24 ms·

Netflix plans to spend $8B to make its library 50 percent original by 2018

88 points by artsandsci 9y ago

ocdtrekkie 9y ago
This is something I expect them to reach fairly quickly, not necessarily through new content: Netflix has steadily carried less and less content from other companies as long as I've been a subscriber. They carry least-common-denominator content in the back catalog plus a few limited time recent movies to keep people hooked. What I've realized is most well-regarded, award-winning film cannot be found on Netflix. They will easily reach 50% original content, mostly because they'll just continue dropping everyone else's content over time. Thankfully, their original content alone is pretty much worth the price.
- plopz 9y ago
  I disagree and haven't been subscribed to netflix for a year and a half. I've switched over to hulu which has a lot of the content that netflix has lost.
- alextheparrot 9y ago
  I noticed almost all of my recommendations were originals, so I started using a third party recommender [0], which has put me back to watching more old/well-regarded films. Haven’t found a source as good for old series, though. [0] https://www.cinesift.com https://www.cinesift.com
  - bennyg 9y ago
    Cool, I'll check this out. Hate browsing for content on the Netflix iOS app since it's all originals when I really just want something else lately. What I'd really like is the ability to set a couple filters on my phone and shake it to get a random movie/series...
  - indigodaddy 9y ago
    I've found flixable.co to be pretty good for finding targeted NF content.
- r00fus 9y ago
  Personally, I really don't care that Netflix doesn't have content from other companies - most of it is overrated trash. I do like that they have more foreign language dubbing/subtitles - that makes TV a learning vehicle for my kids.
- hyperhopper 9y ago
  The problem is though, is that by doing this it is no longer the service that originally attracted many users: a one stop service to watch the things I want to watch. It is just becoming the internet equivalent of an unlimited on-demand cable channel.
  - mattferderer 9y ago
    I've had my subscription for over 10 years. Unfortunately the streaming side does not have what originally attracted me. Fortunately they still have a DVD side to Netflix that has what originally attracted me. Don't get me wrong. I've found Marco Polo, Stranger Things, House of Cards (S1 & S2) & several other shows to be really interesting. I just don't have the time to watch that many episodes. I prefer a nice short movie to unwind to when I have time. That said, I wish more books & comics would be turned into a series instead of movies at the theater. Netflix proved this with 13 Reasons Why. Star Wars, Marvel, etc would also benefit from this.
    - rainbowmverse 9y ago
      >> Star Wars Clone Wars is good. The first season has some questionable animation quality, but it improves.
  - Paul-ish 9y ago
    > It is just becoming the internet equivalent of an unlimited on-demand cable channel. With no commercials. All in all, That's still an improvement over traditional cable.
    - cameronhowe 9y ago
      Can people stop saying this. There are plenty of ads in netflix/amazon/whatever shows. They just make them unskippable by integrating them into their shows. And I know other shows and movies do it as well, that is no reason to pretend you're not getting brainwashed to crave fast food and soda when watching these shows instead.
- southphillyman 9y ago
  >Thankfully, their original content alone is pretty much worth the price. Have to give Netflix credit. They have executed two of the biggest strategy pivots in my recent memory. Transitioning to streaming from the physical mail order system and more recently adjusting to increasing fees by building their own "studio" and producing content. I went from being pissed that movies continuously disappeared from my queue to favoring NetFlix Originals over major releases.
- onion2k 9y ago
  Thankfully, their original content alone is pretty much worth the price. I've enjoyed a lot of what I've watched but I've never actively looked for anything on there. It's all been random chance because it looked interesting while I was browsing. It wouldn't take many poor choices before I cancelled if there was any other content...
kodablah 9y ago
I wish they would spend more money on finding old films and digitizing them. There have to be vaults of old Italian films that don't have significant licensing costs. Sure, I may represent a small segment of their paying customers, but I find myself using Amazon's video service more and more because of this. To me, a newly released old movie has similar value to a newly released new movie, and I bet the former can come cheaper and faster (I personally am mostly done w/ TV shows and often consider the format a protracted way to consume my time over a standalone movie).
- smacktoward 9y ago
  The problem is that there is also a vanishingly small audience of people who want to watch old Italian films (or old films from anywhere, really). The mass audience only cares about the new releases. This has been true since the dawn of home video; anyone who ever browsed the shelves of a Blockbuster store will remember how lopsided the selection was -- entire walls filled with copies of the latest releases, a few shelves with movies released over the last ten years, practically nothing farther beyond that. They didn't stock that way because they wanted to, they stocked that way because recent movies where what their customers wanted to rent. Even universally-acknowledged classics are hard to market to the mass audience -- there are tons of people who flat out refuse to watch anything in black and white, for instance.
  - kodablah 9y ago
    I agree the audience is currently small, but I don't agree it is getting smaller. People rediscover eras and genres. The good part for Netflix vs Blockbuster is that this is a one-time cost and it will be digitized forever. You don't have to market it to a mass audience or attempt to determine the number of VHSs you'd have to create. I don't think they need to market it at all. Just do it. Surely it is only a fraction of the cost of having Will Smith in a Police-Alien movie and it'll boost your catalog.
    - coldtea 9y ago
      >I agree the audience is currently small, but I don't agree it is getting smaller. People rediscover eras and genres. Slowly enough to not matter and always stay a niche endeavour.
dabernathy89 9y ago
I really enjoy a lot of Netflix originals, but I wish they would direct more energy into improving their streaming library's 3rd party content. There are so many films only available via their DVD service, which I (and many others) no longer use.
- empath75 9y ago
  Netflix simply can’t afford the licensing fees. All the other movie companies are trying to put Netflix out of business and aren’t going to charge them anything like a reasonable rate.
  - dcole2929 9y ago
    It's worse than that. Studio's are simply declining to license their stuff to Netflix for streaming at all. Losing Disney was incredibly telling because their catalog is so big and diverse I can't imagine that Netflix wasn't willing to write a blank check to ensure they didn't lose access to that content. The children's movies alone would be worth the cost.
- foolfoolz 9y ago
  the best way to watch movies is buying the dvd for $1 at your local video store. or library sale. or thrift store. you just can’t easily search
  - jobebob 9y ago
    With some extra work you can extract the movie and place it on a plex server, now you have a searchable movie collection.
JustSomeNobody 9y ago
I get why they feel they need to do this, but I hate the trend of everyone taking their ball and going home. I loved how with Netflix, I had most of the content I would want right there on a single service. Note to content providers: I'm not going to have Disney, Netflix, HBO, CBS, Hulu, etc subscriptions. It's just not going to happen. I'll do without first.
- oelmekki 9y ago
  I've stopped using torrents since I subscribed to Netflix and Spotify years ago, but I can see myself very well returning to it if that scattering trend continues.
- natoliniak 9y ago
  I sense a resurrection of torrenting and ironically enough, DVD rentals. BTW, Netflix still has a very rich library of streaming content, but in other world regions. A good global VPN service and some DNS tweaks will unlock a ton of streaming content.
  - dagw 9y ago
    A good global VPN service and some DNS tweaks will unlock a ton of streaming content. Can you recommend something the works? I used to have a couple of different ones, but Netflix got really good a blocking VPNs a while back so I kind of gave up.
    - natoliniak 9y ago
      You are right, it is a bit of cat and mouse game, but I have been quite successful at using a Nordvpn's French and Brazilian pops (for at least the past 6 months). You have to also modify your client DNS settings to either use European/S. American DNS servers (plenty of free ones) so that Netflix's apis will resolve to the proper region, otherwise you will get only NA catalog, even if you are on VPN. good luck!
- smacktoward 9y ago
  > Note to content providers: I'm not going to have Disney, Netflix, HBO, CBS, Hulu, etc subscriptions. It's just not going to happen. The history of cable TV, in which people happily paid $100+ for a bundled content package, suggests otherwise. My guess is that eventually streaming content will go the same route. When the providers realize that there's not enough dollars out there to support everybody having ten $10/month content subscriptions, they'll start merging and there will be a race to see which one can put together the first bundle that most people will consider "good enough."
bearcobra 9y ago
This seems like a huge opportunity for Hulu or whatever service the 21Fox/Disney deal leads to. HBO has long proven that there is tremendous value in originals, but having a really broad base of legacy content seems like it could attract a ton of people who don't place the same value on new shows.
- e1ven 9y ago
  A lot of TV shows and movies are now only available on Hulu. I've started subscribing, and am seriously considering dumping Netflix.
codingdave 9y ago
I'm more and more disappointed in their content. I'm sure some people love their original content, but I am not one of them. Nevertheless, I stick with Netflix because their UI for navigating it all, while not perfect, is far better than the other streaming services. And they have easy to use profiles including a 'Kids' option. But if any other provider catches up to their UX, I'll drop Netflix in a second.
dcole2929 9y ago
I think it's important to note that this is not by choice, but rather the only path left to Netflix now that studios have realized the value of their catalogs to streaming. Netflix originally made a bunch of content deals that made them the sole streamer of entire backlogs of syndicated material. It worked out great for them and pretty decently for the studios too, but after Netflix's success the studios now realize what they gave away. As more of those deals expire the various studios are all looking for ways to get their own streaming platform up where they own more of the profits. A Netflix where the majority of shows are originals, is just an online only version of HBO, which is a shame because the experience is still vastly superior to all the other streaming options. In their greed the studios have basically turned one of the great internet ideas into the second coming of cable. It's understandable why they would all want their own platform but it's much worse for the consumer
- wmf 9y ago
  At least you can aggregate most of the streaming "channels" though Amazon so you don't have to use a bunch of different apps.
  - TallGuyShort 9y ago
    As long as the service doesn't start sucking (like other monopolies and government services), I think there are a lot of benefits to being able to stream through an established player: it's not just about licensing all the content people want to watch. Supporting a lot of devices (I care about Linux support, A LOT), having agreements to cache content locally with ISPs to ensure performance, etc. I wouldn't mind having a different 4-5 apps for different shows, or switching services every few months. But if everyone went solo and they were all still figuring out how to support everyone's device and how to scale? Not gonna bother.
  - andrewla 9y ago
    Hulu has started offering this as well -- HBO, in particular, doesn't really care about the streaming platform per se so much as making the content available. I think this is likely to be a path that others will take to take advantage of the fact that consumers may have a preference, and HBO would prefer to offer a nice standalone app, but perfectly happy to let customers choose Amazon/Hulu etc., for customers who prefer a different or integrated experience.
nathan_long 9y ago
Online movie services are a disappointment because the selection is terrible. Go to IMDB.com. Pick a random movie. Click on the director to see more movies by him or her. Choose one. Click the lead actor to see more movies with him or her. Choose one. Click the studio to see more movies by them. Choose one. Why can't I do this with any streaming service? There's no decent search and filter ability because there's not enough selection to support it. The interfaces are all geared toward suggesting what you might like, not letting you search for what you know you want, or filter out what you know you don't. Want to see only Best Picture winners? Only 5-star PG movies? Only detective films from before 1970? Nope. Sorry, not enough selection. Maybe you'd like this new drama we just made? Technically, we could have a service with every movie ever made. But we don't, for stupid business reasons. If we ever get a service with a decent selection, it won't be possible for it to have 50% original content because it would take a hundred years of solid filming to get there.
- kodablah 9y ago
  I regularly use https://www.justwatch.com https://www.justwatch.com for looking up movies. But its scraping abilities leave a lot to be desired; they are often wrong. And the data is not very transparent (e.g. historical data). I have considered creating an alternative. And have the client choose the streaming services they have like JustWatch. However, for unavailable movies, have a "I'd watch this if it were streaming for me" button. Then I'd record the cross-section of that user's streaming services and their request and keep public counters. I'd remove all users votes if that movie became available for any of their streaming options. I'd show votes for movie per streaming subscription service. Also, in the interest of transparency, I'd keep a running history of when movies came and went from providers. I'd also scrape TV guide to see when they are on TNT or whatever. This is the type of data people deserve. Aside: JustWatch people, I know you browse HN...you can steal this idea and monetize it by, instead of being nice like me and making the votes transparent, just keep the counters internal and sell them as data points. You can couple it into a "I'd watch this! Notify me when this movie is available" feature.
  - dewey 9y ago
    > But its scraping abilities leave a lot to be desired; they are often wrong. If you spot any mistakes, especially ones that are consistent and happen frequently (wrong price on a provider,...) feel free to email us at data-police@justwatch.com and we'll take a look. We are very responsive when it comes to that and are constantly improving our scraping infrastructure to stay as accurate as possible. Unfortunately it'll always be a bit of catching up if you scrape hundred of third party providers in more than 30 countries that constantly change their APIs or websites :) As for the "notification" system. That's definitely something that we think about, stay tuned! Disclaimer: I work on the JW scraper
jjrh 9y ago
From what I understand Netflix is pretty smart about where/what they film to take advantage of tax credits and other incentives countries provide. So that $8B really stretches. Seems like they are at the point where they need to keep their head above water long enough to let other content providers try/decide if it's worth trying to compete in the streaming business.
everdev 9y ago
$8B could add a lot of good movies that are currently absent from the collection. Original content is probably a better financial move, but my impression of the quality of shows on Netflix is not high.
- jjrh 9y ago
  Netflix original content is a mixed bag. They have some really good shows, and some more forgettable ones that are the type you throw on for background noise.
Noos 9y ago
Considering this means a lot of low quality sitcoms and endless comic book television series (until the next fad is made manifest), its hardly a value proposition.
gigatexal 9y ago
this is likely to be an unpopular opinion but I hope they produce content that is also family appropriate. It doesn't have to suck or be cliche, just be relatively clean. Too much of the original content I am seeing is TV-MA. If they do this they will enfranchise many families to ditch cable than would otherwise have done so.
sloxy 9y ago
well, if their catalog grows to 50% original content, here's hoping netflix adopt more UK/HBO style formats for tv shows. have a clear defined arc lasting ~3 seasons with 6/8 episodes in each season..and then just stop. point in case, house of cards should have been a 2 series show with frank never becoming President.
King-Aaron 9y ago
How about spending $8B to make the current library of titles available to more regions...

88 points by artsandsci 9y ago

This is something I expect them to reach fairly quickly, not necessarily through new content: Netflix has steadily carried less and less content from other companies as long as I've been a subscriber. They carry least-common-denominator content in the back catalog plus a few limited time recent movies to keep people hooked. What I've realized is most well-regarded, award-winning film cannot be found on Netflix. They will easily reach 50% original content, mostly because they'll just continue dropping everyone else's content over time. Thankfully, their original content alone is pretty much worth the price.

plopz 9y ago
I disagree and haven't been subscribed to netflix for a year and a half. I've switched over to hulu which has a lot of the content that netflix has lost.
alextheparrot 9y ago
I noticed almost all of my recommendations were originals, so I started using a third party recommender [0], which has put me back to watching more old/well-regarded films. Haven’t found a source as good for old series, though. [0] https://www.cinesift.com https://www.cinesift.com
- bennyg 9y ago
  Cool, I'll check this out. Hate browsing for content on the Netflix iOS app since it's all originals when I really just want something else lately. What I'd really like is the ability to set a couple filters on my phone and shake it to get a random movie/series...
- indigodaddy 9y ago
  I've found flixable.co to be pretty good for finding targeted NF content.
r00fus 9y ago
Personally, I really don't care that Netflix doesn't have content from other companies - most of it is overrated trash. I do like that they have more foreign language dubbing/subtitles - that makes TV a learning vehicle for my kids.
hyperhopper 9y ago
The problem is though, is that by doing this it is no longer the service that originally attracted many users: a one stop service to watch the things I want to watch. It is just becoming the internet equivalent of an unlimited on-demand cable channel.
- mattferderer 9y ago
  I've had my subscription for over 10 years. Unfortunately the streaming side does not have what originally attracted me. Fortunately they still have a DVD side to Netflix that has what originally attracted me. Don't get me wrong. I've found Marco Polo, Stranger Things, House of Cards (S1 & S2) & several other shows to be really interesting. I just don't have the time to watch that many episodes. I prefer a nice short movie to unwind to when I have time. That said, I wish more books & comics would be turned into a series instead of movies at the theater. Netflix proved this with 13 Reasons Why. Star Wars, Marvel, etc would also benefit from this.
  - rainbowmverse 9y ago
    >> Star Wars Clone Wars is good. The first season has some questionable animation quality, but it improves.
- Paul-ish 9y ago
  > It is just becoming the internet equivalent of an unlimited on-demand cable channel. With no commercials. All in all, That's still an improvement over traditional cable.
  - cameronhowe 9y ago
    Can people stop saying this. There are plenty of ads in netflix/amazon/whatever shows. They just make them unskippable by integrating them into their shows. And I know other shows and movies do it as well, that is no reason to pretend you're not getting brainwashed to crave fast food and soda when watching these shows instead.
southphillyman 9y ago
>Thankfully, their original content alone is pretty much worth the price. Have to give Netflix credit. They have executed two of the biggest strategy pivots in my recent memory. Transitioning to streaming from the physical mail order system and more recently adjusting to increasing fees by building their own "studio" and producing content. I went from being pissed that movies continuously disappeared from my queue to favoring NetFlix Originals over major releases.
onion2k 9y ago
Thankfully, their original content alone is pretty much worth the price. I've enjoyed a lot of what I've watched but I've never actively looked for anything on there. It's all been random chance because it looked interesting while I was browsing. It wouldn't take many poor choices before I cancelled if there was any other content...

kodablah 9y ago

I wish they would spend more money on finding old films and digitizing them. There have to be vaults of old Italian films that don't have significant licensing costs. Sure, I may represent a small segment of their paying customers, but I find myself using Amazon's video service more and more because of this. To me, a newly released old movie has similar value to a newly released new movie, and I bet the former can come cheaper and faster (I personally am mostly done w/ TV shows and often consider the format a protracted way to consume my time over a standalone movie).

smacktoward 9y ago
The problem is that there is also a vanishingly small audience of people who want to watch old Italian films (or old films from anywhere, really). The mass audience only cares about the new releases. This has been true since the dawn of home video; anyone who ever browsed the shelves of a Blockbuster store will remember how lopsided the selection was -- entire walls filled with copies of the latest releases, a few shelves with movies released over the last ten years, practically nothing farther beyond that. They didn't stock that way because they wanted to, they stocked that way because recent movies where what their customers wanted to rent. Even universally-acknowledged classics are hard to market to the mass audience -- there are tons of people who flat out refuse to watch anything in black and white, for instance.
- kodablah 9y ago
  I agree the audience is currently small, but I don't agree it is getting smaller. People rediscover eras and genres. The good part for Netflix vs Blockbuster is that this is a one-time cost and it will be digitized forever. You don't have to market it to a mass audience or attempt to determine the number of VHSs you'd have to create. I don't think they need to market it at all. Just do it. Surely it is only a fraction of the cost of having Will Smith in a Police-Alien movie and it'll boost your catalog.
  - coldtea 9y ago
    >I agree the audience is currently small, but I don't agree it is getting smaller. People rediscover eras and genres. Slowly enough to not matter and always stay a niche endeavour.

dabernathy89 9y ago

I really enjoy a lot of Netflix originals, but I wish they would direct more energy into improving their streaming library's 3rd party content. There are so many films only available via their DVD service, which I (and many others) no longer use.

empath75 9y ago
Netflix simply can’t afford the licensing fees. All the other movie companies are trying to put Netflix out of business and aren’t going to charge them anything like a reasonable rate.
- dcole2929 9y ago
  It's worse than that. Studio's are simply declining to license their stuff to Netflix for streaming at all. Losing Disney was incredibly telling because their catalog is so big and diverse I can't imagine that Netflix wasn't willing to write a blank check to ensure they didn't lose access to that content. The children's movies alone would be worth the cost.
foolfoolz 9y ago
the best way to watch movies is buying the dvd for $1 at your local video store. or library sale. or thrift store. you just can’t easily search
- jobebob 9y ago
  With some extra work you can extract the movie and place it on a plex server, now you have a searchable movie collection.

JustSomeNobody 9y ago

I get why they feel they need to do this, but I hate the trend of everyone taking their ball and going home. I loved how with Netflix, I had most of the content I would want right there on a single service. Note to content providers: I'm not going to have Disney, Netflix, HBO, CBS, Hulu, etc subscriptions. It's just not going to happen. I'll do without first.

oelmekki 9y ago
I've stopped using torrents since I subscribed to Netflix and Spotify years ago, but I can see myself very well returning to it if that scattering trend continues.
natoliniak 9y ago
I sense a resurrection of torrenting and ironically enough, DVD rentals. BTW, Netflix still has a very rich library of streaming content, but in other world regions. A good global VPN service and some DNS tweaks will unlock a ton of streaming content.
- dagw 9y ago
  A good global VPN service and some DNS tweaks will unlock a ton of streaming content. Can you recommend something the works? I used to have a couple of different ones, but Netflix got really good a blocking VPNs a while back so I kind of gave up.
  - natoliniak 9y ago
    You are right, it is a bit of cat and mouse game, but I have been quite successful at using a Nordvpn's French and Brazilian pops (for at least the past 6 months). You have to also modify your client DNS settings to either use European/S. American DNS servers (plenty of free ones) so that Netflix's apis will resolve to the proper region, otherwise you will get only NA catalog, even if you are on VPN. good luck!
smacktoward 9y ago
> Note to content providers: I'm not going to have Disney, Netflix, HBO, CBS, Hulu, etc subscriptions. It's just not going to happen. The history of cable TV, in which people happily paid $100+ for a bundled content package, suggests otherwise. My guess is that eventually streaming content will go the same route. When the providers realize that there's not enough dollars out there to support everybody having ten $10/month content subscriptions, they'll start merging and there will be a race to see which one can put together the first bundle that most people will consider "good enough."

bearcobra 9y ago

This seems like a huge opportunity for Hulu or whatever service the 21Fox/Disney deal leads to. HBO has long proven that there is tremendous value in originals, but having a really broad base of legacy content seems like it could attract a ton of people who don't place the same value on new shows.

e1ven 9y ago
A lot of TV shows and movies are now only available on Hulu. I've started subscribing, and am seriously considering dumping Netflix.

codingdave 9y ago

I'm more and more disappointed in their content. I'm sure some people love their original content, but I am not one of them. Nevertheless, I stick with Netflix because their UI for navigating it all, while not perfect, is far better than the other streaming services. And they have easy to use profiles including a 'Kids' option. But if any other provider catches up to their UX, I'll drop Netflix in a second.

dcole2929 9y ago

I think it's important to note that this is not by choice, but rather the only path left to Netflix now that studios have realized the value of their catalogs to streaming. Netflix originally made a bunch of content deals that made them the sole streamer of entire backlogs of syndicated material. It worked out great for them and pretty decently for the studios too, but after Netflix's success the studios now realize what they gave away. As more of those deals expire the various studios are all looking for ways to get their own streaming platform up where they own more of the profits. A Netflix where the majority of shows are originals, is just an online only version of HBO, which is a shame because the experience is still vastly superior to all the other streaming options. In their greed the studios have basically turned one of the great internet ideas into the second coming of cable. It's understandable why they would all want their own platform but it's much worse for the consumer

wmf 9y ago
At least you can aggregate most of the streaming "channels" though Amazon so you don't have to use a bunch of different apps.
- TallGuyShort 9y ago
  As long as the service doesn't start sucking (like other monopolies and government services), I think there are a lot of benefits to being able to stream through an established player: it's not just about licensing all the content people want to watch. Supporting a lot of devices (I care about Linux support, A LOT), having agreements to cache content locally with ISPs to ensure performance, etc. I wouldn't mind having a different 4-5 apps for different shows, or switching services every few months. But if everyone went solo and they were all still figuring out how to support everyone's device and how to scale? Not gonna bother.
- andrewla 9y ago
  Hulu has started offering this as well -- HBO, in particular, doesn't really care about the streaming platform per se so much as making the content available. I think this is likely to be a path that others will take to take advantage of the fact that consumers may have a preference, and HBO would prefer to offer a nice standalone app, but perfectly happy to let customers choose Amazon/Hulu etc., for customers who prefer a different or integrated experience.

nathan_long 9y ago

Online movie services are a disappointment because the selection is terrible. Go to IMDB.com. Pick a random movie. Click on the director to see more movies by him or her. Choose one. Click the lead actor to see more movies with him or her. Choose one. Click the studio to see more movies by them. Choose one. Why can't I do this with any streaming service? There's no decent search and filter ability because there's not enough selection to support it. The interfaces are all geared toward suggesting what you might like, not letting you search for what you know you want, or filter out what you know you don't. Want to see only Best Picture winners? Only 5-star PG movies? Only detective films from before 1970? Nope. Sorry, not enough selection. Maybe you'd like this new drama we just made? Technically, we could have a service with every movie ever made. But we don't, for stupid business reasons. If we ever get a service with a decent selection, it won't be possible for it to have 50% original content because it would take a hundred years of solid filming to get there.

kodablah 9y ago
I regularly use https://www.justwatch.com https://www.justwatch.com for looking up movies. But its scraping abilities leave a lot to be desired; they are often wrong. And the data is not very transparent (e.g. historical data). I have considered creating an alternative. And have the client choose the streaming services they have like JustWatch. However, for unavailable movies, have a "I'd watch this if it were streaming for me" button. Then I'd record the cross-section of that user's streaming services and their request and keep public counters. I'd remove all users votes if that movie became available for any of their streaming options. I'd show votes for movie per streaming subscription service. Also, in the interest of transparency, I'd keep a running history of when movies came and went from providers. I'd also scrape TV guide to see when they are on TNT or whatever. This is the type of data people deserve. Aside: JustWatch people, I know you browse HN...you can steal this idea and monetize it by, instead of being nice like me and making the votes transparent, just keep the counters internal and sell them as data points. You can couple it into a "I'd watch this! Notify me when this movie is available" feature.
- dewey 9y ago
  > But its scraping abilities leave a lot to be desired; they are often wrong. If you spot any mistakes, especially ones that are consistent and happen frequently (wrong price on a provider,...) feel free to email us at data-police@justwatch.com and we'll take a look. We are very responsive when it comes to that and are constantly improving our scraping infrastructure to stay as accurate as possible. Unfortunately it'll always be a bit of catching up if you scrape hundred of third party providers in more than 30 countries that constantly change their APIs or websites :) As for the "notification" system. That's definitely something that we think about, stay tuned! Disclaimer: I work on the JW scraper

jjrh 9y ago

From what I understand Netflix is pretty smart about where/what they film to take advantage of tax credits and other incentives countries provide. So that $8B really stretches. Seems like they are at the point where they need to keep their head above water long enough to let other content providers try/decide if it's worth trying to compete in the streaming business.

everdev 9y ago

$8B could add a lot of good movies that are currently absent from the collection. Original content is probably a better financial move, but my impression of the quality of shows on Netflix is not high.

jjrh 9y ago
Netflix original content is a mixed bag. They have some really good shows, and some more forgettable ones that are the type you throw on for background noise.

Noos 9y ago

Considering this means a lot of low quality sitcoms and endless comic book television series (until the next fad is made manifest), its hardly a value proposition.

gigatexal 9y ago

this is likely to be an unpopular opinion but I hope they produce content that is also family appropriate. It doesn't have to suck or be cliche, just be relatively clean. Too much of the original content I am seeing is TV-MA. If they do this they will enfranchise many families to ditch cable than would otherwise have done so.

sloxy 9y ago

well, if their catalog grows to 50% original content, here's hoping netflix adopt more UK/HBO style formats for tv shows. have a clear defined arc lasting ~3 seasons with 6/8 episodes in each season..and then just stop. point in case, house of cards should have been a 2 series show with frank never becoming President.

King-Aaron 9y ago

How about spending $8B to make the current library of titles available to more regions...