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Netflix is turning into cable TV

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Re: Netflix is turning into cable TV

#11

Post by BLKNSLVR »

I'll always have some sympathy for Netflix because they were effectively first.

I remember waiting patiently for Netflix to arrive in Australia, and then as soon as it did arrive, a flood of competitors decided to "me too" into the party. They were too afraid to be first, so I've stuck with Netflix out of respect for their blazing the trail.

The competitors such as Disney and Paramount have caused the enshittification by fracturing the offerings; walling off their IP into their own individual gardens rather than licensing it out.

Ideally there would be multiple Netflix equivalents, with slightly differing value propositions, but with significant overlap in content licensed from the likes of Disney and Paramount.

That's not the present we've found ourselves in though. It's an interesting outcome of how "the market" works.

I feel like I'm an apologist for Netflix, and so I must be to some extent, but Netflix are reacting to the market it finds itself in, in order to remain viable.

Re: Netflix is turning into cable TV

#12

Post by cheriot »

stcredzero wrote: post #3
pleasantpeasant wrote: post #2

It's becoming TV. All it needs is a live news & sports section and you'd never need to leave the Netflix app.

Then we're back to bundling. Exactly what is keeping us from having a system where viewers just directly pay content creators? (And the likes of Game of Thrones is distributed therein?)

There's a lot of movies available to "rent" or buy for a couple dollars, but more people pay for bundles than a la cart.

Re: Netflix is turning into cable TV

#13

Post by jimt1234 »

imgabe wrote: post #7

It's not even doing a good job of that, though. The other day someone mentioned the 1990 movie "Taking Care of Business" with Jim Belushi and Charles Grodin. It's a pretty unremarkable movie, but I remembered liking it as a kid for whatever reason and wanted to see it again. Of course, it's not on any of the four streaming services I pay for (I'm outside the US so ymmv). And why? Why is the studio hoarding access to…

This is exactly why I miss the old, neighborhood, mom-and-pop DVD-rental store. The place near my apartment back in the early-2000s pretty much never removed anything from the shelves, so you could find almost any movie ever made. You just had to wipe the dust off some of them.

Re: Netflix is turning into cable TV

#14

Post by coder543 »

I just want a 4K Originals Plan with 1 screen.

Features:

    - Only Netflix Original content (in 4K)
    - 1 screen, since password sharing isn’t allowed anyways
    - No ads
    - No WWE
    - No smartphone games
    - No licensed content (which seems to be mostly 1080p anyways), since I can watch that elsewhere
I will offer $14/mo, at most.

Why should I be forced to pay for a bunch of stuff I don’t want or can’t use?

This is why I don’t have a Netflix subscription.

I subscribed for one month back in December to see how good/bad it was, and I was not impressed at all for $23/mo. The licensed content almost exclusively being 1080p just added insult to injury.

Re: Netflix is turning into cable TV

#15

Post by whalesalad »

Ever since HBO merged with Discovery, the content library has become garbage. It’s all reality shows, real housewives, tons of low effort content. HBO used to be the spot for edgy/racy content, great movies and really great shows.

Re: Netflix is turning into cable TV

#16

Post by cromka »

jimt1234 wrote: post #13
imgabe wrote: post #7

It's not even doing a good job of that, though. The other day someone mentioned the 1990 movie "Taking Care of Business" with Jim Belushi and Charles Grodin. It's a pretty unremarkable movie, but I remembered liking it as a kid for whatever reason and wanted to see it again. Of course, it's not on any of the four streaming services I pay for (I'm outside the US so ymmv). And why? Why is the studio hoarding access to…

This is exactly why I miss the old, neighborhood, mom-and-pop DVD-rental store. The place near my apartment back in the early-2000s pretty much never removed anything from the shelves, so you could find almost any movie ever made. You just had to wipe the dust off some of them.

Any movie ever made in the US, that is…

Re: Netflix is turning into cable TV

#17

Post by gumby »

cwales95 wrote: post #6

This has been happening for years with the spawning of all these streaming services. At one point a lot of content was on Netflix but now it’s been bundled into the owners own streaming platform. So we’ve effectively went from cable tv to digital streaming freedom and almost back to square one.

Most of those owners are bleeding out, so to stanch the flow they are licensing their content to other companies like...netflix.

It'll end up with a little oligarchy of a small number of streamers and then quality will plummet and ads will be unavoidable.

Re: Netflix is turning into cable TV

#18

Post by bxparks »

Netflix produced some interesting original shows. Most of them got canceled after a single season, on a cliff-hanger. That got frustrating, so we stopped watching Netflix original shows. Then we stopped watching Netflix. Then we canceled Netflix.

Re: Netflix is turning into cable TV

#19

Post by geertj »

cwales95 wrote: post #6

This has been happening for years with the spawning of all these streaming services. At one point a lot of content was on Netflix but now it’s been bundled into the owners own streaming platform. So we’ve effectively went from cable tv to digital streaming freedom and almost back to square one.

While I agree that there is ongoing enshittification, I do not think it's fair to say we're back at square one yet or any time soon. With Cable I am forced to buy a single ~$70+ plan with 100s of channels I don't need. With the streamers, at least I can get their ~$20 options independently.

Re: Netflix is turning into cable TV

#20

Post by onlyrealcuzzo »

whalesalad wrote: post #15

Ever since HBO merged with Discovery, the content library has become garbage. It’s all reality shows, real housewives, tons of low effort content. HBO used to be the spot for edgy/racy content, great movies and really great shows.

You have to think big.

The market for trash TV is enormous.

HBO had saturated the quality market for a long time. If it wanted to grow, it needed trash.

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