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Disney, Warner, Comcast, and Paramount are contemplating cuts, possible mergers

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Re: Disney, Warner, Comcast, and Paramount are contemplating cuts, possible mergers

#191

Post by wolverine876 »

costanzaDynasty wrote: post #132

I dropped cable in 2007, and streaming last year. If streaming is no longer a value and ad free then I don't have a need for it. I'm FAST and buy what I want on sale through a single ecosystem. The whole industry was hotshotted and its going to take a while before they game the CBAs. But honestly think that my time is better spent doing other things. Perhaps my money will be more appreciated in those areas. If I star…

> I'm FAST and buy what I want on sale through a single ecosystem.

What does that mean?

Re: Disney, Warner, Comcast, and Paramount are contemplating cuts, possible mergers

#192

Post by jncfhnb »

vehemenz wrote: post #187
jncfhnb wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Describing old things with old terminology is just confusing.

Only if the new terminology is better and actually adds something. Does adopting half-baked concepts from TikTokers really add anything here?

I feel like you’re trying to gaslight me into thinking this term is from TikTok.

Re: Disney, Warner, Comcast, and Paramount are contemplating cuts, possible mergers

#193

Post by geodel »

lolinder wrote: post #165
tom_walters wrote: post #29

I think this primarily comes down to a fundamental misunderstanding of where the value in streaming services lies from the perspective of old world media giants. The majority of people who buy streaming, I suspect, are interested mainly in the conveyor belt of diverse and engaging content. Sure I whack an episode of Rick and Morty on via Netflix once a month, but 90% of viewing is of new serialized content. Disney na…

Netflix's secret starting in their DVD days was to provide a service that had way more variety than Blockbuster, so that no matter who you were, the movies you wanted to watch would be available. Disney especially was arrogant enough to assume that they controlled all the IP that people actually want to watch, so they thought they could just pull out of Netflix and everyone would switch. But that's not how movie pref…

To be honest I give credit to consumers to puncture Disney's inflated ego and bring them down to earth. If a minimum threshold of folks kept hankering for Disney's content to keep them in good financial condition they'd remain arrogant as ever.

Re: Disney, Warner, Comcast, and Paramount are contemplating cuts, possible mergers

#194

Post by mrj »

jonplackett wrote: post #156
tom_walters wrote: post #29

I think this primarily comes down to a fundamental misunderstanding of where the value in streaming services lies from the perspective of old world media giants. The majority of people who buy streaming, I suspect, are interested mainly in the conveyor belt of diverse and engaging content. Sure I whack an episode of Rick and Morty on via Netflix once a month, but 90% of viewing is of new serialized content. Disney na…

It’s funny how crap the other streamers apps still are compared to Netflix. Little things matter. Netflix always picks up the exact second you left a show. Apple, Disney and prime sometimes jump back 5 minutes or even more. Netflix app opens super fast even in my crap old smart TV. Apple, Disney, prime take ages. Even when open the UI is very sloppy. Netflix adjusts the streaming quality depending on your connection.…

Oh it's so much worse than opening speed. Paramount+ is straight unusable on every platform I tried, the Android reviews show I'm not the only one. It crashes, fails to load, kicks your dog, you name it. Can't be used.

Peacock has no way to remember I want to see my local news channel live. I have to scroll the entire list of all of the channels across the nation and find mine. It's somewhere near the bottom.

Peacock also has the problem if I pause and want to resume somewhere in the last 15 minutes of a show it'll assume I've finished it and restart. Not great when you just wanted to watch the conclusion after getting off of the treadmill. Also not great when combined with the impossible to use scrubbers, it moves far too fast to be accurate. If you get within 5 minutes of what you were aiming for, it's best to just rewatch that 5 minutes again. You can't improve on it.

I could go on for a while about these platforms, they're hot garbage.

Re: Disney, Warner, Comcast, and Paramount are contemplating cuts, possible mergers

#195

Post by wolverine876 »

Companies in many, many industries have been cutting as the economy is booming. What explains this phenomenon? Is it somehow political? Are corporate leadership following the all-is-despair-and-corruption trend, and lack vision, optimism, and drive?

Re: Disney, Warner, Comcast, and Paramount are contemplating cuts, possible mergers

#196

Post by geodel »

aqfamnzc wrote: post #151
maxerickson wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disney also has Hulu and ESPN+. (They rolled up Hulu after acquiring a majority share with the purchase of Fox)

Oh, interesting. I'm surprised they haven't merged them / moved people over / shut down Hulu.

They have stake in Hulu, other partner is Comcast. So Disney can't just shut it down on their own.

Re: Disney, Warner, Comcast, and Paramount are contemplating cuts, possible mergers

#197

Post by geraldwhen »

lolinder wrote: post #152
jl6 wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All the old Disney back catalog is still new to my kids so they just watch that and ignore the new junk.

It depends on the age of the kids—for the price of a Disney+ subscription you can buy ~2 DVDs a month, which at my kid's age (4 and 2) is way more frequently than they actually want to watch new movies. When I was a kid, (and I'm seeing it with my own kids) we had a tiny selection of movies that we loved to watch repeatedly. Why pay rent for that selection when you could own it for the same price?

I may do something like this if Disney ever creates good content again on accident.

I bought puss and boots 2 last year on release, and that movie was excellent.

Re: Disney, Warner, Comcast, and Paramount are contemplating cuts, possible mergers

#198

Post by lprd »

I've come to despise all streaming services and hope they all burn down. We've gone full circle in terms of price and convenience. Hell, even Prime now wants to you pay extra to not see ads! Wasn't that one of the benefits over cable in the beginning?

I've gone back to buying physical media and just put everything on my Plex server. The perpetual 'rental' model is a failing one and is not consumer friendly.

Re: Disney, Warner, Comcast, and Paramount are contemplating cuts, possible mergers

#199

Post by skydhash »

geodel wrote: post #172
fzeroracer wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ultimately yeah, it's this. Netflix wins because it understands hanging your hat on one series or IP is business suicide. They churn out a bunch of shows, from higher budget big IPs to a bunch of lower budget series and animations. David Zaslav and other media execs wanted to try and force the old media philosophy in the streaming environment, which also meant executing a bunch of mid-budget and lower-budget series t…

Well Amazon shot many very expensive shows and they turned out to be crapola. The only thing favored Amazon studios was huge cash from Amazon so they could just be fine with all mega failures. So far lot of streaming shows are crappy in a way I can't quite put my finger on and its definitely not just about budget.

I believe it’s the writing. There is no soul in te dialogue and characterization always seems forced. Acting and set design may be good, but it feels like no one is giving a damn about the scenario

Re: Disney, Warner, Comcast, and Paramount are contemplating cuts, possible mergers

#200

Post by dfxm12 »

wolverine876 wrote: post #195

Companies in many, many industries have been cutting as the economy is booming. What explains this phenomenon? Is it somehow political? Are corporate leadership following the all-is-despair-and-corruption trend, and lack vision, optimism, and drive?

When unemployment is as low as it has been, employers lose leverage. They want to gain that leverage back.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/09/13/tim-gurner-u...

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