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Netflix Loses Toy Story 3, Tron and 1,000 More Movies
- mrb 15y ago> “This decision is a result of our strategy to protect the premium nature of our brand by preserving the appropriate pricing and packaging of our exclusive and highly valuable content,” Starz said last September. And the movie industry wonders how to fight piracy... well for one, don't kill a legitimate and convenient way for paying customers to access your movies! "Protecting your brand" you say? You are putting yourself out of business...
- forrestthewoods 15y agoIt's perfectly reasonable if that legitimate and convenient method isn't a sustainable business model. Tragically $10 a month for every movie and TV show ever isn't viable. It is in Starz' interest to focus on acquiring expensive premium cable subscriptions rather than collecting a small portion of the Netflix $10 monthly subscription.
- nknight 15y agoPeople still have cable?
- Quarrelsome 15y agoWhy has it always got to be this direction though? Next time you watch a film try tracking the wastage, the unnecessary cuts, the plethora of extras, the ridiculous quantity of explosions and/or CGI. IMO the future is about more films with lower budgets. At present the amount of money that film studios piss away with their bloated budgets is utterly unsustainable.
- res0nat0r 15y agoNot really. The movies which have racked in the most money of all time all cost 200 million+ to make. http://www.the-numbers.com/movies/records/ http://www.the-numbers.com/movies/records/ The public loves and wants big budget expensive movies.
- Joakal 15y agoHow much of the 200 million+ is marketing? Even some celebrity actors are marketing.
- res0nat0r 15y agoDoes that really matter? The total cost being 200 million plus of every flick on that list shows that big huge expensive movies, marketing, actors included, still are super popular.
- Joakal 15y agoIt's contributing to the popularity, and there's a belief that hollywood is 90% marketing, 10% fluff. I'm just curious if you knew how much was marketing.
- rprasad 15y agoReported budgets for movies do not include marketing, as such costs are highly variable. Thus, those $200 million budgets are the budgets for making the movie, with additional outlay for marketing the movie.
- derleth 15y ago> Tragically $10 a month for every movie and TV show ever isn't viable. Why not? Further, can you explain that in terms an avid Netflix customer can understand?
- res0nat0r 15y agoWhy do you think 10$ for all you can eat movie watching via Netflix is sustainable, when new releases at the theater cost $7-12 PER movie? Unfortunately the industry set the price this low and now it is expected to be that cheap. Since the price is going to inevitably go up, or Netflix will just lose more content, the public is going to have to deal with the increase, or the people who don't want to pony up will just have to cancel their service.
- archangel_one 15y agoThe fact that new releases cost $lots doesn't affect the viability of Netflix's operation, any more than the fact that a new car costs $20,000 affects the viability of selling it secondhand later on for $5,000. Any costs related to property, rent etc are not relevant, and the (much larger) licensing costs of movies are arbitrary figures set by the industry. They could set them pretty much wherever they want for Netflix and still make money since their marginal cost is pretty much zero. And while they may not want to do that, the alternative to customers paying $10/month for Netflix is probably not customers paying $100/month when most people know there are other alternatives.
- res0nat0r 15y agoNetflix had to raise prices eventually, I wonder if they will have to do it again in the future to stay in business. Their licencing fees went from ~200 million in 2010 to ~2 BILLION in 2012. They must raise prices somewhere along the line. $10 a month is a hell of a deal for all you can watch movies. This is the price of 2 trips to McDonalds. They have to charge more somewhere due to their skyrocketing license renegotiation costs the studios are charging. And they can charge this, because there is a demand for their content.
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- moe 15y agoTragically $10 a month for every movie and TV show ever isn't viable. Then they'd better make it viable really quick because that seems to be about the price point that the market has decided on. I also don't see why it wouldn't be viable as long as you distribute it to the content that's actually being watched.
- dhbanes 15y agoLots of people pay $50-$100/month for cable/satellite. I don't.. and I don't understand the value, and you might not either, but a huge amount of the population does.
- endersshadow 15y agoLive events. That's the value of that subscription. It's why ESPN can charge nearly 4x what other channels charge providers. Almost the entirety of my value from television I derive is from watching sports. If I can watch 20 hockey games in a month for the price of actually going to one live, then that's worth it to me. If I can watch my alma mater play some hockey, then that's worth the substitution of buying an expensive plane ticket, getting a hotel, and watching them play (I live about 2000 miles from the good ol' alma mater). I think for this reason, you'll never see that expense go away and TV will remain fairly ubiquitous.
- snprbob86 15y agoIt's not really that simple when you account for the "triple play" style packages. People are getting their internet, phone, and TV all together for around $100/month. People don't really understand what portion of their bill goes to each of those services, but they view all three of them as critical (with phone service rapidly becoming provided by cell phones). There is pretty well understood psychological effects of bundle pricing. When you break out just movies, $10/mo might be what people actually want to pay. I suspect the actual right price point for the mass populous is somewhere > $10 and < $50... but Netflix has to live in a world where people already have TV, thanks to aggressive bundle pushing strategies from cable companies. At $10/mo, Netflix is priced the same as Stars & friends: like "channel packs".
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- toomuchtodo 15y agoThey better get used to $10/month vs $0 when consumers go to The Pirate Bay instead.
- lukifer 15y agoA smarter move would be to offer their own streaming service, or even a download store.
- chrisguitarguy 15y agoAgreed. I'm not sure why this doesn't happen. Maybe because the royalties and such get more and more complex with that sort of system? Can anyone shed some light on this?
- brown9-2 15y agoIt's worth noting here the Starz isn't making these movies - they're paying for to access the content from the creators just like Netflix is. (Starz produces a few tv shows but obviously none of the titles in the title here)
- wam 15y agoStories like this make the Netflix Prize seem ancient. You can build a better mousetrap and then spend a lot of time adjusting the springs, but keep an eye on your cheese supply.
- JunkDNA 15y agoEver since my daughter was born two years ago I basically stopped watching movies and only watch a small amount of TV. This has made me realize that the products being put out by Hollywood are inconvenient and not a good value for the money. The few times I've sat down to rent something I did want to see, I found it wasn't available on onDemand, iTunes, etc... Instead of watching a movie, my wife and I end up goofing around on Facebook or something. I have plenty of entertainment options. Making it hard to see a movie just means I will do something else. I suspect I'm not alone in this regard.
- malkia 15y agoHeh, 4 years since my son was born, and while at the begining HBO was ON, later as he grew up and was bothered by the TV noise, we switched to Netflix, but watch only movies with captions - and these are... well non-english ones :) So here ya go! Oh, And I have to watch with him Yo-gabba-gabba, Franklin and the Upside down show (which is great btw)
- novakinblood 15y agoI'm more excited than my kids are for the upside down show.
- kellishaver 15y agoBoardgames have replaced movies and TV in our house. There are some great games out there. Good ones can run anywhere from $20-80 (though usually around $40-50) but the value for your money is far greater. We get some quality time together as a family and the kid gets some strategic and problem-solving skills. Of course... they take up a lot more space. :)
- officemonkey 15y agoTry Bananagrams. Takes up as much space as a pair of socks.
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- fabricode 15y agoFor those that purport to track piracy, this will be an interesting case study. Perhaps if they can see (again) the inverse relationship of easy, non-free availability to downloads of free copies, maybe they'll finally begin to adjust their business model. I doubt it, but one can hope.
- crikli 15y agoI'm a very heavy Netflix user. Some people listen to music while they code, I watch movies/series. I don't care that Starz has removed their content and I'm not going to chase it down. They've overplayed their hand and it's going to bite them.
- gcv 15y agoCurious. How do you manage to pay attention both to a video and to your code at the same time?
- crikli 15y agoWell...this will sound mildly insane but if i don't have something going it's like there's a bored 5 year old in my head that wants to distract me from coding. Of course there are segments of the video I miss but I follow the dialogue. It's how I watched most of Lost, for example.
- VMG 15y agoBe careful, it might not be good for you: http://www.health.com/health/article/0,,20505051,00.html http://www.health.com/health/article/0,,20505051,00.html
- vijayr 15y agoone of my ex-colleagues used to do this. He had two monitors, one for running some video (youtube, netflix etc) and other was for his work stuff. I could never understand how he could do both at the same time. I assumed, either his work was too boring, or his videos were :D Interesting to know he is not the only one doing this.
- b3b0p 15y agoI do this too. It's quite lonely living alone in a single bedroom apartment. The little extra background keeps me from going nuts at times. I find it easy to code while having the TV on or if I'm just toying around a small window on my display in the bottom corner. The secret I have found is to put on one of two types of shows: 1. Something you have already seen, I really enjoy 24 for example, having it the background when I'm familiar with it, but still enjoy it, helps. 2. Documentaries or something similar such as Top Gear or PBS shows are good choices. New shows that require my attention or movies I have never seen, but want to just don't work for me.
- darrenkopp 15y agoIt's ok, they weren't in HD, so I would never watch them. No point in having movies that clearly have HD versions in standard definition.
- rhizome 15y ago"Streaming HD" is usually a marketing pipedream.
- learc83 15y agoIt's also usually better than "Streaming SD."
- darrenkopp 15y agoNetflix says they stream up to 5MB/s for their video quality, which looks great to me. Not as good as a blu-ray I'm sure, but still looks better than standard definition.
- kenmazy 15y agoImportant correction: Netflix's HD tops out at 5 Mb/s, not 5 MB/s. Bluray max bitrate is 54 Mb/s, but I've generally seen transcoding to 20-30 Mb/s have nearly the same quality.
- erichocean 15y agoCorrect, that's because up to 16 Mb/s is for sound. I have (and love) Blu-ray, but as much for the sound as the picture. Blu-rays have incredible audio.
- adorton 15y agoNetflix's "HD" streaming content looks great. I don't know if it's "real" HD or not, but it's better quality than their non-HD stuff.
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- lukasb 15y agoGood luck getting people to pay for plastic discs in boxes.
- dangrossman 15y agoPlastic disc in box sales this week: $74M http://www.the-numbers.com/dvd/charts/weekly/thisweek.php http://www.the-numbers.com/dvd/charts/weekly/thisweek.php http://www.the-numbers.com/weekly-bluray-sales-chart http://www.the-numbers.com/weekly-bluray-sales-chart
- sehugg 15y agoThe main impression I have surrounding the "premium nature of their brand" is when I go to a Residence Inn and enjoy free movies.
- ldar15 15y ago3 good movies, 997 shit ones. "Lets try this one." ... STARZ PLAY .... "Oh. Probably not then, but lets give it a try" ... ... ... <back to browsing>
- jQueryIsAwesome 15y agoHollywood is never going to learn; i think Netflix should get themselves in the content creation business by making alliances with indie movie makers.
- Tichy 15y agoarticle says they are about to launch a tv show
- wavephorm 15y agoThis sounds like a delusional way of saying "We'll wait until we can replicate the premium cable channel model over the Internet". They clearly don't understand that the concept of a "channel" is what's being disrupted.
- MtotheThird 15y agoYeah, I can't really remember the last time I watched a Starz movie on Netflix. It's been nothing but TV series for me for at least a year now. Occasionally I'll watch a movie that shows up in new releases, but they've been signing a ton of premium shows lately, far more than I can watch. I think it's a perfectly viable strategy for them to focus on series - more content per deal and a perfect match for a long-tail streaming strategy.
- InclinedPlane 15y agoThis is the biggest problem with Netflix, the value of Netflix is the value of its library. If it's not constant then it's a lot harder to justify a consistent monthly payment.
- staunch 15y agoNetflix just needs to raise their damn prices -- or offer a higher tier. Many of us were used to paying $30-$80 for our cable TV packages and another $20-$30/mo for Blockbuster. It's been about 7 years since I paid those, but now I'm only paying $8/mo for TV/movie entertainment in total. I'd be more than happy to pay $18/mo if it meant I had 2-3x more content. Netflix: $8/mo, Netflix Plus: $18/mo, and even Netflix Premium: $28/mo. That they haven't done this is kind of dumbfounding.
- ilikepi 15y ago> Netflix: $8/mo, Netflix Plus: $18/mo, and even Netflix Premium: $28/mo. Hmm...that sounds a lot like how traditional cable TV packages are structured.
- staunch 15y agoSo? It wasn't price that made cable TV suck. It was the lack of on-demand viewing, alternate device viewing, region restrictions, commercials, etc.
- muhfuhkuh 15y agoThat's all you can eat, though. I don't have to worry about emptying out DVRs, or programming it in, or (if I'm not a DVR subscriber) waiting for it to air and sitting through an absolute assault of commercials. Additionally, I simply refuse to watch a PPV movie for $5.00 per on top of paying $50/mo for cable. Most of the channels are absolute garbage (yes, I'm looking at you, "reality" TV) or air the programs I actually want to watch so rarely that I end up not watching them at all. Netflix is simple: Find/browse movie, check user ratings and synopsis, click play. That's Apple-level magic, and it's worth paying a premium, even if it means paying near what I did with cable.
- res0nat0r 15y agoNot sure why you are being downvoted. $10/month is way to low to be sustainable. Netflix has to raise their prices since the content creators are squeezing them because they know they hold all the cards.
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- leeoniya 15y agothis will lead to 10x more piracy than Starz premium subscribers. the flexibility of internet distribution has shown publishers and content creators that consumers will not stand for being sold a bill of goods - not as 16-track albums, nor packaged cable channels.
- nl 15y agoHollywood continues to punish consumers, and then complain about piracy. It is time for statutory streaming licences.
- ary 15y agoPeople forget why Universal Studios was originally founded. The monopoly envisioned by Edison and company (slowly) gave way to a cartel that arose out of opposition to the incumbent surrounded by a desire to capitalize on untapped opportunity. See this Ars Technica article: http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/09/thomas-edisons-plot-to-destroy-the-movies.ars http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/09/thomas-ediso... Far from being a hinderance, the actions of the MPAA and its member studios are an opportunity for smaller, more agile companies to start producing content and refusing to license it to the incumbents. There is a whole new world of distribution out there, and no forced middle-man. Get out there and make it happen.
- mickt 15y agoI'd never heard of Premium cable network Starz until I read that article, and I guess now I'll never see any of their content. I do have Netflix and I don't have cable. I don't understand why people pay so much money to watch TV?