10 ms·

This is the problem. * Amazon Prime * Disney+ * HBO Max * Netflix * Hulu * Paramount+ * Peacock * AMC+ * Apple TV+ * ESPN+ * Shudder * Sundance Now

• Apocryphon 4y ago
  Don't forget WhatTimeIsItRightNow.com
  • echelon 4y ago
    > Don't forget WhatTimeIsItRightNow.com That's the problem with Hollywoo. Too much fragmentation as a result of everyone chasing after the power vacuum created by streaming. Every small outfit thinks they can win. Consolidation will happen as clear winners emerge and failures continue to materialize. (I have that sticker on one of my old laptops. Also a "Hollywoo" sticker on one of my current laptops. I love it because my startup is in that space.)
    • mkaic 4y ago
      reminds me of my favorite game show: "Hollywoo Celebrities: What Do They Know? Do They Know Things? Let's Find Out! with J.D. Salinger"
• ghaff 4y ago
  That doesn't even count all the various Amazon Prime add-on services like Starz.
• seanalltogether 4y ago
  The big question is what is the solution to all this that doesn't involve 3 big players buying out all the rest? Is it even possible to get these guys to all play together in some kind of shared space.
  • ghaff 4y ago
    I'm not sure there is one. There are some potential wrinkles like the way Amazon Prime offers add-ons like Starz. But even that is analogous to the cable world where you had premium channels like HBO. There's also the potential for some content to just go a la carte only sales through a purely distribution platform but I have to believe that ship has mostly sailed. ADDED: But per another comment, things are better than the cable world, much less the pre-cable world that I actually grew up in. So some combination of fragmentation and consolidation is fine for me.
  • riskable 4y ago
    Regulation might be able to fix it: Prevent streaming companies from owning content production. Split up companies that already exist like this (e.g. Comcast, Netflix, Disney, et al) then the content creating entities will be forced to pick the highest bidder for exclusive access or try to maximize profit by syndicating their content across as many platforms as possible. It would be a better world, IMHO.
    • lotsofpulp 4y ago
      Why would adding a middleman make anything better? If society wants more people to be able to watch more TV, then society should just give people cash so they can buy access to more streaming services. Or reduce copyright terms to something reasonable like 10 years.
      • izacus 4y ago
        > Why would adding a middleman make anything better? Because market competition is what makes capitalism a liveable social order for most people. Adding market competition makes everything better. Command economies (corporate or socialist) don't.
        • lotsofpulp 4y ago
          Adding middlemen increases the supply of middlemen, and hence puts pressure on the price of middlemen. Disney can charge $15 to an individual, or $15 to a middleman, it makes no difference to them. It is just a waste of society’s resources. Reducing copyright length so old Disney stuff enters the public domain quicker would increase supply and drive down price for the media.
• Night_Thastus 4y ago
  I know how to solve this! We'll just bundle a bunch of them together, and offer a slight discount over the cost of paying for them all individually. Maybe offer the most niche ones as add-on packages. We can even put in some ads in exchange for the convenience and... Oh wait, what were we doing again?
  • HDThoreaun 4y ago
    Cable was bad because of forced ads, forced bundles, no on demand, and long term contracts. None of those are seen in the streaming industry. This "streaming is cable 2.0" meme doesn't make sense to me.
    • Melatonic 4y ago
      Cable was originally free no? Lets see where we end up in 20 years
      • RandallBrown 4y ago
        I don't think cable was ever free. Broadcast tv was (and still is) free.
      • dhosek 4y ago
        Cable was never free
    • Night_Thastus 4y ago
      These things are becoming a reality for streaming. As the prices go up, and the content becomes broken up between more and more services, 2 things happen: * The idea of a bundle that saves you money, adds convenience and leaves you less caught out when licenses change hands compared to 20+ individual subscriptions becomes more and more tempting * The 6-month and 12-month plans for these services are much cheaper and become more appealing. Back when it was only netflix at $7, there was no need for a bundle or a 12-month plan. But when it's all these services at $15 each, a 12-month long bundle would save a lot of money in the long run. Bundles may not exist yet, but they will. Mark my words.
• tptacek 4y ago
  I'm getting most (all?) of what AMC has through Hulu and Netflix.
  • zerocrates 4y ago
    AMC is one of the more aggressive stations in not letting its content out to other streamers. You can't watch... oh I don't know, Interview with the Vampire anywhere else, other than having AMC on linear TV or having access to their associated video-on-demand. I remember having to cast around to find the (pretty good) John le Carre adaptation The Little Drummer Girl anywhere after having missed its initial broadcast: I ended up getting the free trial of Sundance Now, which is more or less AMC+'s predecessor... or something like that. But: most of what people most want to watch is stuff that's on legacy deals, or that they're letting out older seasons of, or just don't control. Like, Better Call Saul is on Netflix, but not the current/final season. I feel like the era of them really jealously guarding their shows to try to make AMC+ work has coincided with a bunch of stuff people aren't that interested in seeing (and maybe the stuff people do want to see they don't fully control). Lodge 49 is cool (but ultimately quite niche, I think), but they don't have an audience clamoring to stream Low Winter Sun or whatever.
    • Kiro 4y ago
      What? Disney+ and Prime are much worse. You can't find a single show anywhere else. I would say AMC is one if the better in this regard considering both BB, MM, BCS and TWD can be watched on a plethora of other services.
      • zerocrates 4y ago
        AMC is basically trying to act like it's Disney+ or Netflix, or whatever you prefer, for its own content. Their issue is just that the stuff from them people actually want to see in big numbers is more or less that list you mentioned. They don't actually control Breaking Bad, Mad Men or Better Call Saul. The Walking Dead and Fear the Walking Dead seem to be on legacy contracts that give all the "back" seasons to Netflix and Hulu, respectively. They haven't had anything new that people actually care about enough to notice its exclusivity. The newer Walking Dead spinoffs would be about it, I guess.
• coredog64 4y ago
  Who pays Amazon for Prime and then only uses it for video? Prime-affiliated services (Prime Video, Amazon Music, etc.) exist to make Prime more sticky and keep you in the ecosystem. Walmart is doing something similar with, IIRC, Paramount+.
  • zargon 4y ago
    Anyone who wants to watch Prime Video content and doesn't use other Amazon services. You can't pay for Prime Video separately.
    • cptskippy 4y ago
      > You can't pay for Prime Video separately. I'm not sure that I would be willing to pay for it separately. It has some good shows but not an astounding amount. The interface is hot garbage that tries to upsell additional pay-for content and streaming services like Starz. Unless you know what you're looking for and go in with surgical precision, you get bogged down in a morass of upcharges. They also started intermixing free-with-ads content and making it difficult to distinguish. My kid has started a couple movies only to get lambasted with ads every 15 mins and becoming thoroughly upset.
  • deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  • gigel82 4y ago
    They recently made Amazon Music worse (you can't skip songs in playlists / radios), to force you into upgrading to Music Unlimited. I also haven't watched a show on Amazon Video in years (Man in the High Castle was the last one). Yet they continue increasing the cost of Prime citing those other "benefits". I wish they'd offer an a-la-carte Prime, we only make use of the free shipping one.
    • wombatpm 4y ago
      The Amazon Music changes drives me mad. What?! I can’t skip songs in my own playlist. Time to breakdown and pay for Apple Music
• fleddr 4y ago
  I'm frankly annoyed that so many people call this a problem. Sure, I understand the surface level inconvenience of this fragmentation, but I think we're getting a little spoiled here. Dial back all these streaming services and you'd have less content back then. And virtually no say in what to watch when, plus shitty ads. To watch anything specific, you'd have to go to the movies or go for a rental. Now you have a huge amount of freedom of choice, with no ads, much more convenience, at fairly reasonable prices. The exceptions you mentioned are just that, exceptions. So that's my first point, we seem to be perpetually unhappy, no matter how rich an offering is. Second, I consider this semi-fragmented landscape a solution, it's healthy. Services are fiercely competing with each other for your eye balls. That means they're in a race to produce good content and it suppresses prices. This is actually happening. When Netflix dominated, they had advanced plans for major price hikes. The arrival of Disney+ stopped this in its tracks. Do you really want this industry to be consolidated into 1-2 players? With a price monopoly? With producers being squeezed, creatively constrained? Just so you have to press one less button? Third, the idea that you could combine the production value of hundreds of billions of $ worth of material into a single affordable streaming service for the masses is a delusion. The math simply doesn't add up. Fourth, most people just vegetate after work for an hour or two. They need something watchable. They don't need 17 subscriptions, it's not a common need.
  • lotsofpulp 4y ago
    I also do not understand why people complain about having the choice to not pay for things they do not want to watch. I can turn on the TV, press the microphone button, say the name of the media I want to watch, and usually a screen pops up letting me know if I have already paid for it, and if not, how much it will cost. And a couple buttons later, I can be watching it, or doing something else with my time. Much more convenient than watching media in the 1990s and 2000s.
    • no_wizard 4y ago
      I think what everyone wanted and briefly had, was a few streaming services for basically all content, without ads. Before the more recent Cambrian explosion, it was just Netflix, HBO (via HBO Now), Hulu, and Showtime. Yes, there are some smaller players too, but these were the big ones. Everything else was licensed out (typically to Netflix) and in some instances was perhaps only available on cable. People got alot of content for sub 60 USD, for the most part. Then everyone started clawing back their catalogues for their own streaming services. I think the 2017-2019 period was the "golden age" of Netflix streaming in terms of sheer good content availability, and people really liked it. At least Apple TV+ is original content and not re-selling the rights that used to be on a different platform. They're a genuinely new entrant into the space.
• eikenberry 4y ago
  > Want to watch the old Newhart show? You mean the Bob Newhart Show? If so you can find it on Hulu.
  • MBCook 4y ago
    No, his second big show, “Newhart”. Plus I don’t know if it’s the case with Bob Newhart, but some old shows on Hulu (like Taxi) are missing tons of episodes.
• luhn 4y ago
  As a Packers fan living in California, the NFL thing particularly bothers me. It is impossible for me to legally stream all the games. The only option to watch every Sunday game is NFL Sunday Ticket, which has a streaming option but it's not available for my address—They force you to buy DirecTV satellite if it's available in your area. Contrast that with the NBA, where for a surprisingly reasonable $15 a month I can stream every game on YouTube TV. Apparently DirecTV's exclusive NFL contract is expiring, so I'm hoping next season will come with new streaming options.
  • brookst 4y ago
    Also an NFL fan in a different market than my team. This year I ended up paying for Sunday Ticket, Peacock, Paramount+, and Fubo to actually watch my games. Each week there was some wrinkle that made a game unavailable on ST. Next year, screw it, I’m just not watching the games. Maybe I’ll hit a bar for one or two. It’s not even the money, which is annoying, it’s the hunting for each game and what service to watch it on. That was really aggravating.
  • cool_dude85 4y ago
    >Apparently DirecTV's exclusive NFL contract is expiring, so I'm hoping next season will come with new streaming options. Prepare to be impressed by the rumored prices of the live stream package. As an aside, especially on the west coast, if you are willing to be patient and wait a few hours after the game's over, I can strongly recommend NFL+ for replays.
    • greedo 4y ago
      Apple apparently wasn't going to add an extra charge to Appletv+...
  • cco 4y ago
    NBA is way better than the NFL but the NBA League Pass is not perfect. However I've found YouTube TV's basic package at $65 a month (basically just cable) plus the league pass at $15 gets you basically everything you want. NFL is impossible, I'll catch the game on "regular TV" but otherwise it's pirate or nothing.