EU to move ahead with cultural quotas for streaming services • Hacker News Board

Re: EU to move ahead with cultural quotas for streaming services

#321

Post by bluGill » Thu, Sep 06, 2018, 12:52 PM UTC

iguy wrote: post #113

bluGill wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It can't work mathematically unless it is from any EU country. There are more than 3 EU countries, which means that eventually you will get some great content from some other country that you are not allowed to access. That is 30% Irish, 30% French, 30% German, and 30% Italian content already doesn't add up, meaning some things that you personally might want from a different country are on the list of things you are…

Once you have an amazon.com account, you magically also have an amazon.de account, and an amazon.it account... and it's a few clicks to switch in the app. Maybe that's how it'll go?

maybe. However in most countries the courts tend to see through such things. I wouldn't be surprised if Amazon doesn't risk this loophole. If they do (even accidentally) I expect some lawyer will sue - there are a bunch of EU countries to choose which to sue in, the results might be different in each.

Re: EU to move ahead with cultural quotas for streaming services

#322

Post by pluma » Thu, Sep 06, 2018, 1:20 PM UTC

probably_wrong wrote: post #127

pluma wrote: post #112

I'd be fine with "30% from any country in the EU", but "30% from my country" is torture. I mean, have you even seen what movies Germany produces? If I could stand any of that rubbish, I'd be watching cable TV, not Netflix.

You mean "The lives of others"? "Run Lola Run"? "Goodbye Lenin"? "Wir Kinder Vom Bahnhof Zoo"? "Fack ju Göhte"? I know there are bad German movies. But with the biggest film studio in Europe being right next to Berlin, I think saying "there are no good German movies" it's a bit too much. The fact alone that there are decent German movies for children seems to me like a plus - I probably won't go see "Das schönste Mäd…

I didn't say there are no good German movies. I said I don't like most German movies. Logically speaking "30% German movies" means that for every German movie there can be only 2-3 movies from _any other country_ (including UK, France, Spain, or other countries that aren't the US).

I'd be fine with a restriction like "30%+ EU movies" or even "50%+ EU movies" (or even "50%+ EU movies, including at least 10% German"). But _German_ movies specifically? That's pointlessly nationalistic.

There isn't 1 good German movie for every 2-3 good international movies. Even personal preference aside the numbers simply don't add up if you assume that there at least two other countries producing as many good movies as Germany does.

So this won't mean more "Goodbye Lenin", it will mean more "Hui Buh, das Schlossgespenst". If we're lucky.

If we're not lucky, it won't mean less Hollywood blockbusters, it will mean less international non-Hollywood movies. Because the Hollywood blockbusters are reliable money printing machines.

So instead of having a lot of Hollywood movies and also a lot of international movies (including several movies from Asia and South America) and a select few German movies, we'll end up with a lot of Hollywood movies and a lot of German movies, basically the same thing you see on regular TV.

Just look at it from Netflix's perspective: you want to add Black Panther because people will want to watch it. To keep the quote you'll have to add another German movie but you can also fit in another international one. Which international movie will you pick? Another Hollywood superhero movie or a lesser known French movie?

Re: EU to move ahead with cultural quotas for streaming services

#323

Post by pluma » Thu, Sep 06, 2018, 1:21 PM UTC

nikanj wrote: post #306

pluma wrote: post #112

I'd be fine with "30% from any country in the EU", but "30% from my country" is torture. I mean, have you even seen what movies Germany produces? If I could stand any of that rubbish, I'd be watching cable TV, not Netflix.

Growing up in the EU, pretty much all german content we saw was porn. And pretty much all the porn we saw was german. Looking back, I’m morbidly curious what sort of weird chain of events lead to this.

That says more about your porn preferences than about German cinema, though.

Re: EU to move ahead with cultural quotas for streaming services

#324

Post by pluma » Thu, Sep 06, 2018, 1:33 PM UTC

adventured wrote: post #133

pluma wrote: post #112

I'd be fine with "30% from any country in the EU", but "30% from my country" is torture. I mean, have you even seen what movies Germany produces? If I could stand any of that rubbish, I'd be watching cable TV, not Netflix.

Out of curiosity as an American looking to learn more about European cinema, which countries in continental Europe would you say produce the best movies?

That's just the thing. IMO there isn't one best country as far as movies (or TV shows) go in the EU.

I would say the UK is a strong contender but mostly because BBC and Channel 4 produce pretty high quality straight-to-TV movies.

Re: EU to move ahead with cultural quotas for streaming services

#325

Post by pluma » Thu, Sep 06, 2018, 1:50 PM UTC

Semaphor wrote: post #212

adventured wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Out of curiosity as an American looking to learn more about European cinema, which countries in continental Europe would you say produce the best movies?

Not a direct answer, but for TV (serialized crime/police) shows it's the Scandinavian countries. Then the US comes and makes a usually far inferior copy of it.

Also UK?

Luther, Cracker, Broadchurch come to mind. Even the UK version of Law & Order was surprisingly watchable.

Re: EU to move ahead with cultural quotas for streaming services

#326

Post by phyller » Thu, Sep 06, 2018, 2:19 PM UTC

gonvaled wrote: post #315

phyller wrote: post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So? Walk onto a set and I bet you'll find people from every continent except Antarctica there. People born on those continents too, not just descendants.

So? - What language do they speak? - What cultural nuances are they bringing to their films? Local food, local culture? 99% of US films have little to do with international perspectives, much less with local cultures. A black man eating a Big Mac is a person eating a Big Mac, no matter how black he is.

I disagree. This entire line of thought is just ridiculous prejudice. If you think the US film industry is entirely represented by the 20 or so big blockbusters that come out each year, and that somehow the hundreds of smaller and independent movies don't count, that's your problem. Just because you haven't heard of them doesn't mean they don't exist.

Re: EU to move ahead with cultural quotas for streaming services

#327

Post by larrik » Thu, Sep 06, 2018, 4:48 PM UTC

subway wrote: post #219

larrik wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Good Place is just an NBC show in the US.

Right -- and Star Trek Discovery is just a CBS show in the US. When either show airs in the US, the new episodes are available immediately on Netflix in the UK. If I want to watch them in the US, I either have to pay per-episode/season on Google/Amazon/iTunes. CBS offers access to their entire library, but at $10/mo, it's more than a Netflix subscription. My point is just that comments about the Netflix library being…

Actually, Star Trek Discovery does not air on CBS in the US. It is exclusive to their streaming program.

Re: EU to move ahead with cultural quotas for streaming services

#328

Post by m0llusk » Thu, Sep 06, 2018, 6:19 PM UTC

wukerplank wrote: post #49

phyller wrote: post #7

> The proposals will require that streaming services give over at least 30% of their on-demand catalogues to original productions made in each EU country where a service is provided (individual EU Member States could choose to set the content bar even higher, at 40%) 30% for each country seems really high to me. As usual for regulation, there will likely be high unintended consequences. While in the US and elsewhere…

> 30% of movies in Indiana need to be created in Indiana Seems like the media production is pretty centralized in the US. It's hard to compare with Europe, where most nations have different languages, their own TV stations (producing their own content) and their own funds to support productions of movies. It would be a shame if these biotopes of media production would get dried out because of US monopolies. At least…

NYC and LA mostly, not really centralized as much as concentrated

Re: EU to move ahead with cultural quotas for streaming services

#329

Post by rbehrends » Thu, Sep 06, 2018, 9:19 PM UTC

grimskin wrote: post #318

rbehrends wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 30% for each country seems really high to me. The article misstates what the proposal actually says. It's a quota of 30% on "European works". The term is defined in Article 1 (1) (n) of Directive 2010/13/EU [1], which the proposal seeks to amend; it includes works originating in the member states, works originating in countries that are parties to the European Convention on Transfrontier Television, and works copro…

Ok, let's say that any title made in EU will suffice for every EU member. Still, for every 100 non-EU (basically, US) titles Netflix would need to get 50 EU titles. And I don't think that amount of movies/series/etc produced in US is only twice as big as in EU.

Netflix already offers only a fraction of its US titles in EU member states.

And you'd be surprised. The UK, France, and Germany combined already outproduce America in terms of movies [1] (quality may be a different story, of course).

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Film_industry#Statistics

Re: EU to move ahead with cultural quotas for streaming services

#330

Post by pas » Fri, Sep 07, 2018, 2:10 PM UTC

hardlianotion wrote: post #268

pas wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no economics without politics, and vice versa. The EU as a single market has great potential. But that needs uniform and standardized access, which is politics. And no, it wouldn't work without the political overlay (or foundations), because member states are already each in a non pure market state, and it would take a very long time for those politically disjoint markets to standarize and uniformize. And the…

As irrelevant as Australia, Japan, Canada, South Korea? I think I could handle that.

> [Australia et al] ... I think I could handle that.

Fair point. Though the future might not be so rosy. But in an unfortunate timeline those countries are likely to quickly align with some others anyway.

However, deals made in peace are usually better.