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It sucks that Netflix is pushing their own content as a solution. Don't get me wrong, some of their own content is great, but I don't want to subscribe to 10 di

by SCdF 10y ago

It sucks that Netflix is pushing their own content as a solution. Don't get me wrong, some of their own content is great, but I don't want to subscribe to 10 different streaming services that all have their own original content, I want to subscribe to one. Netflix--and others, like Amazon Prime--are becoming less and less worthwhile, and piracy is becoming more and more convenient again.

mattmaroon 10y ago
I don't think the fragmentation is a problem since the cost is so low. We used to pay a lot more for cable and got less quality content than if we just buy a few streaming services combined. Some players like my Roku (and I think Apple TV right?) allow you to do a universal search too. Netflix's problem with movies is intractable because you'd have to pay much more than they're willing to charge to make the studios happy. The studios make more money they way they're doing it (they have accountants too).
- ArkyBeagle 10y ago
  I don't get the vibe that the studios are in very good shape. For context, see Scorcese's "Personal Journey."
parennoob 10y ago
> I don't want to subscribe to 10 different streaming services that all have their own original content, I want to subscribe to one As long as they are unbundled and easy to subscribe and unsubscribe from, I don't really mind. The bundling is the real thing I hate about cable. Now sub-subscriptions like Amazon Prime has with Showtime and such really suck, and I wouldn't want those, but if registration is as simple as setting up or cancelling a recurring subscription, I'm fine with subscribing to 10 different services. I can also see the market for a free or one-time paid app that will maintain a queue of what you want to watch, and automatically subscribe to the correct channel for that month so you can watch the maximum content for the minimum money. [Also, this is a personal opinion, but to me, Netflix's original content + their reduced catalog is definitely worth $10/month. Much better than the $100+ "special offer price" that Comcast offers if I want to watch non-stupid channels from their lineup.]
ftrflyr 10y ago
Completely agree. I travel a ton. When I subscribe to Netflix and Hulu and pay them for using their services, I expect to be able to use that service wherever I go. To tell me because I am in Panama I cannot use their services makes me seriously question why I am paying for the service to begin with. The solution, cancel both of them and be done with streaming TV / Movies altogether.
- fluxquanta 10y ago
  On a related note, a couple of weeks ago I wanted to meet up at a friend's house to watch the Overwatch ELeague finals airing on TBS (basically a competitive video game event on national tv). They did air a bare bones version on Twitch.tv but without commentary and filler stuff. He doesn't have cable but I have a PlayStation Vue subscription which includes TBS, and we wanted to watch the whole production to see what competitive video games on national TV would be like. So I get to his house in the next town over and try to login to my Vue account. That's when we get a message saying that they detected my login location was not my house, and that the only way to access the service was to permanently change my home location. I verified in the TOS that if I agreed to change my home location there's no going back. In the end we just watched the Twitch stream, which meant I didn't get to access the service I pay for just ten miles from home, and TBS didn't get our eyeballs on their advertisements. Seems like a bad policy on their part.
TarpitCarnivore 10y ago
> I don't want to subscribe to 10 different streaming services that all have their own original content Funny how so many people screamed for al la care programming and now that it's happening everyone is realizing it's actually worse. I know people hated it, but there is something to be said about traditional TV and how it's consumed. Having a centralized menu/guide of all the content you can view makes it much easier to consume (at least for me). Jumping in and out of services can be kind of annoying, and often times has lead me to forget about content on these services. My hope is Vue and SlingTV pick up more momentum and we begin to decouple broadcast TV from it's hardware. I don't want to rely on the FCC to do this, as we've seen it fail with CableCard and Tru2Way, so maybe more providers jump on this. I doubt we'd see Comcast doing this, but even if they did and locked it to AppleTV or Roku it'd be a huge step forward. The issue has never been the cost of the bundle, it's always been the cost of the sub-par hardware.
- emodendroket 10y ago
  What we're getting isn't a la carte; we're getting a bunch of bundles with more chaff than wheat.
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- arbitrage 10y ago
  There's nothing wrong with à la carte offerings. The failure is charging $10/month for every service.
  - TarpitCarnivore 10y ago
    So what should HBO, Netflix, FX, ESPN, et al be charging then? Creating content isn't cheap.
draugadrotten 10y ago
> Netflix--and others, like Amazon Prime--are becoming less and less worthwhile, and piracy is becoming more and more convenient again. Lawyers are the primary reason why Netflix is becoming less convenient, and by pure coincidence, lawyers will benefit from an increase in piracy. Money talks.
- caractacus 10y ago
  So why doesn't this happen in the music industry? And a few exclusives here and there doesn't count. Spotify / Apple / Amazon / Tidal / Deezer have 99.9% of the same content with a few high profile albums that are only found on one or another service.
  - belorn 10y ago
    Good question. Could be that Apple is more hardware bound and music distributors would need to be quite heavily compensated in order be exclusive apple and miss out on all those people with android phones. It could also be that people are more willing to make platform purchasing decisions when it comes to video and game exclusivity but not music. This would lead to lower interest to buy exclusivity by the platforms, and thus having full market coverage is more economical for publisher.
    - ascagnel_ 10y ago
      Apple Music is available on Android (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.apple.android.music&hl=en https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.apple.andr...), so there isn't a hardware dependency for that service. It competes more with Spotify than Google Play Music.
  - jedberg 10y ago
    The main reason is that licensing works totally differently for music. For music, you go to a central licensing source and pay for the license. They will license to anyone with money. For movies, you have to negotiate separately with every movie producer for every title. In other words, to start a music service, you need money. To start a movie service, you need money and connections to every Hollywood studio.
roboguy12 10y ago
Last weekend my wife and I wanted to watch the movie Goat. It was pretty recently in theaters, so we didn't expect it to be on Netflix. We searched HBO Now, Hulu, Starz, and all of the other video streaming services that we have (and pay money for!). We found two options - rent it on Google Play Movies, or rent it through Amazon Prime. Now, we wanted to Chromecast it, and Amazon (to the best of my knowledge) does not allow you to do that, presumably because they want you to buy their Fire TV instead. So, we spent the $6 to rent the movie on Google Play. About 10 minutes into the movie, the quality plummeted and playback stopped with an error code. We called customer support and they talked us through possible solutions for ~35 minutes before we gave up and asked for a refund. It wasn't a problem with our Wifi, since Netflix/Youtube and other services worked just fine, it was a problem with Google Play streaming to the Chromecast. After searching and trying for over an hour to watch a movie legally using paid services, we went to putlocker, plugged an hdmi cable into my computer and streamed it just fine. We really, really tried to do it the legal way and pay money for the content we wanted to watch, but it was far too complicated to even find a place to watch it, let alone actually successfully watch it. I was reminded a lot of this comic http://theoatmeal.com/comics/game_of_thrones http://theoatmeal.com/comics/game_of_thrones throughout the whole thing. All of this fragmentation is going to become a huge problem again, when piracy is just so easy and convenient.
- ftrflyr 10y ago
  > We really, really tried to do it the legal way and pay money for the content we wanted to watch, but it was far too complicated to even find a place to watch it, let alone actually successfully watch it. Hey @Google, @Amazon, @etc., you have UX designers (tons of them). If this problem isn't fixed soon, more will do the same.
  - jerf 10y ago
    Robotguy12 did not describe a UI problem. First there was a licensing problem, then there was a technical playback problem. The movie was nominally legally available, but it might as well not have been, for how hard it was to find and then playback. The technical problem is relatively easily fixed and probably just an isolated local issue. The licensing problem is a bigger one. For rentals, you have the problem of having to create accounts for all the places it may be, assuming you've even got the searching chops to do it (presumably one gets tired of just trying all of them by hand), and for subscription services you have the even larger problem of accumulating a $10/month service here, $10/month service there until you're talking about real money. That reminds me, I need to turn off my Hulu service. (Seriously, not just for rhetorical point. Literally gonna go do that next thing. Edit: Yup, just did it.) We're not using it in the current season. (Edit: Incidentally, Hulu really cut itself off here. Because so many of the shows, even with the paid subscription, only have the last 5 episodes of the most recent season, and then aggressively disappear once the season is over, I have no reason to stick around if I'm not watching anything that's on right now. There's actually two shows that I did not watch as they came out, but might have left on my subscription for if they were still available, but now they're gone from the service like they never existed, so.... cancelled. See ya next season, maybe.)
gdulli 10y ago
I like the idea of having one bill for 200+ channels, a single remote/device, no need to change (ugh) apps or inputs on the TV when I go from one service to another. It seems like consolidation was a lesson we learned a few decades ago and are in danger of forgetting. I may only watch 10 channels out of 200+ but from month to month it's not always the same 10. A service like Netflix that would augment real, current TV with a library of older shows/movies would have been worth a separate bill. (Had that library not shrunk.) But one more channel of original shows? It's not worth subscribing to a new service and not enough for me to replace cable. And I'm not going to sign up for 4-5 of them. Even if their total cost is a little less than cable, the convenience lost is significant.
- forgetsusername 10y ago
  >A service like Netflix that would augment real, current TV with a library of older shows/movies would have been worth a separate bill. Yeah, for you (and me), as a customer. But what advantage is there for the content creator? You're not going to not watch Game of Thrones because it isn't on Netflix. You'll find a way. The content creators have (and in my opinion, rightfully so) the leverage.
  - mhurron 10y ago
    > You'll find a way The alternative is not paying for it at all. That may mean not watching it, but it doesn't have to because the owner doesn't have complete control of everything. So the advantage to the creator is they can get some money instead of none. The have chosen to go the all or nothing route when giving nothing is really easy for people.
- CarpetBench 10y ago
  > It seems like consolidation was a lesson we learned a few decades ago and are in danger of forgetting. Despite groans to the contrary, I don't think consolidation is the reason services like Netflix/etc. are so popular and why cable service is starting to become considered gauche. I posit that it's entirely about: 1) The on-demand content that services like Netflix/etc. provide 2) To a lesser extent, the discoverability of content I don't want to watch Game of Thrones on Sunday evening. I want to watch it now. I want to re-watch Ocean's Eleven tonight, not Thursday during the day. Netflix (in theory) helps me with that. Cable service doesn't. I want to watch an action movie, and one that I can actually watch right now. Netflix helps me with that. Cable service doesn't, unless I just put on whatever the "action movie" channel is showing. Hell, cable service providers try to offer some of this already - it's just that their selection sucks. It's either incredibly old movies, or movies that no one wanted to see the first time around. Or it's just the latest episode of a popular television show, or the first season and we're on season 12 now. Again, despite what people might say I don't think they really want a la carte programming: They want a Spotify subscription for television and film.
rayiner 10y ago
I strongly disagree. I'd much rather have upstarts competing with great new content instead of all of them streaming the same dreck from the same handful of major studios. That's exactly what a market should look like.
6stringmerc 10y ago
If memory serves me correctly, Netflix's ongoing issues with negotiating access to major film studio or major TV network content without going broke spurred them into the business of 'content creator' status. I mean, they hired professionals and really just joined in the game their own way, and now they're piling up compelling, high-draw programming. Programming that would be going to AMC or FX or even ABC maybe. They're tapping into some film production as well, time will tell if the results are financial winners (that's the yard stick - not if people like it, does it make money). I've been looking into film and TV production for years as an outsider and come across several mentions that Netflix pays extremely well and is incredibly picky about their productions. So they're in the game to play for keeps it seems. "Come for the Netflix originals, but stay for some binge TV or the occasional random flick like a big on-demand shifting library!" as a tag-line sort of works.
- logfromblammo 10y ago
  Implicitly, Netflix is pointing out to the studios that they may be charging more to license their content than what it costs to produce a directly competing property from scratch. Why, for instance, should I pay as much for a season of X-Files reruns as for the production of an entirely new series of Stranger Things? Why would I pay as much for episodes of The Sopranos, that I have already seen, and have on DVD, instead of another new series of Lillyhammer? I wouldn't, and neither would Netflix. The original content is a reminder to the owners of distribution rights that Netflix is the one who owns the ball, and they're the ones that will be taking it with them if they decide to go home and play alone. And Netflix originals are getting nominated for Emmy Awards, in competition with AMC and HBO shows. Producing exclusive original content was absolutely the correct play for Netflix at the time they decided to do it, and remains so for the present.
jrnichols 10y ago
"I want to subscribe to one." But the studios all want you to subscribe to their store. And they don't want to let iTunes have everything, because they want you to go to them first. Or their friends with Ultraviolet. Studios don't like giving up their iron grip, which is what Apple was doing a good job of doing. :/ I'm also on the list of people that don't want 10 different monthly subscriptions to streaming services, and piracy really does look way more convenient. Especially with things like Popcorn Time.
forgetsusername 10y ago
>It sucks that Netflix is pushing their own content as a solution. What choice do you have when you don't own the infrastructure or content? Let's face it, the barrier to entry to creating streaming app is low. Granted, Netflix is awesome in this department (they have to be), but I don't see how the future isn't in creating and distributing the content you own yourself.
forrestthewoods 10y ago
Nah. It's never Beene easier in the history of time to legally acquire content. I bet iTunes has 250 of IMDBs top 250 available for rent. Piracy isn't more convenient. It's just cheaper. It turns out that $10/month isn't enough to pay for every movie and TV show ever made. Who knew?
wnevets 10y ago
> and piracy is becoming more and more convenient again. which would be a shame because I stopped pirating once things started to become convenient and affordable.
- dexterdog 10y ago
  It's the reality. It is always better and cheaper. If you have a copy of your favorite show you never have to worry about a legal battle between businesses that will change the distribution. Piracy has even become a business because if you are willing to pay a little you can get even more reliable sources.
jimbokun 10y ago
You say this as if Netflix has any other option. Netflix (and Amazon) would love to have all the content licenses they used to have. The content companies are the ones making it impossible to have one service where you can get all of the content you want.
jly 10y ago
I think the Netflix content is fantastic - more than enough to pay their pretty cheap monthly streaming price for. And in addition, they have a massive catalog of other content. Who cares how many IMDB top 250 they have. It's similar to an HBO but half the price. We pay $20/month or so for Netflix and Hulu, plus Amazon comes with prime which I pay for more for the shipping than the streaming. This isn't a lot - compare that to what cable costs. The situation today is better than ever - a bunch of cheap ala cart services that together still add up to way less than cable.
- thirdsun 10y ago
  > Who cares how many IMDB Top 250 they have. Anyone trying to watch a specific film will care. Netflix is basically useless in a scrnario where you're looking to watch specific content. I maintain a to-watch list with about 20-30 films at any given time - Netflix offers none of them. Not their fault, I know, but the situation is far from acceptable.
- dexterdog 10y ago
  Netflix is similar to HBO but cheaper much the way the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre RailRiders are similar to the New York Yankees.
JustSomeNobody 10y ago
What are they supposed to do?
wjoe 10y ago
>Netflix--and others, like Amazon Prime--are becoming less and less worthwhile, and piracy is becoming more and more convenient again. I don't think it's Netflix's choice that they're getting rid of their broader range of content, more to do with licensing agreements. I assume they had so many films in the past because they had old licensing deals, when the production companies were more willing to go "Yeah, sure, let's give that small company a cheap deal to stream our movies online. What does it matter, no one watches movies on their computer, they'll still buy our DVDs or subscribe to our cable packages" Now they recognise Netflix as a major competitor, and people are actually ditching their cable packages, and watching Netflix rather than buying DVDs. They can't compete with their old business model, so their only option is to demand extortionate prices or simply refuse to do business with Netflix, Amazon, etc. It's the frustrating reason why companies like Fox, Universal, etc are able to be so successful, because they own the studios, the distribution, and the cable channels. They don't have to worry about getting someone else to give them content, or to distribute theirs. It's frustrating that Netflix is going to same way and being forced to rely on producing their own content, with less opportunity to show others. Netflix are increasingly becoming like just another cable channel, with it's own set of content, and that's before you even get into all the regional differences. It's still an improvement over the alternative of bundled cable TV packages in terms of pricing and convenience, but I wonder how long that will be the case.
cookiecaper 10y ago
Yeah, I'm sure we are eventually going to see the re-emergence of traditional cable package models, just retooled for the digital age. Netflix is going to become the new Comcast and Amazon Video the new Time Warner. I assume it's only a matter of time before they cross-license content to each other, possibly as a premium add-on a la HBO and Starz. The engine driving all of this that no one ever discusses is our current copyright regime. This cycle is going to continue to repeat itself as long as copyright remains unchanged. If our copyright laws were more sane, the whole thing would look a lot different.
nerfhammer 10y ago
The content owners do want 10 different streaming services competing for licenses.
res0nat0r 10y ago
The problem is that yourself and everyone else expects to have every movie ever made available for $10/month. It just isn't financially possible. I'm sure Netflix could have a lot bigger permanent catalog, but you are going to be paying much more than what they charge now.
dghughes 10y ago
Someone needs to make a streaming streamer to stream Netflix, Hulu, etc. I guess Kodi addons are just that.

by SCdF 10y ago

mattmaroon 10y ago

I don't think the fragmentation is a problem since the cost is so low. We used to pay a lot more for cable and got less quality content than if we just buy a few streaming services combined. Some players like my Roku (and I think Apple TV right?) allow you to do a universal search too. Netflix's problem with movies is intractable because you'd have to pay much more than they're willing to charge to make the studios happy. The studios make more money they way they're doing it (they have accountants too).

ArkyBeagle 10y ago
I don't get the vibe that the studios are in very good shape. For context, see Scorcese's "Personal Journey."

parennoob 10y ago

> I don't want to subscribe to 10 different streaming services that all have their own original content, I want to subscribe to one As long as they are unbundled and easy to subscribe and unsubscribe from, I don't really mind. The bundling is the real thing I hate about cable. Now sub-subscriptions like Amazon Prime has with Showtime and such really suck, and I wouldn't want those, but if registration is as simple as setting up or cancelling a recurring subscription, I'm fine with subscribing to 10 different services. I can also see the market for a free or one-time paid app that will maintain a queue of what you want to watch, and automatically subscribe to the correct channel for that month so you can watch the maximum content for the minimum money. [Also, this is a personal opinion, but to me, Netflix's original content + their reduced catalog is definitely worth $10/month. Much better than the $100+ "special offer price" that Comcast offers if I want to watch non-stupid channels from their lineup.]

ftrflyr 10y ago

Completely agree. I travel a ton. When I subscribe to Netflix and Hulu and pay them for using their services, I expect to be able to use that service wherever I go. To tell me because I am in Panama I cannot use their services makes me seriously question why I am paying for the service to begin with. The solution, cancel both of them and be done with streaming TV / Movies altogether.

fluxquanta 10y ago
On a related note, a couple of weeks ago I wanted to meet up at a friend's house to watch the Overwatch ELeague finals airing on TBS (basically a competitive video game event on national tv). They did air a bare bones version on Twitch.tv but without commentary and filler stuff. He doesn't have cable but I have a PlayStation Vue subscription which includes TBS, and we wanted to watch the whole production to see what competitive video games on national TV would be like. So I get to his house in the next town over and try to login to my Vue account. That's when we get a message saying that they detected my login location was not my house, and that the only way to access the service was to permanently change my home location. I verified in the TOS that if I agreed to change my home location there's no going back. In the end we just watched the Twitch stream, which meant I didn't get to access the service I pay for just ten miles from home, and TBS didn't get our eyeballs on their advertisements. Seems like a bad policy on their part.

TarpitCarnivore 10y ago

> I don't want to subscribe to 10 different streaming services that all have their own original content Funny how so many people screamed for al la care programming and now that it's happening everyone is realizing it's actually worse. I know people hated it, but there is something to be said about traditional TV and how it's consumed. Having a centralized menu/guide of all the content you can view makes it much easier to consume (at least for me). Jumping in and out of services can be kind of annoying, and often times has lead me to forget about content on these services. My hope is Vue and SlingTV pick up more momentum and we begin to decouple broadcast TV from it's hardware. I don't want to rely on the FCC to do this, as we've seen it fail with CableCard and Tru2Way, so maybe more providers jump on this. I doubt we'd see Comcast doing this, but even if they did and locked it to AppleTV or Roku it'd be a huge step forward. The issue has never been the cost of the bundle, it's always been the cost of the sub-par hardware.

emodendroket 10y ago
What we're getting isn't a la carte; we're getting a bunch of bundles with more chaff than wheat.
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arbitrage 10y ago
There's nothing wrong with à la carte offerings. The failure is charging $10/month for every service.
- TarpitCarnivore 10y ago
  So what should HBO, Netflix, FX, ESPN, et al be charging then? Creating content isn't cheap.

draugadrotten 10y ago

> Netflix--and others, like Amazon Prime--are becoming less and less worthwhile, and piracy is becoming more and more convenient again. Lawyers are the primary reason why Netflix is becoming less convenient, and by pure coincidence, lawyers will benefit from an increase in piracy. Money talks.

caractacus 10y ago
So why doesn't this happen in the music industry? And a few exclusives here and there doesn't count. Spotify / Apple / Amazon / Tidal / Deezer have 99.9% of the same content with a few high profile albums that are only found on one or another service.
- belorn 10y ago
  Good question. Could be that Apple is more hardware bound and music distributors would need to be quite heavily compensated in order be exclusive apple and miss out on all those people with android phones. It could also be that people are more willing to make platform purchasing decisions when it comes to video and game exclusivity but not music. This would lead to lower interest to buy exclusivity by the platforms, and thus having full market coverage is more economical for publisher.
  - ascagnel_ 10y ago
    Apple Music is available on Android (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.apple.android.music&hl=en https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.apple.andr...), so there isn't a hardware dependency for that service. It competes more with Spotify than Google Play Music.
- jedberg 10y ago
  The main reason is that licensing works totally differently for music. For music, you go to a central licensing source and pay for the license. They will license to anyone with money. For movies, you have to negotiate separately with every movie producer for every title. In other words, to start a music service, you need money. To start a movie service, you need money and connections to every Hollywood studio.

roboguy12 10y ago

Last weekend my wife and I wanted to watch the movie Goat. It was pretty recently in theaters, so we didn't expect it to be on Netflix. We searched HBO Now, Hulu, Starz, and all of the other video streaming services that we have (and pay money for!). We found two options - rent it on Google Play Movies, or rent it through Amazon Prime. Now, we wanted to Chromecast it, and Amazon (to the best of my knowledge) does not allow you to do that, presumably because they want you to buy their Fire TV instead. So, we spent the $6 to rent the movie on Google Play. About 10 minutes into the movie, the quality plummeted and playback stopped with an error code. We called customer support and they talked us through possible solutions for ~35 minutes before we gave up and asked for a refund. It wasn't a problem with our Wifi, since Netflix/Youtube and other services worked just fine, it was a problem with Google Play streaming to the Chromecast. After searching and trying for over an hour to watch a movie legally using paid services, we went to putlocker, plugged an hdmi cable into my computer and streamed it just fine. We really, really tried to do it the legal way and pay money for the content we wanted to watch, but it was far too complicated to even find a place to watch it, let alone actually successfully watch it. I was reminded a lot of this comic http://theoatmeal.com/comics/game_of_thrones http://theoatmeal.com/comics/game_of_thrones throughout the whole thing. All of this fragmentation is going to become a huge problem again, when piracy is just so easy and convenient.

ftrflyr 10y ago
> We really, really tried to do it the legal way and pay money for the content we wanted to watch, but it was far too complicated to even find a place to watch it, let alone actually successfully watch it. Hey @Google, @Amazon, @etc., you have UX designers (tons of them). If this problem isn't fixed soon, more will do the same.
- jerf 10y ago
  Robotguy12 did not describe a UI problem. First there was a licensing problem, then there was a technical playback problem. The movie was nominally legally available, but it might as well not have been, for how hard it was to find and then playback. The technical problem is relatively easily fixed and probably just an isolated local issue. The licensing problem is a bigger one. For rentals, you have the problem of having to create accounts for all the places it may be, assuming you've even got the searching chops to do it (presumably one gets tired of just trying all of them by hand), and for subscription services you have the even larger problem of accumulating a $10/month service here, $10/month service there until you're talking about real money. That reminds me, I need to turn off my Hulu service. (Seriously, not just for rhetorical point. Literally gonna go do that next thing. Edit: Yup, just did it.) We're not using it in the current season. (Edit: Incidentally, Hulu really cut itself off here. Because so many of the shows, even with the paid subscription, only have the last 5 episodes of the most recent season, and then aggressively disappear once the season is over, I have no reason to stick around if I'm not watching anything that's on right now. There's actually two shows that I did not watch as they came out, but might have left on my subscription for if they were still available, but now they're gone from the service like they never existed, so.... cancelled. See ya next season, maybe.)

gdulli 10y ago

I like the idea of having one bill for 200+ channels, a single remote/device, no need to change (ugh) apps or inputs on the TV when I go from one service to another. It seems like consolidation was a lesson we learned a few decades ago and are in danger of forgetting. I may only watch 10 channels out of 200+ but from month to month it's not always the same 10. A service like Netflix that would augment real, current TV with a library of older shows/movies would have been worth a separate bill. (Had that library not shrunk.) But one more channel of original shows? It's not worth subscribing to a new service and not enough for me to replace cable. And I'm not going to sign up for 4-5 of them. Even if their total cost is a little less than cable, the convenience lost is significant.

forgetsusername 10y ago
>A service like Netflix that would augment real, current TV with a library of older shows/movies would have been worth a separate bill. Yeah, for you (and me), as a customer. But what advantage is there for the content creator? You're not going to not watch Game of Thrones because it isn't on Netflix. You'll find a way. The content creators have (and in my opinion, rightfully so) the leverage.
- mhurron 10y ago
  > You'll find a way The alternative is not paying for it at all. That may mean not watching it, but it doesn't have to because the owner doesn't have complete control of everything. So the advantage to the creator is they can get some money instead of none. The have chosen to go the all or nothing route when giving nothing is really easy for people.
CarpetBench 10y ago
> It seems like consolidation was a lesson we learned a few decades ago and are in danger of forgetting. Despite groans to the contrary, I don't think consolidation is the reason services like Netflix/etc. are so popular and why cable service is starting to become considered gauche. I posit that it's entirely about: 1) The on-demand content that services like Netflix/etc. provide 2) To a lesser extent, the discoverability of content I don't want to watch Game of Thrones on Sunday evening. I want to watch it now. I want to re-watch Ocean's Eleven tonight, not Thursday during the day. Netflix (in theory) helps me with that. Cable service doesn't. I want to watch an action movie, and one that I can actually watch right now. Netflix helps me with that. Cable service doesn't, unless I just put on whatever the "action movie" channel is showing. Hell, cable service providers try to offer some of this already - it's just that their selection sucks. It's either incredibly old movies, or movies that no one wanted to see the first time around. Or it's just the latest episode of a popular television show, or the first season and we're on season 12 now. Again, despite what people might say I don't think they really want a la carte programming: They want a Spotify subscription for television and film.

rayiner 10y ago

I strongly disagree. I'd much rather have upstarts competing with great new content instead of all of them streaming the same dreck from the same handful of major studios. That's exactly what a market should look like.

6stringmerc 10y ago

If memory serves me correctly, Netflix's ongoing issues with negotiating access to major film studio or major TV network content without going broke spurred them into the business of 'content creator' status. I mean, they hired professionals and really just joined in the game their own way, and now they're piling up compelling, high-draw programming. Programming that would be going to AMC or FX or even ABC maybe. They're tapping into some film production as well, time will tell if the results are financial winners (that's the yard stick - not if people like it, does it make money). I've been looking into film and TV production for years as an outsider and come across several mentions that Netflix pays extremely well and is incredibly picky about their productions. So they're in the game to play for keeps it seems. "Come for the Netflix originals, but stay for some binge TV or the occasional random flick like a big on-demand shifting library!" as a tag-line sort of works.

logfromblammo 10y ago
Implicitly, Netflix is pointing out to the studios that they may be charging more to license their content than what it costs to produce a directly competing property from scratch. Why, for instance, should I pay as much for a season of X-Files reruns as for the production of an entirely new series of Stranger Things? Why would I pay as much for episodes of The Sopranos, that I have already seen, and have on DVD, instead of another new series of Lillyhammer? I wouldn't, and neither would Netflix. The original content is a reminder to the owners of distribution rights that Netflix is the one who owns the ball, and they're the ones that will be taking it with them if they decide to go home and play alone. And Netflix originals are getting nominated for Emmy Awards, in competition with AMC and HBO shows. Producing exclusive original content was absolutely the correct play for Netflix at the time they decided to do it, and remains so for the present.

jrnichols 10y ago

"I want to subscribe to one." But the studios all want you to subscribe to their store. And they don't want to let iTunes have everything, because they want you to go to them first. Or their friends with Ultraviolet. Studios don't like giving up their iron grip, which is what Apple was doing a good job of doing. :/ I'm also on the list of people that don't want 10 different monthly subscriptions to streaming services, and piracy really does look way more convenient. Especially with things like Popcorn Time.

forgetsusername 10y ago

>It sucks that Netflix is pushing their own content as a solution. What choice do you have when you don't own the infrastructure or content? Let's face it, the barrier to entry to creating streaming app is low. Granted, Netflix is awesome in this department (they have to be), but I don't see how the future isn't in creating and distributing the content you own yourself.

forrestthewoods 10y ago

Nah. It's never Beene easier in the history of time to legally acquire content. I bet iTunes has 250 of IMDBs top 250 available for rent. Piracy isn't more convenient. It's just cheaper. It turns out that $10/month isn't enough to pay for every movie and TV show ever made. Who knew?

wnevets 10y ago

> and piracy is becoming more and more convenient again. which would be a shame because I stopped pirating once things started to become convenient and affordable.

dexterdog 10y ago
It's the reality. It is always better and cheaper. If you have a copy of your favorite show you never have to worry about a legal battle between businesses that will change the distribution. Piracy has even become a business because if you are willing to pay a little you can get even more reliable sources.

jimbokun 10y ago

You say this as if Netflix has any other option. Netflix (and Amazon) would love to have all the content licenses they used to have. The content companies are the ones making it impossible to have one service where you can get all of the content you want.

jly 10y ago

I think the Netflix content is fantastic - more than enough to pay their pretty cheap monthly streaming price for. And in addition, they have a massive catalog of other content. Who cares how many IMDB top 250 they have. It's similar to an HBO but half the price. We pay $20/month or so for Netflix and Hulu, plus Amazon comes with prime which I pay for more for the shipping than the streaming. This isn't a lot - compare that to what cable costs. The situation today is better than ever - a bunch of cheap ala cart services that together still add up to way less than cable.

thirdsun 10y ago
> Who cares how many IMDB Top 250 they have. Anyone trying to watch a specific film will care. Netflix is basically useless in a scrnario where you're looking to watch specific content. I maintain a to-watch list with about 20-30 films at any given time - Netflix offers none of them. Not their fault, I know, but the situation is far from acceptable.
dexterdog 10y ago
Netflix is similar to HBO but cheaper much the way the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre RailRiders are similar to the New York Yankees.

JustSomeNobody 10y ago

What are they supposed to do?

wjoe 10y ago

>Netflix--and others, like Amazon Prime--are becoming less and less worthwhile, and piracy is becoming more and more convenient again. I don't think it's Netflix's choice that they're getting rid of their broader range of content, more to do with licensing agreements. I assume they had so many films in the past because they had old licensing deals, when the production companies were more willing to go "Yeah, sure, let's give that small company a cheap deal to stream our movies online. What does it matter, no one watches movies on their computer, they'll still buy our DVDs or subscribe to our cable packages" Now they recognise Netflix as a major competitor, and people are actually ditching their cable packages, and watching Netflix rather than buying DVDs. They can't compete with their old business model, so their only option is to demand extortionate prices or simply refuse to do business with Netflix, Amazon, etc. It's the frustrating reason why companies like Fox, Universal, etc are able to be so successful, because they own the studios, the distribution, and the cable channels. They don't have to worry about getting someone else to give them content, or to distribute theirs. It's frustrating that Netflix is going to same way and being forced to rely on producing their own content, with less opportunity to show others. Netflix are increasingly becoming like just another cable channel, with it's own set of content, and that's before you even get into all the regional differences. It's still an improvement over the alternative of bundled cable TV packages in terms of pricing and convenience, but I wonder how long that will be the case.

cookiecaper 10y ago

Yeah, I'm sure we are eventually going to see the re-emergence of traditional cable package models, just retooled for the digital age. Netflix is going to become the new Comcast and Amazon Video the new Time Warner. I assume it's only a matter of time before they cross-license content to each other, possibly as a premium add-on a la HBO and Starz. The engine driving all of this that no one ever discusses is our current copyright regime. This cycle is going to continue to repeat itself as long as copyright remains unchanged. If our copyright laws were more sane, the whole thing would look a lot different.

nerfhammer 10y ago

The content owners do want 10 different streaming services competing for licenses.

res0nat0r 10y ago

The problem is that yourself and everyone else expects to have every movie ever made available for $10/month. It just isn't financially possible. I'm sure Netflix could have a lot bigger permanent catalog, but you are going to be paying much more than what they charge now.

dghughes 10y ago

Someone needs to make a streaming streamer to stream Netflix, Hulu, etc. I guess Kodi addons are just that.