Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Netflix shares decline after reporting disappointing subscriber growth

bbc.co.uk

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

81–90 of 191 posts

Re: Netflix shares decline after reporting disappointing subscriber growth

#81

Post by heavenlyblue »

geoffmcc wrote: post #43
unethical_ban wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Audio previews! Holy shit! Terrible experience. And auto-play for episodes. I know it gets people hooked to watch, but still annoying. There are so few configurable items in their Netflix menu.

I have noticed lately that the "Are you still there" message has gone away. While it is nice when you are awake, it sucks when you fall asleep and wake up on season 6 of something when last you knew you were on season 2. Then you have to figure out exactly what episode you fell asleep on, not impossible but can be a pain.

Hate that option. I tend to work from home and leave my TV with something on. Picking up my remote every few hours is a waste. I don’t see why it’s so hard to let users turn it off.

Re: Netflix shares decline after reporting disappointing subscriber growth

#82

Post by madrox »

keithnz wrote: post #73

I don't know if anyone else does this, but I subscribe to netflix for a while, then I hit a wall of "nothing to watch" and new content that I'm interested in dribbles out too slowly. So I unsubscribe and subscribe with a different streaming service, and watch their content for a bit, then go to another, and then eventually come back to netflix. If it's been long enough I also get free trials for another month also :)

You've basically described the streaming business these days. Listening to talks from Netflix, they optimize for this kind of behavior. While they're interested in retention, they have a pretty optimized winback funnel.

Re: Netflix shares decline after reporting disappointing subscriber growth

#83

Post by wolco »

undefined1 wrote: post #68
wavefunction wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sacred Games and Secret City (among others) are far more well-done than most other recent offerings from other providers imnsho. Hulu has The Handmaid's Tale and HBO has Westworld but that's about it.

HBO also has Game of Thrones, Silicon Valley, John Oliver, good documentaries from time to time...

HBO is double the price and once you get through the best 15 series content is thin. Netflix has so much variety coming out daily.

Re: Netflix shares decline after reporting disappointing subscriber growth

#84

Post by odnarupoque »

One thing no one notices is DRM and lack of content on Netflix overseas... It is nearly impossible to have Netflix on Chinese Android devices (thanks to Widevine), which is a huge loss due to rapidly growing smart projector market... who needs 480p on a 150'' screen??

As for lack of content: my family is trilingual, and we constantly moving between countries. It's almost impossible to get content we like outside of US (even Australia sucks), these unbelievably stupid and shortsighted ideas of distribution regions (for DVD/BD) and DRM (for streaming) keeps me on torrents for 20+ years already, and I see no end to this ordeal. I tried to "go legal" on so many occasions, and EVERY SINGLE TIME I stumble upon some ludicrous "new tech" that prevents me as a consumer to watch content I like.

When will the studios realize that ALL content is out there already? And literally NONE of their effort since DVD css stopped anyone from "stealing" anything.

I can get any movie/show from torrents in max quality, but I would like to just pay $15 to someone and stream FullHD/4K content in any language to any device, and finally stop pirating stuff. Too much to ask, Netflix?

Music industry learned this lesson hard way 10 years ago, unleashed unlimited HQ streaming, and now look -- music piracy is nearly extinct, and both listeners and industry are happy.

In the meantime, I'm filling my 4TB hdd with BD remuxes and enjoying 4k videos w/o paying any cent to anyone. No other way around it for consumer, it seems.

Re: Netflix shares decline after reporting disappointing subscriber growth

#85

Post by bunderbunder »

ehsankia wrote: post #63
Gustomaximus wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd add to this their removal of star ranking and that percentage system. It's so geared to what they want to promote vs what is good TV.

I honestly don't care about what ranking they use as it gives good results. Thumbs up, 5 starts, 10 starts, %, it's all the same. What frustrates me is that even after changing it, the recommendations are still just as bad, so the whole change was basically pointless.

The recs were very good back when it was the DVD service.

Wild conjecture: A paucity of things to recommend, combined with a desire to not concede that there are only like 3 things left I haven't watched yet but would be likely to give 5 stars, prompted them to first tweak the recommender's calibration, then eventually to wholesale switch to a metric that blurs the distinction between, "Yeah, I'll watch it", and "That was great!"

Re: Netflix shares decline after reporting disappointing subscriber growth

#86

Post by toomuchtodo »

dfee wrote: post #70
pkaye wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've realized the same. I'm always surprised they are part of the FAANG stocks given how little they have control they have over their catalog.

I took the N out and realized that would never fly. As Netflix is the odd duck of the group, maybe some banking associate put it in there just to give some ferocity to the acronym (I.e. engineered a backronyn).

I always thought it odd that Netflix was picked instead of Microsoft for the "FAANG" group, considering market cap.

Re: Netflix shares decline after reporting disappointing subscriber growth

#87

Post by whoisjuan »

keithnz wrote: post #73

I don't know if anyone else does this, but I subscribe to netflix for a while, then I hit a wall of "nothing to watch" and new content that I'm interested in dribbles out too slowly. So I unsubscribe and subscribe with a different streaming service, and watch their content for a bit, then go to another, and then eventually come back to netflix. If it's been long enough I also get free trials for another month also :)

There's a large percentage of users who won't go through all that trouble just to find new content. Anecdotally I can tell you that there's a large percentage of users who can re-watch the same series over and over (I'm one of those people).

Netflix knows this so that's why they go great lengths to keep series like The Office and Friends, btw, both owned by Comcast...so you can guess why Netflix is cheering for Comcast to win that Fox bid...

Re: Netflix shares decline after reporting disappointing subscriber growth

#88

Post by redthrowaway »

I'm curious about their decision to push original content as hard as they have. In some cases, like comedy specials, it's a clear win. But their original dramas are really hit or miss, and for every Altered Carbon you have a half dozen utterly forgettable shows. It makes the "Netflix Original" badge pretty meaningless as an indicator of quality, so I still have to wait for a buzz to develop to commit to trying a show. I don't end up watching Netflix nearly as much as I'd like to.

Also, the diminishment of the back catalogue (and the fact that so much of it is SD--not their fault) is negating one of their biggest selling points.

Re: Netflix shares decline after reporting disappointing subscriber growth

#89

Post by heavenlyblue »

orky56 wrote: post #72
foepys wrote: post #16

When Disney will launch their streaming service in late 2019, Netflix will be in deep trouble. If Disney is allowed to aquire Fox, they will have such a massive (and exclusive) catalogue, that Netflix will simply be too expensive. Netflix Originals are not too bad but also not exceedingly good and I personally wouldn't pay 11€/mo for them.

They will have the technology side covered [1] but they have to nail the pricing/catalogue/UI mix to succeed. However Disney has the resources (time/$/talent) to go at it until they take down Netflix. [1]: https://www.theverge.com/2017/8/9/16118694/disney-bamtech-es...

It’s not 90s anymore. Technology is a commodity. If they are smart enough anout it they’ve got all the chances to beat Netflix by that time.

Re: Netflix shares decline after reporting disappointing subscriber growth

#90

Post by codebje »

geoffmcc wrote: post #43
unethical_ban wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Audio previews! Holy shit! Terrible experience. And auto-play for episodes. I know it gets people hooked to watch, but still annoying. There are so few configurable items in their Netflix menu.

I have noticed lately that the "Are you still there" message has gone away. While it is nice when you are awake, it sucks when you fall asleep and wake up on season 6 of something when last you knew you were on season 2. Then you have to figure out exactly what episode you fell asleep on, not impossible but can be a pain.

Netflix carries a decent selection of kid's entertainment, where having a 10-minute show followed by the next episode automatically is useful.

On the Apple TV app, at least, the "Are you still watching" message is still there.

Post reply on HN