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It’s not a zero-sum game for Apple TV+, Netflix, and Disney+

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Re: It’s not a zero-sum game for Apple TV+, Netflix, and Disney+

#21

Post by prawn »

illuminati1911 wrote: post #2

"For months now, journalists, industry insiders, and consumers have opined on who will “win” the streaming wars and why." The more streaming services there will be, the more likely it is that only thepiratebay and torrents will win.

Especially because torrenting was once slow and painful, so Netflix and co compared very favourably. Now, torrenting is fast and chances are you've watched almost anything worth watching on Netflix already.

Paying for a few of them might appeal to people who've historically paid for cable (or Foxtel/etc in Australia), but it's a noticeable cost otherwise. We currently subscribe to Netflix and Stan, but have dropped Stan in the past and may again.

Re: It’s not a zero-sum game for Apple TV+, Netflix, and Disney+

#22

Post by jayalpha »

akiselev wrote: post #17
Akababa wrote: post #14

Call me pedantic, but the usage of the term "zero-sum" in this article makes no sense. They use it synonymously with "winner-take-all" which is so far from it's original meaning that you have to question whether the author even knows what zero-sum means, or if they're just using the buzzword to attract clicks. In fact, increased competition leads to reduced profits (at least in the short term), making this a "negativ…

> In fact, increased competition leads to reduced profits (at least in the short term), making this a "negative-sum" game. I'm not an economist but I've never heard of competition described as "negative-sum." It's zero-sum because the consumer wins. "Negative-sum" would be a nuclear weapons manufacturer profiting off blowing up half the planet. The manufacturer might have made money, but overall everyone else loses f…

"I'm not an economist but I've never heard of competition described as "negative-sum.""

It is obvious that, if competition is strong for a cake with a given size, that costs, e.g. for advertisement, may actually decrease the profits. While the size of the cake stays the same, the market players have less profits due to increased costs. So in the end everybody has a smaller slice. If I remember correctly, this has happened in a stagnant cigarette market where one player decided to increase his share. They spend a fortune on advertisement, as did the other since they don't want to lose their share. After some years the war stopped and everybody had more or less the same share as before, while having lost a tremendous amount of money on advertisement without gaining any benefit.

This may also be a funny example: https://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/31/nyregion/in-manhattan-piz...

"It's zero-sum because the consumer wins."

A zero sum game has nothing to do with consumers in this example. It means, the cake has a given size. If you want to increase the size of your slice, you have to take something away from another player.

A non-zero sum game would be were the cake (market) is growing. Every year you have a bigger cake. Then it is possible that you can increase your slice without reducing the slice of another player.

Re: It’s not a zero-sum game for Apple TV+, Netflix, and Disney+

#23

Post by akiselev »

asdfasgasdgasdg wrote: post #19
akiselev wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In fact, increased competition leads to reduced profits (at least in the short term), making this a "negative-sum" game. I'm not an economist but I've never heard of competition described as "negative-sum." It's zero-sum because the consumer wins. "Negative-sum" would be a nuclear weapons manufacturer profiting off blowing up half the planet. The manufacturer might have made money, but overall everyone else loses f…

> It's zero-sum because the consumer wins. That's not the traditional economic understanding of the *-sum expression either. In economics, competition forces efficiency improvements, which makes competition in cases where increased efficiency is possible positive-sum.

What's the point of efficiency improvements to a business without a consumer? They could be another business, but at the end of day a member of the public has to pay for it with taxes or post-tax dollars. Economies dont exist without consumers to consume what the producers produce.

Sure you could measure efficiency in widgets per human-hour but at the end of day, efficiency improvements do not happen in lock-step across industries so at some point you have to convert to a meaningful value dictated by consumers.

Re: It’s not a zero-sum game for Apple TV+, Netflix, and Disney+

#24

Post by akiselev »

jayalpha wrote: post #22
akiselev wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In fact, increased competition leads to reduced profits (at least in the short term), making this a "negative-sum" game. I'm not an economist but I've never heard of competition described as "negative-sum." It's zero-sum because the consumer wins. "Negative-sum" would be a nuclear weapons manufacturer profiting off blowing up half the planet. The manufacturer might have made money, but overall everyone else loses f…

"I'm not an economist but I've never heard of competition described as "negative-sum."" It is obvious that, if competition is strong for a cake with a given size, that costs, e.g. for advertisement, may actually decrease the profits. While the size of the cake stays the same, the market players have less profits due to increased costs. So in the end everybody has a smaller slice. If I remember correctly, this has hap…

A non-zero sum game would be were the cake (market) is growing. Every year you have a bigger cake. Then it is possible that you can increase your slice without reducing the slice of another player.j

I meant zero-sum in the context of this article. Have Disney+, Netflix, etc stopped growing their offerings and market size? Has everyone who can afford to signed up to all of them at the same time?

Re: It’s not a zero-sum game for Apple TV+, Netflix, and Disney+

#25

Post by Supermancho »

npo9 wrote: post #18
zeroonetwothree wrote: post #12

They are so cheap that I am just subscribed to everything. I know I’m fortunate to be able to afford that but compared to what Americans are spending on everything else it’s surely not a lot for the value you get. Still cheaper than I used to pay for cable ($100)

I have never paid for cable in my life. The youngest generation hasn’t. Comparing subscription services to cable won’t work for the newest customers because they aren’t use to cable.

> Comparing subscription services to cable won’t work for the newest customers because they aren’t use to cable

Most Americans have cable. It's often inextricably linked with internet access. The newest customers, in both rural and urban, are definitely used to it.

Re: It’s not a zero-sum game for Apple TV+, Netflix, and Disney+

#27

Post by alain94040 »

illuminati1911 wrote: post #2

"For months now, journalists, industry insiders, and consumers have opined on who will “win” the streaming wars and why." The more streaming services there will be, the more likely it is that only thepiratebay and torrents will win.

It's amazing how we have gone full circle in the last 15 years or so. In the old days, people complained about their cable tv bill: why do I have to pay for 250 channels when I only watch 5 of them? Let me pay only for what I watch.

Now that the future is here, people are complaining that they need to sign up for too many streaming services. Why can't I just pay once for a bundle and get everything I need?

I'm just as guilty as everyone else, I don't have a good answer...

Re: It’s not a zero-sum game for Apple TV+, Netflix, and Disney+

#28

Post by xiphias2 »

prawn wrote: post #21
illuminati1911 wrote: post #2

"For months now, journalists, industry insiders, and consumers have opined on who will “win” the streaming wars and why." The more streaming services there will be, the more likely it is that only thepiratebay and torrents will win.

Especially because torrenting was once slow and painful, so Netflix and co compared very favourably. Now, torrenting is fast and chances are you've watched almost anything worth watching on Netflix already. Paying for a few of them might appeal to people who've historically paid for cable (or Foxtel/etc in Australia), but it's a noticeable cost otherwise. We currently subscribe to Netflix and Stan, but have dropped S…

I happily pay for Netflix, but actually I travel a lot and don't always have Wifi, so I like to download the movies.

My problem with Netflix is that its download function is very unstable, so actually I'm thinking of going back to torrenting just because there's no payed option for watching movies offline easily.

Re: It’s not a zero-sum game for Apple TV+, Netflix, and Disney+

#29

Post by hadlock »

We are dropping Disney+ minutes after the last episode of the Maldorian finishes it's screening at our house. Unless they release something immediately thereafter. We split Netflix with my best friend and my wife and I split Amazon prime/hbo. As soon as last week tonight wraps up we're cancelling hbo too. We briefly had Hulu while the wife was binging on handmaid's tale but have since cancelled. Not keeping these services on 52 weeks a year

Re: It’s not a zero-sum game for Apple TV+, Netflix, and Disney+

#30

Post by ajhurliman »

akiselev wrote: post #17
Akababa wrote: post #14

Call me pedantic, but the usage of the term "zero-sum" in this article makes no sense. They use it synonymously with "winner-take-all" which is so far from it's original meaning that you have to question whether the author even knows what zero-sum means, or if they're just using the buzzword to attract clicks. In fact, increased competition leads to reduced profits (at least in the short term), making this a "negativ…

> In fact, increased competition leads to reduced profits (at least in the short term), making this a "negative-sum" game. I'm not an economist but I've never heard of competition described as "negative-sum." It's zero-sum because the consumer wins. "Negative-sum" would be a nuclear weapons manufacturer profiting off blowing up half the planet. The manufacturer might have made money, but overall everyone else loses f…

It may be trying to estimate something like the "real value" (difficult to measure as it's very subjective) versus cost.

In that case, the question at hand is: "Are consumers getting more real benefits per dollar spent?"

I'd argue that there's another dimension to the conversation which is granularity. Most of the streaming services don't allow purchasing a single show (except for YouTube, Amazon Prime and a few others), and for the services that do let you buy a single show it's way too expensive for a series.

If you try to buy an entire season of a single show it'll often cost you the price of 6 months of the streaming service.

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