
Netflix Flexes - jmsflknr
https://stratechery.com/2019/netflix-flexes/
======
2bitencryption
My takeaway from Bird Box is that if Netflix wants to make any of their
original content one of the most-watched media events of the year, they can do
it, regardless of the quality of the content itself.

All it takes is for them to slip it in to people's "custom, curated" lists at
a higher frequency, and maybe do a little subtle social-media engineering on
Reddit/Facebook, and bam: instant box office smash of a derivative film with a
66% on Rotten Tomatoes.

That's a huge "flex". Big studios could pump hundreds of millions into a
decent film and still have it flop. Netflix can take a B-movie and make it a
sensation with relative ease. No wonder every game in town is trying to break
into this model. Why invest millions on a potential flop when you can engineer
one with 75% accuracy whenever you wish?

(though maybe I'm being just a bit too paranoid here. I have to admit some of
the Bird Box magic stems from its intriguing concept. guerilla marketing
doesn't work so well if what you're selling doesn't seem too interesting)

edit: people are debating the idea of "box office smash" here. I didn't use
that phrase to emphasize direct earnings as a result of the film (which is
"free" to watch if you pay for a subscription). The article addresses this:

> Secondly, and relatedly, Netflix is counting on subscription revenue. To
> that end, producing a piece of content that 58% of its subscriber base
> viewed in a single month is by definition a triumph (and yes, worth ~$700
> million).

The idea is that Netflix was able to coerce _more than half_ of its
subscribers to watch this film. That's crazy. The result, as we see in the
article, is a tidal-wave of Bird Box achieving near-meme status. How does that
feel to someone who does not have a Netflix subscription? What big joke/story
are they missing out on? For only $14.99 a month, they can win social
acceptance by being "in the know" of the current big thing.

~~~
iamgopal
Indian Netflix and Amazon prime are making originals that are border line porn
with no story or acting or what so ever. They know one simple thing. Sex
sells.

~~~
aviraldg
Do you have specific examples in mind? I've really liked most of their
original content so far, like Sacred Games, Mirzapur, Rajma Chawal, Selection
Day, etc.

------
happybuy
All the signs indicate that Netflix has become a user hostile company that is
prioritising ongoing user engagement and stickiness over their users needs.

It's starting to remind me of another company which at one point in their
evolution prioritised user engagement over everything else – Facebook. Once
this occurs, it is a long slippery slope which leads to a series of user
hostile internal decisions which ultimately leads to the user and their
privacy becoming the product.

When you actually pay for Netflix and this is their modus operandi it leaves a
large opening for a competitor with a more user-focused approach to come in
and gain marketshare.

A few examples of how Netflix is prioritising engagement over their users:

\- Auto-playing shows once a show has finished (this leads lazy users
unnecessarily watching more Netflix)

\- Promoting Netflix shows above third party content, irrespective of quality.
This prioritises what's best for Netflix instead of promoting the best content
for the user.

\- Algorithmically modifying the poster frames / thumbnails of shows to be
more appealing to users. Again promoting engagement and misleading users of
the true content of the show.

\- Removing the ability to easily see the complete catalogue via comprehensive
categories, which enhances the reliance users have on algorithmic suggestions

I'm sure all of this has been tested in Netflix and they can show that these
approaches increase stickiness and engagement. Stickiness and engagement is
not what is in the users best interest however and over the medium and long
term I think it will be detrimental to a better measurement which is user
satisfaction.

~~~
lh7777
I think their worst decision of late is to include auto-playing "trailers"
(with sound!) when you pause for more than a second on a title. Between that
and the lack of a decent "browse by category" interface you mentioned, I
rarely bother using the TV UI to discover content. Googling "what's good on
netflix" works much better for me.

At least you can still disable the auto-play next episode "feature".

~~~
Semaphor
> auto-playing "trailers" (with sound!)

I've read about this a few times. If you disable it once, does it get disabled
permanently? Because Netflix (unlike the Amazon Prime Video ads) never plays
trailers with sound for me.

> auto-play next episode "feature"

I'd certainly call it a feature. I'd hate having to manually click every time
I want to see a new episode.

~~~
lorenzhs
My TV's Netflix app doesn't have an option to disable the auto-playing
trailers, or even just their sound (short of muting the TV). It's quite
annoying.

~~~
Semaphor
ah, okay, that makes sense. Though to be fair, that sounds like a shitty app
(one of many reasons I have a dumb TV).

~~~
lh7777
Are you able to disable auto-playing trailers, or are you just using the web
interface or a smartphone/tablet that don't have this feature in the first
place?

I have a recent AppleTV, which doesn't have any way to disable auto-playing
trailers. Same for my previous STB (Roku). This is a somewhat new feature, so
some older STBs and Smart TVs don't have it, but that's just because they
can't be updated to the latest version of the Netflix app.

You can disable auto-play next episode across _all_ interfaces and devices in
the settings on netflix.com. I just wish there was an equivalent switch for
trailers.

~~~
Semaphor
Never seen a function to disable trailers completely (my dumb tv is a large,
wall-mounted 3rd computer monitor, so I'm using the web interface), but at
least they don't play sound which would probably make me cancel my Netflix
subscription.

------
dasil003
Having dedicated nearly a decade of my life to a startup competing in this
space, the OA is right about Netflix's superior strategy when it comes to user
experience and content production. Netflix surged ahead of the pack because
they focused relentlessly on the quality of the streaming experience while all
the legacy players were focused on deal-making. In other words, while Netflix
was building a solid video delivery platform, the rest of the industry was
fumbling around with biz dev deals like TV Everywhere that have a very low UX
ceiling in the best-case scenario.

However that's the past now, and the OA is missing a few trends:

First, Netflix will not maintain its UX lead at the same level for long. Video
streaming like all technology is commoditizing, the experience will get better
and better from non-tech companies. Meanwhile Netflix is continuing to plow
down this path of algorithm-driven engagement and ramming stuff down people's
throats with auto-play, bad search, and other dark patterns. Given the current
cultural zeitgeist (eg. Facebook backlash), this isn't going to end well if
they don't change course.

Perhaps even more important is the fact that Netflix has a long way to go on
the production side. There's a lot of volume of Netflix productions, but not a
lot of quality. This is where the OA underestimates Disney—their content is
way broader and better than Netflix, and people care a lot about that.

Netflix's experimental Interactive content and Reed Hasting's comments about
Fortnite also give me pause. This is typical SV-style next-big-thing thinking,
but it also represents taking the eye off the ball. Video games are video
games, Netflix doesn't know shit about them, and if you ask me they are better
off focusing on their core competency versus trying to build a moat with a
gimmicky concept.

5 years ago I would have said Netflix has a better chance at becoming a great
producer than Disney has at creating a great streaming experience, but now I'm
not so sure.

~~~
mlthoughts2018
I agree Netflix is trending towards failure, but I couldn’t disagree more
about why and the path leading them there. Netflix is and has been the least
attractive of these services for a long time, specifically because other
platforms have far expanded inventory and integrate the ability to instantly
rent or buy additional content not directly included.

Ultimately what _everyone_ wants is a super easy interface to pay for precise
a la carte content, never bundled, never subscription-based. If a given person
wants to buy everything from HBO, they still could, and maybe could get a
discount for subscribing, but nobody wants to be _forced_ to subscribe to
watch just a handful of content items.

It doesn’t matter if it’s Disney streaming, Netflix, Premier League soccer, or
anything else. It’s clear rent-seeking to create walled gardens of content
only unlockable by bundled subscriptions, and the clear consumer drive
existentially threatening the TV industry is that all anybody wants is a dumb
pipe with an easy interface to individually purchase each content item on its
own merit, flat out.

Many streaming services, particularly Amazon’s, offer this to a way higher
degree than Netflix, especially in terms of sports access and new release
films.

Netflix is betting that it can create locked-in content that will compel
people to stay subscribing, but I think this is a long-term failing idea. Bird
Box is a great example: really poor production, sloppy writing with contrived
villains, lowest common denominator stuff. Stranger Things? I couldn’t see one
reason to care about it. Not exceptionally bad, just overproduced blandness.
The gimmick of making things into viral phenomena is not a stable business
plan in this area.

As prices rise, Netflix just becomes another HBO. A walled garden of content,
except HBO actually makes good television and knows how to do it. Netflix is
trashing its own brand with mindless crap. It’s network quality for premium
add-on prices. Especially if economic hard times hit, this is exactly
something people are going to realize they can live without.

~~~
ryanwaggoner
_Ultimately what everyone wants is a super easy interface to pay for precise a
la carte content, never bundled, never subscription-based._

I 100% do not want this. I want to pay for one subscription to get all the
media I want (music, tv shows, movies, books, etc). And I don’t care at all
about ownership. I’d pay $50-100/month for this subscription, and we’re
getting close if you don’t mind cobbling together a half dozen subscriptions
and using a bunch of different apps.

~~~
mlthoughts2018
You start by saying you don’t want a unified interface where you can get
exactly the content you want, then your very next sentence is that you want a
single unified interface to get exactly the content you want.

It sounds like you specifically _do_ want a single interface for a la carte
content (note: this has nothing to do with ownership vs restricted access),
and you currently achieve something like this with a combination of
subscription products that bundle a bunch of content you do want with a bunch
of other content you don’t want but also don’t care about.

A situation where the price is broken down to individually activate just the
content you want and not the content you don’t would offer exactly the same
experience but with less irrelevant content and you’d only pay for what you
choose to consume.

In other words, the concept of “I pay for one subscription and get exactly and
only all the content I personally want” is equivalent to a unified portal for
a la carte purchasing.. activating an on-going payment for ability to see Show
A and never activating the same payment for Show B which you don’t care for.
The “subscription price” is just the total price of your personal a la carte
activations (be they ownership purchases, rentals, or recuring payments to
license access to that singular content).

At any rate, your comment here is explicitly contradictory.

~~~
ryanwaggoner
You’ve misread my comment. The unified interface part is not what I objected
to.

I explicitly do NOT want to pay a la carte. I understand what you’re saying
about only paying for what I consume and not paying for any irrelevant
content.

And yet, I _prefer_ a subscription, even if the total cost is higher. I don’t
want the cognitive overhead of constantly trying to decide if it’s worth a
little bit of money to purchase or rent a specific piece of content. I’d much
rather pay a flat fee once per month for all-you-can-consume access. If we
were talking about something very expensive, then my position might differ,
but in the grand scheme of things, this is relatively trivial, so I’m happy to
pay a few extra bucks to not think about it as much.

~~~
mlthoughts2018
> “I don’t want the cognitive overhead of constantly trying to decide if it’s
> worth a little bit of money to purchase or rent a specific piece of
> content.”

But you already engage with this decision-making overhead when deciding what
to watch and not watch. It’s built into any viewing system whether it’s all-
you-can-watch after entry in a portal or not.

Also I hardly believe you never purchase on-demand content _at all_ ,
especially since no combination of subscription services currently covers
everything, and large chunks of content still can only be purchases in an on-
demand fashion.

------
jVinc
My takeaway from Birdbox is the old adage: "Any observed statistical
regularity will tend to collapse once pressure is placed upon it for control
purposes."

Sure it got tons of views because of all the advertisement and the tons of
focus on viral media advertisement on every single platform. But the reaction
from people watching it before me when asked if it was good was "Well I mean,
I did watch it to the end, but i wouldn't call it good". Personally I didn't
care for it. It was a huge and expensive stunt by Netflix to show that they
could game viewer numbers for a one-shot thing. And I get that this is an
important thing for them to do, but it's in no way sustainable or valuable
either to them or their viewers.

If they did more stunts like bird-box throughout the year, most would quickly
start to completely ignore them with an attitude of "Oh sure I head about X,
and it's "blowing up on facebook" but that's always the case with Netflix
focus pieces, they aren't worth watching though."

~~~
misterprime
For me it was: "Cool, this is some decent new content from something I was
already paying for."

Perhaps if I wasn't already a subscriber and the social media hype led me to
subscribe I would be disappointed, but for an existing subscriber? I'll keep
my auto-renew going.

~~~
AdrianB1
For me, it was the time to ask myself seriously if I should cancel the
subscription. The "decent new content" is subjectively mediocre and most of
what I see in the catalog is mediocre or worse. I have just 3 TV series I
enjoyed in the past year, 2 are British weird stuff and one is Altered Carbon,
all were ok, nothing great.

------
jrnichols
The article made a great point about TV Everywhere and the inconsistency of
app logins. This is something we encounter with apps like the History Channel
app, for example. it wants us to log in, go to history.com/activate, but doing
so brings up a blank screen or some bizarre error message. I've been trying to
authenticate with DirecTV Now, which should be supported and is on the list,
but it just sits there. Is it a problem with pihole? unlock origin? Safari?
Tried Firefox and Chrome, and same issue. Not a good user experience.

Logging in with a friends credentials for a tv provider she cancelled over a
year ago still worked, oddly enough.

Netflix has been way more attractive, even with the slight price hike. Hulu as
well.

~~~
WorldMaker
Something that bugs me a slight bit in the TV app diaspora was that one of the
original Hulu mandates back when it was a GE project was to be a strong
software provider for TV frontends and backends; that as much as Hulu would be
a thing itself there'd also be "Powered by Hulu" opportunities to avoid every
TV app having an entirely different experience or missing some should-be
standard backend/frontend features.

It shouldn't be a surprise that that original vision was somewhat lost when
Comcast bought NBC/Universal and gained a huge stake in Hulu, but it's still a
shame that we don't have more "powered by Hulu" apps per that original vision.
I still don't understand why NBC/Universal's Seeso attempt wasn't "powered by
Hulu" given how central NBC/Universal was as a Hulu content partner (nor why
Hulu didn't just inherit the majority of Seeso content when they got bored
with the experiment), and that's a large part of why I didn't bother with
Seeso. I guess I'm still often angry at the CW for dropping Hulu support for
their own app which is just full of technical papercuts that Hulu fixed a long
time ago; I would mind the CW app less (even if it was still a separate app)
if it was at least "powered by Hulu" and had some of the backend streaming
tech improvements, UX improvements, and commercial volume smoothing tech that
Hulu uses.

Disney+ supposedly is using backend tech/knowledge from ESPN+, so it won't be
entirely from scratch, but with Disney now being majority owner of Hulu, again
it seems a shame that it probably won't just be "powered by Hulu", and is
likely yet another case where we'll see bugs and UX papercuts that the
industry as a whole could have worked to fix together instead of each their
own.

------
doe88
I would only speak anecdotally and from what I've observed from people I know.
Thus I don't try to infer anything at all, but at least locally I've found it
remarkable: in a couple of years, Netflix has become synonym of _streaming_ in
their mind, it has really become _a thing_. They are watching Netflix movies
and series a lot, mainly because there are on Netflix, good or bad,
indiscriminately, and even more surprisingly, they are discussing about them.
It seems to me some people really like Netflix, the service, like some people
like Amazon Prime, the service. Netflix seems to have succeeded in building a
relationship with them.

------
erikbe
I find this to be off-base in a number of ways, starting with the premise that
Netflix is a two-sided platform like Facebook, Google and Amazon.

Netflix used to be a distributor. It paid content owners to license its back
catalog which no longer had any value in primary channels, namely cinemas. It
then charged users for access. In contrast, two-sided Facebook's user do not
pay anything, but the advertisers pay for access to them. The relationship is
roughly the reverse.

Netflix also do not have suppliers that build up the attractiveness of the
platform to end users. Netflix paid for back catalogs. Amazon doesn't pay its
merchants. Today, Netflix is both a distributor and a producer. This doesn't
make Netflix twice as strong but introduces a number of dilemmas into the
organization. In the same way that Disney would look to external distribution
channels to maximize the return on its investment in content, Netflix now has
the same incentives. Netflix has no suppliers in the sense of Amazon - it pays
for all the productions on its platform. It supplies itself.

In fact, they could theoretically make more by having staggered releases where
premium channels like cinema receives new titles first. Why? First, because a
single ticket to the cinema costs more than a month's subscription to Netflix.
Second, because the direct income from Bird Box is $0.

Certainly Bird Box has a positive effect on subscriptions but it can only be
inferred. This is an enormous problem. How can you justify spending say $100
on a production which could directly generate $700M at the box office, and
then just release it to a limited audience? There are going to be numerous
internal battles over this. I bet we'll see Netflix go for wide cinematic
release of some titles.

Another issue is capital. Not only does Netflix has to produce content from
which there is no direct return. They also have to market it. A $100M
production may receive half or the same amount of spend on marketing. They
have to build IP that is as relevant as Marvel. In summary, the challenges
Netflix has is contradictory incentives between distribution and production,
mastering the art of production and building of IP, and spending on marketing
new productions.

------
general8bitso
I have been a Netflix subscriber for over 5 years now, but seldom use it
anymore.

Most streaming is via Hulu (commercial free) or Prime in our house nowadays.

I don’t have children, but I could see how having the Disney catalog would be
enticing to parents of young children.

Also, strange the article did not mention Fortnight, by name, as a competitor.

~~~
adwf
I honestly don't think a Disney streaming platform should scare Netflix that
much. You can get the entire classic Disney DVD back catalogue for ~£200, why
would parents buy a streaming service for £10-20/month for years on end?

And that's the whole classic catalogue - when you bear in mind that kids will
happily watch the same old Frozen DVD over and over again, I don't see it as a
huge compelling offering. Even adding all of Marvel, I still believe people
will prefer to pick and choose their favourite individual media over an
expensive subscription.

It's the continuous flow of new and unique TV/movies that is really working
for Netflix. Disney just don't output anywhere near the same content hours to
make a subscription worthwhile, and kids probably wouldn't care even if they
did.

~~~
jdietrich
Disney are much, much bigger than you seem to think. They own Pixar, Lucasfilm
and Marvel Studios. They already own a large chunk of the US cable TV market,
including ABC and ESPN. They have just gained regulatory apprival to buy 21st
Century Fox. They aren't newcomers to streaming, because they have a 30% stake
in Hulu, which will increase to 60% after the Fox deal is completed. They also
own BAMTech Media, which provides streaming video services for the MLB, the
NHL, the PGA Tour and WWE.

Netflix should be very, very worried about Disney's streaming ambitions.

~~~
adwf
The sport is probably the most interesting out of all of those mentioned.
There will always be a market for sports subscriptions, so they could have a
very competitive offering there that Netflix aren't even involved in.

Marvel, Lucasfilm, etc. I'm still not seeing it. Two or three movies a year
that I can pick up on DVD/Bluray cheaper. And that's if they're even worth
buying on DVD after having watched them once in the cinema. Marvel movies have
been wearing fairly thin, and Star Wars is showing similar fatigue.

I'm not saying they won't have a big market, Disney are huge afterall. I'm
just saying that I really don't see them as strictly a direct Netflix killing
competitor. They're in a slightly different game, content-wise, and Disney's
biggest enemy will be itself.

~~~
majewsky
> Marvel movies have been wearing fairly thin

Outside of your bubble, Infinity War is the highest-grossing film of all time.
(With Black Panther following in 2nd or 3rd place if I'm not mistaken.)

Sure, Marvel does not particularly contribute to the pantheon of cinema, but
it's nowhere near "wearing thin" commercially. Quite the contrary actually.

------
iambateman
I’ve said this before, but I expect Netflix to continue to flex their muscle
until they have an average subscription cost of $35-40/month.

There’s so much room in the entertainment market for them to save customers
$50/mo, offer them more, and increase their revenue.

~~~
orev
The market is on its way to fragmentation as more content producers move to
have their own apps instead of going through an intermediary. And they all
want $10-$15 a month. It won’t be long before people refuse to pay for more
apps, as the total cost of both the Internet connection and all app
subscriptions surpasses the price they used to pay for cable. That is what
limits the price any one app can charge.

~~~
deathanatos
Perhaps. But we just recently tried CBS's streaming service, and it was
_terrible_. AFAICT, only 720p, and the encoder they used appears to have had
the quality set to "potato" (blurry, tons of what look like interlacing
jaggies during rapid motion). It made me really appreciate how good of a job
Netflix is doing on the technical side of things.

~~~
orev
I have not seen it myself, but CBS is the clear loser of all the apps. They
seem to be trying to build a pay service on the back of Star Trek (maybe they
think the Internet is just for nerds?) and everything else they have is free
content OTA anyway.

~~~
FiveSquared
Yep, besides, why not just watch the OG Star Trek reruns (if they still do
that, I don’t really follow Star Trek anymore) or pirate if the app is so
crappy? And OTA.

------
chinathrow
"Netflix is so confident in its position it is effectively stating that if
customers choose to watch TV, they will choose Netflix."

That is, until they stop choosing Netflixt.

I cancelled my Netflix account a week ago after finally realizing what a huge
time suck it has become in my life. I know I'm just one data point but I'm
pretty sure others will come to that conclusion eventually.

~~~
mattnewport
I was an early Netflix adopter and evangelist to family and friends. I
canceled my account months ago last time they had a price increase and haven't
missed it. I got sick of spending more time scrolling through uninspiring
content looking for something to watch than actually watching enjoyable
content.

I see a flaw in a lot of subscription models in that they lead to companies
optimizing for "engagement" rather than maximizing the value of my time as a
consumer. In theory this seems like it shouldn't be fundamental to a
subscription model in that Netflix's costs could be lower if they offered me
less but higher quality content but in practice it doesn't seem to work out
that way.

Netflix might be right that if people choose to watch TV they'll choose
Netflix. I chose not to watch TV any more rather than switching to another
provider.

~~~
maksimum
> I see a flaw in a lot of subscription models in that they lead to companies
> optimizing for "engagement" rather than maximizing the value of my time as a
> consumer

This is really interesting. I suppose the question is how do you measure value
delivered?

Typically people show that they value something by paying for it. Normally you
pay for goods with money, but many subscription services and F2P games are
happy for you to pay with time. I feel like using "time paid" is a valid proxy
for how much value customers get from the service. What doesn't make sense to
me is why it appears that so many people value their (free) time so lowly.

Perhaps if Netflix offered a second PPV service its recommendation engine
would have different incentives. With that model you also have payment
friction and discovery friction. But honestly I'm not sure why they don't do
it -- Amazon has been for a while.

~~~
mattnewport
It seems like there's something misleading going on with the paying with time
trend. Companies can increase "engagement" for a while by making their
experiences waste more of their users' time. There's a frog boiling effect
where people don't really notice incremental changes but one day suddenly
realize the service doesn't seem like a good use of their time any more and
they ditch it completely. This has happened to me with Netflix, Facebook and
Instagram and while it's not super common yet there does seem to be a bit of a
trend of early adopter types ditching these services.

From the company's point of view this might look like a positive trend in
engagement followed by a sudden hard to explain complete drop off.

------
ajcodez
Netflix should create less content, not more. I find it low quality and will
discount titles with Netflix logo that otherwise look interesting. I’m also a
Mubi and Amazon Prime subscriber. It’s surprising to hear the original content
is working for the company.

~~~
monetus
I don't see how they could pursue anything but that considering how they
probably won't be able to license the shows of other streaming services.

------
LandR
I actually really enjoyed Bird Box. It's the closest thing we've got to a
Lovecraft horror film.

------
40acres
A lot of observers, especially on HN, worry about the balkanization of video
streaming content and see it as hindering Netflix's growth. In my opinion, I
don't really see it. When the dust settles I think we'll see Netflix and
Amazon as the duopoly of this era of video streaming.

I don't think Disney's streaming service is out to compete with Netflix
directly, to me it's more of a play to leverage the Disney brand and ensure
they still have a 1:1 relationship with the consumer. Look at it this way,
dozens of journalistic outfits have gone by the wayside in the era of Facebook
and Google, but the New York Times and Wall Street Journal are not trying to
compete by being aggregator platforms like Facebook and Google, instead they
are leveraging and monetizing their goodwill and reputation by putting up
paywalls, I see Disney doing the same for their content. Also, Disney
(smartly) is going to hedge their bets and continue to put new original
content on ABC, ABC Family, movie chains, etc. They are not playing the same
game as Netflix. The same can be said for Hulu, yes Hulu has more original
content -- but at the end of the day Hulu is mainly a channel for the
traditional networks to get their hit shows on a streaming platform ASAP from
original air date.

As long as Netflix keeps their debt under control, they will continue to grow
and have a lot of room to keep raising their prices. Netflix is still
drastically cheaper than the cheapest cable bundle, even if you combined a
Netflix subscription with Amazon, HBO, Hulu, etc.

~~~
airstrike
FWIW, Netflix will no longer be able to license Daredevil shows from Marvel /
Disney. I think a lot of folks signed up for Netflix to watch that catalog of
films and shows specifically, including the latest Avengers and whatnot.

I think the more likely scenario is Hulu goes away and we're left with Amazon,
Disney/ESPN and Netflix. And HBO, of course.

~~~
cpsempek
Disney has a large stake in Hulu, due in part to the Fox acquisition.
Moreover, Disney+ will focus on kids and family content, they will need Hulu
to provide the network TV along with more adult focused content. Per Disney's
own admission, Hulu will partner with their streaming service and will likely
not go away anytime soon.

~~~
Fripplebubby
Yep, they already own a 30% stake which will become a controlling stake (60%)
provided the Fox buy closes.

------
notalwayshuman
offtopic, are the diagrams made in photoshop or something more approachable?

------
shmerl
Netflix gradually turned from bad to worse. First they pushed DRM into HTML
standard. Then they joined the MPAA cartel. Nothing good should be expected on
that trajectory.

~~~
beerlord
0.01% of customers care about that and less than 1% could even decipher those
acronyms.

~~~
monetus
That is not a measure of moral good or bad. It sucks that it doesn't matter.

