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Netflix's New Chapter

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Re: Netflix's New Chapter

#301

Post by TylerE »

WalterBright wrote: post #196
gorbypark wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The issue is making money. There are lots of low budget movies with good plots that don’t make money (or not a lot of it). While at the same time, they can make the 5th sequel to some shitty comic book video and almost guarantee a few hundred million in profits. Of course movies can tank, but generally they are not stupid and the accounts have it figured out.

If you're going to spent $100 million on a movie, why settle for a boring plot and pedestrian dialog? I watched the La Brea show for a while. Lots of expensive special effects. But the dialog was just pablum. The characters each talked like they were the same person - using the same words and phrases. They behaved the same, too.

Because bad/simple dialog is way easier for the over 50% of the modern box office that isn’t the US. CGI explosions don’t need to be dubbed/subtitles in 20 or 30 different languages

Re: Netflix's New Chapter

#302

Post by subradios »

voisin wrote: post #149
paxys wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disney's content library only appeals to very specific demographics. Mostly just kids and the Avengers/Star Wars crowd. Netflix has something for literally everyone.

> Netflix has something [mediocre, that will be cancelled after the first season] for literally everyone. FTFY.

A lot of the Netflix one or two season shows got cancelled when they were finally finding their legs too.

Re: Netflix's New Chapter

#303

Post by thiago_fm »

hbn wrote: post #144
thiago_fm wrote: post #16

Something I don't understand is why Disney and others need to have their own streaming service. Why Netflix can't sit down with Disney and merge the two streaming services. Disney is amazing at making content, so is Netflix at the moment. They could take a look at the present, their market cap, debt and so on and structure a solution that would: 1. Make Netflix the best streaming service with the best content, also b…

> Disney is amazing at making content Are they? They're certainly good at buying IP that people like, and now they own a big back-catalogue of beloved franchises. But the vast majority of content they pump out these days is mediocre at best. They own so much that if you want to go to a theatre to watch a movie, your pickings are essentially all owned by Disney. They generally make money but it's because they bought e…

So... they are amazing at making content. They can sell it and make a profit.

Also great partnerships with IPs and so on. I'm no disney fan, and prefer slow paced european numbers, but their numbers are very good.

The movies industry has had a lot of trouble in the past decade and they've still thrived.

Re: Netflix's New Chapter

#305

Post by enos_feedler »

twblalock wrote: post #159
msluyter wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"1. You can’t have enough new content every month, subscribers therefore don’t keep the subscription year round." For our household, this is true of all streaming services. We rotate them, or subscribe for short stretches. For example, I got Paramount+ for a couple of months, watched all of the Star Trek content, and then cancelled. Amazon Prime is the exception (because free(-ish) shipping.) I wonder to what extent…

The services definitely know about this and to a large extent they build it into their model. Every subscription service has a churn model being accounted for. The services also know that the only thing they can do about this is release enough new content to keep users engaged, or bundle the subscription with other ones.

Or offer discounted annual subs. Or partner with credit card companies for statement credits. Lots of ways to fight churn.

Re: Netflix's New Chapter

#306

Post by LatteLazy »

no_wizard wrote: post #7

I'm gonna attempt to break this down: - Netflix has 5-6 Billion USD free cash flow, and because they got what debt they do have under favorable terms, they are positioned to retain most of that free cash flow - Disney, Comcast (Peacock), CBS/Viacom and other media corporations are saddled with debt, and are all losing money on their own independent streaming businesses. Likely untenable in their shareholder model - T…

Bob Iger addressed this on the a16z podcast a few weeks back.

He said 2 things really:

* he thinks that content will beat out distribution every single time. And Disney has content Netflix doesn't and cannot get (think of Disneys huge catalogue and IP collections)

* he said when he went to the board and proposed that they (a) give up a huge revenue stream and (b) spend a tonne of money building their own streaming service, he expected it to be a hard battle. He thought it would be very hard to convince investors to look at anything beyond the effect on the next quarter financials. Instead, once they heard the case, they demanded he actually go faster, spend more and be more aggressive. He said (I have not checked) that when they announced the move, the stock price went UP...

https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5zaW1wbGV...

Personally I think he made a pretty good case that content distributors were basically commodities and were priced as such (you get low margins). Bit content creators/owners were in a non-competitive position and so had much higher margins and better long term prospects.

I guess in a way, we are back to "Netflix has to become HBO before HBO can become Netflix". Can Netflix use it's huge cash pile to build/acquire enough content to become Disney-like before Disney can build enough infrastructure/customer base to be Netflix?

Re: Netflix's New Chapter

#307

Post by LatteLazy »

zamadatix wrote: post #11
no_wizard wrote: post #7

I'm gonna attempt to break this down: - Netflix has 5-6 Billion USD free cash flow, and because they got what debt they do have under favorable terms, they are positioned to retain most of that free cash flow - Disney, Comcast (Peacock), CBS/Viacom and other media corporations are saddled with debt, and are all losing money on their own independent streaming businesses. Likely untenable in their shareholder model - T…

What I don't understand is how e.g. Disney+ is losing so much money. It's Disney's content, has an enormous userbase, and somehow is bleeding billions?

Remember that profit is basically just a made up number in accounting. The "profit" or "loss" made by one business unit within a group even more so.

Re: Netflix's New Chapter

#308

Post by TrueSlacker0 »

LarryMullins wrote: post #197
TrueSlacker0 wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They don't even list all their old content. For example the old Donald duck cartoons, there seem to only be about 15 or so streaming. The rest are not available. Why?

I don't know about Donald Duck cartoons in particular, but I think a lot of those old cartoons are difficult to find because they contain content that the corporation fears might offend somebody. Racist (or arguably so) ethnic caricatures, extreme cartoon violence, that sort of thing. For instance, the original version of Disney's The Three Little Pigs has the wolf disguising himself as a stereotypical Jewish merchan…

I understand that fear and that is probably the reason, but why not just put a warning at the beginning and not post it on the kids profile?

Re: Netflix's New Chapter

#309

Post by hbn »

thiago_fm wrote: post #303
hbn wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Disney is amazing at making content Are they? They're certainly good at buying IP that people like, and now they own a big back-catalogue of beloved franchises. But the vast majority of content they pump out these days is mediocre at best. They own so much that if you want to go to a theatre to watch a movie, your pickings are essentially all owned by Disney. They generally make money but it's because they bought e…

So... they are amazing at making content. They can sell it and make a profit. Also great partnerships with IPs and so on. I'm no disney fan, and prefer slow paced european numbers, but their numbers are very good. The movies industry has had a lot of trouble in the past decade and they've still thrived.

They've "thrived" because of what I just said - Disney has a near monopoly on blockbuster movies that come through theatres, but that doesn't mean it's good content people want to watch, they just don't give anyone much of an option.

I don't think their model would work if they just dumped all their content on Netflix. If it's not working with Disney+, why would it work in another service that's the same thing with a different name? People have plenty of options of content to stream that aren't from Disney, so their status doesn't mean anything in that space.

Also it's not "great partnerships," it's monopolistic purchases that allowed them to buy their way to their current position. And even with the well-beloved IPs they acquired, they still manage to fumble things. Look how badly they messed up that Star Wars trilogy. They're not good at making content.

Re: Netflix's New Chapter

#310

Post by anonymoose33282 »

wefarrell wrote: post #273
xrd wrote: post #9

The first time I've seen a well written critique of activist investors like Carl Icahn. He certainly scuttled any chance that Blockbuster had of succeeding. He's often right about small details when it comes to traditional companies and where to cut costs (as are many activist investors), but this story reads like he sabotaged Blockbuster when it had an actual substantial and viable chance to compete. I had not heard…

Blockbuster had plans to deliver streaming content in 1999. They partnered with an innovative energy company that wanted to get into the broadband business: https://www.inc.com/quora/how-early-streaming-video-led-to-u... I wonder what ever happened to them.

Now that is a name I never would've expected to see next to Blockbuster's. I also had no idea that Blockbuster was that close to launching a streaming service; like a lot of other people, I guess I always assumed they just were overconfident and thus too slow to catch up.
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