post by mikeash » Sun, Jun 17, 2018, 9:31 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #21

MisterTea wrote: post #3

These companies are obsessed with fragmenting the market for the sake of owning content from production to delivery. I have bad news for them: you're going to lose. People don't want to go back to paying $100/month for a dozen streaming "channels" with one or two good shows and a the same crap the rest of the other "channels" have. We want an on-demand nexus. A single hub. Just the other day I had the urge to watch g…

What you’re proposing would lead to a terrible market structure. It would eliminate the most important differentiating factor: content. Subscribing to multiple streaming services might be somewhat less convenient, but it also allows competition based on producing and distributing quality content.

Music seems to have no trouble competing on quality content despite the nearly identical catalogs of the various streaming services. You just allocate subscription money based on plays (or whatever other metric approximates “how much the paying customers like this”) and it works fine.

Re: Netflix Is Why AT&T bought Time Warner, and Comcast and Disney want Fox

#79

Post by Karishma1234 » Sun, Jun 17, 2018, 9:33 PM UTC

MisterTea wrote: post #3

These companies are obsessed with fragmenting the market for the sake of owning content from production to delivery. I have bad news for them: you're going to lose. People don't want to go back to paying $100/month for a dozen streaming "channels" with one or two good shows and a the same crap the rest of the other "channels" have. We want an on-demand nexus. A single hub. Just the other day I had the urge to watch g…

Well the ATT and other behemoths are set for a massive failure. Their core business has been navigating regulatory mazes while trying to seek near monopoly and push expensive and crappy subscriptions down the throats of old and gullible people.

With each passing Year Netflix and Hulu are adding more and more original content which is becoming part of pop-culture. Within 5 years most of the cool things we want to watch would be from Netflix and Hulu and everything else would come from torrents or youtube.

Dinosaurs are dying and we should cheer.

Re: Netflix Is Why AT&T bought Time Warner, and Comcast and Disney want Fox

#80

Post by heroprotagonist » Sun, Jun 17, 2018, 9:37 PM UTC

MisterTea wrote: post #3

These companies are obsessed with fragmenting the market for the sake of owning content from production to delivery. I have bad news for them: you're going to lose. People don't want to go back to paying $100/month for a dozen streaming "channels" with one or two good shows and a the same crap the rest of the other "channels" have. We want an on-demand nexus. A single hub. Just the other day I had the urge to watch g…

Once that torrent download becomes 'Miscellaneous data' charged per gigabyte due to loss of net neutrality, won't that encourage you through their preferred channel?

Personally, I'll start reading books more but I imagine 90% of my country won't. They'll go through the service that has a deal with their ISP.

The scarier part being that regardless of whether I go through the recommended source or disregard the content altogether, it's an impact on the information and ideas I consume.