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A large part of the initial appeal of Netflix, in particular for foreigners, was that they seemed to house digitized versions of straight-to-VHS movies that nev
by digi_owl 8y ago
A large part of the initial appeal of Netflix, in particular for foreigners, was that they seemed to house digitized versions of straight-to-VHS movies that never left USA.
But after the initial raving success, the big studios have been clamping down on giving blanket access to their back catalog of obscurities. Looking for those extra percentages of leaving out the middle man.
- Rjevski 8y ago> Looking for those extra percentages of leaving out the middle man. Is this profitable in the age of The Pirate Bay or illegal streaming? I'd argue easy legal access & better discoverability would more than make up for the cut taken by middlemen like Netflix.
- ascagnel_ 8y agoNetflix got the rights to stream the entirety of Starz's cable library for peanuts back in 2007 or 2008 -- that deal put them on the map since they got some high-quality content for basically nothing. The movie and TV distributors learned from the record labels -- they're deathly afraid of how iTunes basically took over the market, and will go out of their way to make sure the system stays as decentralized as possible.