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Netflix CEO may have missed the real reason why US subscriber numbers plunged

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Re: Netflix CEO may have missed the real reason why US subscriber numbers plunged

#351

Post by richardw »

dragonwriter wrote: post #186
atombender wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People aren't asking for a single distribution channel in the sense of a single monolithic company owning all the IP. They do want (1) convenient apps that aggregate, such as Apple TV and Amazon Prime Video, and (2) a way to get all the content without having to pay lots of individual companies (I'm subscribing to around 5 streaming services myself). Why can't video be like music? Spotify and Apple Music aggregate pr…

> Why can't video be like music? Music is still fighting being “like music”. > Spotify and Apple Music aggregate pretty much all the music in the world now. There have been a number of recent media reports about how exclusives, which never were absent from streaming music, are playing a bigger role now. > You don't have to sign up Warner and Sony and a thousand other labels to play music. Well, yeah, we haven't gotte…

Radio probably prevents exclusives to some extent. If you can't get your song onto general radio you're going nowhere. Can't have exclusive online when radio isn't.

(generally, obviously there will be exceptions.)

Re: Netflix CEO may have missed the real reason why US subscriber numbers plunged

#352

Post by godzillabrennus »

atombender wrote: post #168
noelsusman wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course people would rather pay $10 a month to access everything, but that's just not sustainable. Look at Netflix's own financials. They got into content creation and they're now deep in debt despite their massive subscriber base. I also don't get why everyone is clamoring for one company to control all video entertainment distribution. Isn't that what we hated about cable? Didn't we beg for the ability to pick an…

People aren't asking for a single distribution channel in the sense of a single monolithic company owning all the IP. They do want (1) convenient apps that aggregate, such as Apple TV and Amazon Prime Video, and (2) a way to get all the content without having to pay lots of individual companies (I'm subscribing to around 5 streaming services myself). Why can't video be like music? Spotify and Apple Music aggregate pr…

I basically have this with Hulu. I pay for the live tv package and cloud dvr. It lets me access a back catalogue of streamable content for each “channel” in my package.

I have hbo/starz/and the big name cable channels for about $140/month with 200gb of cloud dvr.

My only real complaint is that I can’t download content to my phone for flights.

It’s not $12.99/month but when I’m traveling in Asia I can VPN back to my house and watch whatever I want off the cloud DVR.

Re: Netflix CEO may have missed the real reason why US subscriber numbers plunged

#353

Post by 01100011 »

godzillabrennus wrote: post #352
atombender wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People aren't asking for a single distribution channel in the sense of a single monolithic company owning all the IP. They do want (1) convenient apps that aggregate, such as Apple TV and Amazon Prime Video, and (2) a way to get all the content without having to pay lots of individual companies (I'm subscribing to around 5 streaming services myself). Why can't video be like music? Spotify and Apple Music aggregate pr…

I basically have this with Hulu. I pay for the live tv package and cloud dvr. It lets me access a back catalogue of streamable content for each “channel” in my package. I have hbo/starz/and the big name cable channels for about $140/month with 200gb of cloud dvr. My only real complaint is that I can’t download content to my phone for flights. It’s not $12.99/month but when I’m traveling in Asia I can VPN back to my h…

Oh, only $140/month? What a deal...

Bring it down to $60-$80 and I'd consider it.

Re: Netflix CEO may have missed the real reason why US subscriber numbers plunged

#354

Post by cgriswald »

Beldin wrote: post #341
Consultant32452 wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I enjoy the standup specials. I remember when Comedy Central used to have stand up comedy. But I also remember when MTV was mostly music.

Remark that that past evolution (of niche formats) does not bode well for the future of streaming video. Case in point: I expect ads to arrive (within a decade) to streaming videos, much like they did for cable. (Cable's main advantage in the early days was the lack of ads - or so I'm led to believe)

They’re already here. I even pay Hulu extra for no ads only to be greeted occasionally by a statement that due to licensing agreements a video has to have ads. And even the things that “don’t have ads” have ads for their other streaming videos, or try to cram ads in between auto plays.

Re: Netflix CEO may have missed the real reason why US subscriber numbers plunged

#355

Post by VBprogrammer »

nickv wrote: post #280
atombender wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People aren't asking for a single distribution channel in the sense of a single monolithic company owning all the IP. They do want (1) convenient apps that aggregate, such as Apple TV and Amazon Prime Video, and (2) a way to get all the content without having to pay lots of individual companies (I'm subscribing to around 5 streaming services myself). Why can't video be like music? Spotify and Apple Music aggregate pr…

Because Music isn't TV or film. The vast majority of revenue for most artists come from live performances. It's not like the cast of Stranger Things can go and tour the world and perform a live Stranger Things inside stadiums. It doesn't work that way. Additionally, Spotify, especially, has done wonders for obscure discoverablity with Discover Weekly which incentivize smaller bands to support it (because again they m…

> It's not like the cast of Stranger Things can go and tour the world and perform a live Stranger Things inside stadiums. It doesn't work that way.

I for one would totally pay to see that.

Re: Netflix CEO may have missed the real reason why US subscriber numbers plunged

#356

Post by singron »

lonelappde wrote: post #297
adventured wrote: post #281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> People aren't asking for a single distribution channel in the sense of a single monolithic company owning all the IP. They do want (1) convenient apps that aggregate I generally agree with that. I don't care about one platform at all. I'll pay up to ~$30 total per month for nearly everything (TV + movies), whether that's on one site or spread across four. With the way things are going, it looks more likely that I'l…

Premium cables costs $100/mo, and some stuff is still pay per view. Why wout you expect to get it for $30/no?

I saw a chart a while ago that showed how much of your subscription your cable company forwarded to the content networks. Most channels were cents per month. ESPN was highest by far and was still only 5 dollars iirc. It seems like if your ISP is already providing connectivity, you should be paying closer to these prices.

Re: Netflix CEO may have missed the real reason why US subscriber numbers plunged

#357

Post by 01100011 »

noelsusman wrote: post #147
archey1 wrote: post #75

Netflix is just getting more expensive and less interesting to me. With all of the content I like being taken off to be hosted on network exclusive streaming platforms that I refuse to pay for - I'll probably eventually just cancel Netflix as well going back to the tried and true method of just buying bluray box-sets of the content I want to watch. Or piracy. I think the critical mistake that all these megacorps are…

Of course people would rather pay $10 a month to access everything, but that's just not sustainable. Look at Netflix's own financials. They got into content creation and they're now deep in debt despite their massive subscriber base. I also don't get why everyone is clamoring for one company to control all video entertainment distribution. Isn't that what we hated about cable? Didn't we beg for the ability to pick an…

> I also don't get why everyone is clamoring for one company to control all video entertainment distribution. Isn't that what we hated about cable?

No. We hated cable for the high prices and bad service which were enabled by physical monopolies.

If the backend was based on open protocols, you could buy an aggregating frontend from Netflix, Hulu, TiVo, etc and then buy whatever content you like from whatever content owner you like.

Re: Netflix CEO may have missed the real reason why US subscriber numbers plunged

#358

Post by cgriswald »

eikenberry wrote: post #171
JTbane wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>People hated being locked into packages and this is basically the same thing - you need the "NBC" package for The Office or the "CBS" package for Star Trek. I can't be bothered to spend all that money. At this point it is very tempting to go back to good, old-fashioned torrents of TV shows.

But there is a difference in that you aren't locked into things the same way you were locked into cable, where it was all or nothing. You can subscribe and unsubscribe to different services at different times as you wish. Given you get all the content available during your subscription why would you stay subscribed to all of them all the time. Just subscribe to the ones that have the shows you want to watch at that t…

Sure. So I subscribe to Amazon for The Grand Tour, the girlfriend subscribes to Netflix for Marie Kondo, the kids subscribe to NBC for THe Office and Disney for Disney stuff, and Mom subscribes to CBS for Star Trek and now I’m back to basically paying for cable for the five shows we want to watch right now, with the added convenience of worrying about dropping and adding subscriptions for as long as it takes these services to figure out a mechanism to prevent this behavior.

Re: Netflix CEO may have missed the real reason why US subscriber numbers plunged

#359

Post by Twisell »

nickv wrote: post #280
atombender wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People aren't asking for a single distribution channel in the sense of a single monolithic company owning all the IP. They do want (1) convenient apps that aggregate, such as Apple TV and Amazon Prime Video, and (2) a way to get all the content without having to pay lots of individual companies (I'm subscribing to around 5 streaming services myself). Why can't video be like music? Spotify and Apple Music aggregate pr…

Because Music isn't TV or film. The vast majority of revenue for most artists come from live performances. It's not like the cast of Stranger Things can go and tour the world and perform a live Stranger Things inside stadiums. It doesn't work that way. Additionally, Spotify, especially, has done wonders for obscure discoverablity with Discover Weekly which incentivize smaller bands to support it (because again they m…

This was absolutely true... before the Star Wars franchise in 70’s. And I’d bet that "stranger things" derived products are massively more cash producing than any artists live performance.

The real question is about independents, not blockbusters.

Re: Netflix CEO may have missed the real reason why US subscriber numbers plunged

#360

Post by __david__ »

brighter2morrow wrote: post #158
happytoexplain wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>political pandering instead of offering good quality entertainment This, unfortunately, is the ultimate double-edged sword. It would be a very safe and content-less world indeed if fictional media did not in some what appear to address or include something political in nature. Usually when we feel like what we're watching is not political, it's actually because it's simply political in ways that we identify with or…

>Usually when we feel like what we're watching is not political, it's actually because it's simply political in ways that we identify with or do not find offensive. I'd be interested to see a show that has nationalistic/right-wing assumptions. Any good examples?

I would say 24 is an authoritarian wet dream. It's a show where torture is the preferred way to get information quick and it works 100% of the time.
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