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Amazon acquires MGM for $8.5B

reuters.com

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Re: Amazon acquires MGM for $8.5B

#121

Post by w0m »

joombaga wrote: post #99
WarOnPrivacy wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We could really use laws that force, once again, some sort of separation between production and distribution. Piracy is competition to bad content behavior. It's a meaningful consumer response to monopoly, balkanization and other anti-consumer practices.

I think we're at or approaching a tipping point. For a long while I've not been able to justify the effort it takes to maintain automatic content downloads and a streaming server. But that maintenance cost isn't higher when I want content from an additional platform. If I'm gonna pirate an Amazon/MGM exclusive then I'm gonna cancel Netflix, Hulu, Paramount+ and Apple TV+ too.

Piracy was the Easiest/Only way to get content until ~2008ish. Since then; Netflix and (...x streaming platform) made it easier/better to Pay for the content than pirate it.

It does feel like we're approaching a tipping point now in the other direction with all of these streaming fiefdoms.

My household has Netflix, Hulu, D+, and Prime streaming now - that's already too many and needs pairing IMO.

Re: Amazon acquires MGM for $8.5B

#123

Post by amelius »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #114
rchaud wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed. The acquisition opens up numerous product placement opportunities. I can't wait to watch John Krasinski watching a mission briefing with his mPow 2021 Slim Noise Cancelling Bluetooth USB-C headphones.

That’s a funny example considering mPow got banned from Amazon a few days ago for manipulating reviews.

I guess it would be practically impossible to remove the item from the video, though.

Or will Amazon shoot the scene multiple times, with different items?

Re: Amazon acquires MGM for $8.5B

#124

Post by brightball »

paganel wrote: post #83
WarOnPrivacy wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We could really use laws that force, once again, some sort of separation between production and distribution. Piracy is competition to bad content behavior. It's a meaningful consumer response to monopoly, balkanization and other anti-consumer practices.

Or we could fall back to watching movies made from the ‘30s to the ‘50s, that’s what I have been doing for more than half a year now and it has been wonderful for my mental well-being (they really knew how to make comedies back then, even after the Hayes code).

Our whole family has been doing that this year. Watching older movies and TV shows is much more pleasant all around.

This was tougher growing up when kids all watched the same shows and talked about them, but with content so all over the place now that common thread seems to be mostly gone at school (outside of internet video stuff).

Re: Amazon acquires MGM for $8.5B

#125

Post by lotsofpulp »

samdixon wrote: post #95
ameister14 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think that people are united about breaking up Amazon and frankly I don't really see the damage to consumer necessary to break it up; products come faster, cheaper. Could you articulate why Amazon should be broken up? Most of the arguments I've seen boil down to "It's so big" and not really "It's effectively dominated x market and there is no competition there" or even "they are harming competition by pre-ins…

I don't know how large of a concern this is, but Amazons wide growth allows using revenue from their higher profit sectors (such as aws) to force out competitors in other lower margin sectors they are involved with such as grocery stores. This also may very well be a strategy other large conglomerates utilize. Video on subject: https://youtu.be/EYPs-ya_GDA?t=128

Grocery stores use high margin products to sell staples such as bread and meat at cost or loss and force out smaller players like bakers and butchers.

Re: Amazon acquires MGM for $8.5B

#126

Post by throw0101a »

someperson wrote: post #17

This makes it very likely that the beloved Stargate franchise will return as an Amazon Prime exclusive franchise, which will be great news for those of us like myself with appetite for 60+ more seasons of that show (after the 17 seasons that have already been made). I watched the sci-fi show "The Expanse" on Amazon Prime Video. Season 4 (the one made by Amazon Prime Video) felt like it had a tenth of the budget compa…

> Season 4 (the one made by Amazon Prime Video) felt like it had a tenth of the budget compared to season 1 and 2. A completely different show that I found very boring and unwatchable.

Season 4 follows book 4, whereas previous seasons split the books in a non-typical fashion: e.g., S02E05 ("Home") was the end of book 1. Book 4 is also part of the second kind-of-trilogy and so is a bit slower paced, because it set ups the next two books.

This isn't really Amazon's fault: it's from the original content.

Re: Amazon acquires MGM for $8.5B

#127

Post by mrfusion »

someperson wrote: post #17

This makes it very likely that the beloved Stargate franchise will return as an Amazon Prime exclusive franchise, which will be great news for those of us like myself with appetite for 60+ more seasons of that show (after the 17 seasons that have already been made). I watched the sci-fi show "The Expanse" on Amazon Prime Video. Season 4 (the one made by Amazon Prime Video) felt like it had a tenth of the budget compa…

Wow I thought it was just me who didn’t like season 4 of the expanse. At some point they made a turn to focusing on the flaws of all the main characters to an obnoxious degree.

Re: Amazon acquires MGM for $8.5B

#128

Post by ACS_Solver »

someperson wrote: post #17

This makes it very likely that the beloved Stargate franchise will return as an Amazon Prime exclusive franchise, which will be great news for those of us like myself with appetite for 60+ more seasons of that show (after the 17 seasons that have already been made). I watched the sci-fi show "The Expanse" on Amazon Prime Video. Season 4 (the one made by Amazon Prime Video) felt like it had a tenth of the budget compa…

SG-1 is a great show. It holds up surprisingly well for its age. Strikes a great balance between serious and light-hearted, and the self-contained episodes often have interesting ethical or social issues. I'm also fond on how the early episodes emphasize that humans are new to interplanetary travel and are still figuring things out. There are several episodes where SG-1 travels to another planet and actually messes things up, making life worse for the natives. And the show did a great job with having things change in-universe.

There are some cliches and flaws, of course. My least favorite part is probably how non-permanent deaths were, they really overdid the whole thing with characters dying and coming back to life, or being cloned.

I'm surprised that Stargate has had some sort of franchise curse where other media never succeed. They had two more shows in the franchise (I'm in the minority that loved Universe, and I think Atlantis was for the most part bad), but never a movie aside from the one that started the franchise, never a game that succeeded (most attempts failed to even ship).

Re: Amazon acquires MGM for $8.5B

#129

Post by mschuster91 »

ameister14 wrote: post #18
frankbreetz wrote: post #8

If I had to pick a single politically uniting issue, breaking up Amazon and big tech would be it. Why has this not happened yet? Is the out of power party afraid the in power party will get credit? (This has been discussed when both parties were in power) If the government can't get something with this kind of support done, I fear the road we are headed down .

I don't think that people are united about breaking up Amazon and frankly I don't really see the damage to consumer necessary to break it up; products come faster, cheaper. Could you articulate why Amazon should be broken up? Most of the arguments I've seen boil down to "It's so big" and not really "It's effectively dominated x market and there is no competition there" or even "they are harming competition by pre-ins…

> "It's effectively dominated x market and there is no competition there"

Amazon often enough dominates local labor markets - they strategically set up their fulfillment centers in places that have high unemployment, so that employees have no practical (!) alternative than to accept the exploitative working conditions that Amazon offers.

Regarding marketplaces: in accessible online shopping, Amazon and eBay are a de-facto duopoly for the vendors. Get booted off of either and watch your business go dry in a matter of days.

> "they are harming competition by pre-installing free software that I can't uninstall"

That one was literally used as a justification for the IE de-bundling many years ago.

Re: Amazon acquires MGM for $8.5B

#130

Post by acwan93 »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #97
philistine wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You would be shocked at the amount of shows that were sold to NBC but produced by ABC Studios or whatever. It still happens today but the trend is going back to the closed loops.

How does that affect me as a customer?

It means shows that don’t get picked up by the studio making the show can get picked up by other studios to air it.

Two immediate examples I can think of:

“House MD” was produced by NBC/Universal but aired on FOX

“For All Mankind” was produced by Sony but currently airing on Apple TV+

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