I think expecting Netflix to stick around at $10/mo with such a library of content was unrealistic. Sometimes there are odd fluctuations in markets. For exampl

I think expecting Netflix to stick around at $10/mo with such a library of content was unrealistic. Sometimes there are odd fluctuations in markets. For example, the current used car market has insane values with used vehicles costing more than the MSRP on new ones sometimes. Likewise, when Netflix had no competition, they were able to sign deals with content providers for almost nothing because content providers thought streaming was worthless. Either streaming was going to fail and that $10 deal would go away or streaming was going to succeed and content providers wouldn't license content so cheaply. That era was an odd thing in the market before content owners realized that streaming wasn't just a little additional revenue, but a replacement for their service. I don't think you can really compare a market blip to a sustainable business model. HBO and others weren't going to continue licensing their catalogues to Netflix once it was clear that streaming was popular. They made the mistake of licensing to Netflix assuming that they'd be getting a little extra pocket money rather than cannibalizing their services. That mistake is probably the reason Netflix is the giant it is today. Netflix signed deals to license content before content owners realized the value of streaming. They used that content to gain subscribers until they could afford to build their own library of first-party content. Even from Netflix's side, they might have been spending more on content than they wanted to long-term to try and gain subscribers that would be sticky as their library waned and they transformed from "we licensed most of the content you want" to "we're another HBO with a limited content selection". These things happen. We saw MoviePass come and go because it was an unsustainably good deal. I think it's also important to remember that back in that era of Netflix, most people were still paying for cable and renting DVDs. Maybe you weren't, but most people were. I think it's important to think about the whole amount that people were spending and people were spending a lot on their entertainment. It was perfectly normal to head to a Blockbuster and spend $10 renting two DVDs each weekend. That feels like such an alien concept today, but people were spending $100 on cable plus $40 on rentals and getting a lot less entertainment than they are today. Sure, if you were one of the few that only had Netflix, it was a glorious time. $10/mo never bought so much entertainment! Likewise, if you were a MoviePass subscriber, no one had ever gotten so many theater tickets for so little money. But it wasn't going to last because it was unsustainably good. Once MoviePass found that people would actually use the service, it was dead in the water. Once content owners saw that people would cancel their HBO subscription because Netflix had HBO's content, the era of Netflix having such an expansive library for so cheap would end as the deals ran out. Comparing current prices to a market blip isn't really a fair comparison - but there was a pretty great 5 years in there.