
Netflix expected to spend over $6B on original and acquired programming in 2017 - jaimefjorge
http://www.business-standard.com/article/international/enemy-number-one-is-netflix-the-monster-that-s-eating-hollywood-117032600023_1.html
======
irishloop
I'm amazed how many people on HN complain about the content on Netflix.
Especially compared to any other streaming service, such as Amazon or Hulu,
they continue to provide much higher-end content for my dollar, as well as a
(far) superior UI experience.

For me, the stand-up specials like Dave Chapelle and Louis CK alone are huge
and welcome additions, never mind the many, very good lesser known comedy
specials on there.

Their agreement with Dreamworks has only helped, allowing me to enjoy
surprisingly good films like Zootopia.

Even great cable channels like FX (The Americans, Legion) and AMC (Mad Men,
Better Call Saul) are not available for any reasonable price as standalone
cable packages, so I'm not sure what the comparison is in terms of quality.
HBO at 15/month?

But even HBO shows are hit-or-miss. And while their movie selection is
generally pretty great, I still find myself not watching it all that much.

It seems to me that Netflix provides a pretty high level of content at their
price point.

~~~
jly
I regularly use Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon and I disagree on the far superior
UI experience. Amazon and Hulu have done a great job in recent days and I
think has Netflix currently has the worst UI experience, at least on Apple TV.
The Netflix app does a poor job of highlighting their original content
separately from others (recently I searched for a complete list of Netflix
Originals and could not find it on the app - the list I did find was
incomplete). I also don't like how they organize content, or more specifically
the lack of organization options. For example, it's very difficult to view
only movies or TV shows - something I'd expect to be a common use case and
Hulu makes very easy.

Content-wise I think Netflix is doing an amazing job, even if I cannot come
close to keeping up. They're doing so well, it's harder and harder to track
their originals you might be interested in.

~~~
dec0dedab0de
Amazon's technique of mixing prime, and pay content is clearly a dark pattern.
The way they display each season as it's own item is just annoying.

On the other hand I actually like Hulu's interface better than Netflix.

Really I wish they would agree on a standard streaming API, to enable 3rd
parties to create UIs. Right now I find myself opening up multiple apps
searching Netflix, Hulu, Amazon, and Crackle to find something specific.

~~~
JaphyRyder
[http://instantwatcher.com/](http://instantwatcher.com/)

------
thirdsun
I really hope they don't lose focus on the quality of their original content.

I understand that not everything Netflix does is tailored to me, particularly
due to Netflix' growing, increasingly mainstream audience, diverse and varying
preferences, more ground to cover, etc.

However lately Netflix' content simply seems to lack substance to me. It feels
as if it's just the superficial result of throwing a promising combination of
those very specific tags/categories the services is famous for onto the
assembly line and ending up with a show or film that, while ticking all the
boxes and not being bad at all, is still pretty far off the masterpieces of
the medium. I'm not sure if classics like The Wire, The Sopranos or Mad Men
could have been created with such a formulaic approach and I'm missing shows
of that caliber on Netflix. Maybe the service should offer brillant content
creators the freedom and opportunity to do the shows they want to do, instead
of dictating the theme and framework.

~~~
jwl
> However lately Netflix' content simply seems to lack substance to me. It
> feels as if it's just the superficial result of throwing a promising
> combination of those very specific tags/categories the services is famous
> for onto the assembly line and ending up with a show or film that, while
> ticking all the boxes and not being bad at all, is still pretty far off the
> masterpieces of the medium.

That is very much the feeling I got from Stranger Things. It is solid in
almost every way, but it also felt like it was written to maximize variables
and checkboxes from a user survey. Add characters, references and stylistic
choices to get the most 80's nostalgic feeling in the viewer as possible.

~~~
cholantesh
Interesting; I feel that Stranger Things is one of their stronger recent
offerings. Much better than Flaked, Love, or Master of None.

~~~
sAbakumoff
:) I tried to watch stranger things twice and couldn't have finished it as it
feels like very stupid show that tries to play on 80x nostalgia. Master of
none I watched twice and think that it's the masterpiece.

~~~
nbarbettini
Master of None didn't do it for me, but I loved Stranger Things.

This is a great example of how Netflix's model works well for "long tail"
content. They can produce and keep shows around that have a different or
smaller audience than traditional networks can.

~~~
ConceptJunkie
The difference of opinion in this small sample is good. As long as a show has
some people who love it, that's a good thing. Content made for the widest
audience possible is usually bland and predictable... just look at pop music
in the last few decades. Network TV is just as bad because if a show isn't a
hit in 2 or 3 episodes they pull it. If they'd done that in era of "classic
TV" (60s - 80s), half the most famous ever wouldn't have made it.

------
flexie
To me, it seems like Hollywood is betting everything on 3D movies in the
fantasy/superhero/werewolf/supernatural abilities/animated/zombie genre(s).

That's roughly 3/4 of what the three cinema chains in my city show. That
leaves some 25 percent to the remotely realistic movies - the ones with
characters and stories that could be true, at least in a distant future. There
are nights where the only movies the cinemas show, are fantastic ones. Where
the only cinema experience would involve wearing 3D glasses and watching
childish characters save the world.

Personally, I am fine with the establishment taking some beating. But I sure
hope there will be more than just a handful of providers of content.
Hollywood, HBO, Netflix, Amazon. That's not nearly enough.

~~~
stinkytaco
> Hollywood, HBO, Netflix, Amazon. That's not nearly enough.

Except I don't want to pay for another service. I already pay for Netflix and
Amazon and one of the reasons streaming was appealing is that it was different
from cable. If we multiply streaming services, pretty soon I'm paying $5/month
here and $10/month there and much of that for one thing I'd like to see on
that service. I'd like to see production and distribution separated, though I
recognize that's probably a pipe dream.

~~~
rhino369
So only pay for Netflix and just accept that you won't get everything
available. There is already too much content to watch.

Netflix and Amazon aren't magic. Sure there is some industry of scale by
selling their wares internationally and some savings by letting ISPs
distribute their content, but fundamentally TV hasn't become cheaper to make.
If anything, Netflix and Amazon are spending more than average amounts of
money on their new content. That results in beautiful shows, but it's not
cheap. And those services don't use commercials, which means they'll be more
expensive than cable content that does.

You can get production and distribution separated, by paying per episode on
itunes or amazon. But that is more expensive for heavy users because they
can't bake in an unlimited plan. You can use these services to get the handful
of shows you really want to watch but aren't on netflix or amazon.

~~~
stinkytaco
I suppose I meant that in response to "the establishment taking a beating".
It's taking a beating, but leading to a new establishment that's much the same
as the old one. Yes, I get a lot of content with Netflix, but since content is
scattered and exclusive, I end up paying for much that I don't want across
many services. Much like if I want to watch network "x" on cable, I also need
to get network "y". To watch show "w", I need to get show "x" on network "y".

Of course, I can buy show by show, but since a single season of a show costs
as much as several months of a subscription, that shows there's much to be
gained in "bundling" for providers and I suppose we'll need to accept that
(like I said, it's a pipe dream).

I think in a few years time this will all start to become more complicated.
For a younger generation, the content is in independent products distributed
on YouTube rather than professional productions on subscriptions networks. If
the YouTube model becomes popular, TV will become cheaper to make and then
costs shift to distribution.

------
meesterdude
I've liked some of netflix's original content - house of cards was the first -
but a LOT of it is trash too. I don't doubt they have numbers that lead them
to create these shows... but i question the scale of it sometimes. Of the
netflix originals, i've only enjoyed a handful.

Meanwhile, I've enjoyed a number of "low-budget" shows they've had (like ice
pilots) and a number of the kung-fu movies they have available. But to be
fair, a LOT of the low-budget stuff they have is trash too.

It's clear (to me) that there is some effort to pad their content, to seem
like they have a fuller collection, even if it's only a collection a raccoon
would love. This, taken with the idea they tote of "having only the best
performing people" displays a mismatch in cultural ideas and actual output.

For me, I want netflix to succeed because another content producer is a
welcome addition to the scene, and i hope they stay independent and don't get
bought up by disney. I know in a few years they'll have a collection of
original content to rival the older players.

~~~
izacus
IMO the fact that they can record "trash" is what will make them ultimately
successful - their shows can target very limited demographics while still
making profit. While on network TV your prime-time show MUST cater to as wide
audience , Neflix doesn't have to. They can make Sense 8, Jessica Jones, Kimmy
Schmidt, cooking shows, etc. etc. Each of those will only appeal to a part of
audience, but because of that it can be more targeted and creative than
watered down inoffensive prime-time schlock.

The fact that they're pretty much the only ones (with the exception of Amazon
Prime lately which is shooting themselves in the food for not providing apps
for Android TV and other platforms) that are open to world-wide audiences,
they're in for a huge success.

Meanwhile, HBO and others still rather show "Not available in your country"
than collect 10EUR/month from several TENS of millions of subscribers outside
US.

~~~
crispyambulance
You're right. It's all about the long tail.

Netflix (and amazon) are in a powerful position to analyze and understand what
people really want in a way that cable and networks (remember those) simply
can't match.

Providing "hits" to relatively small demographics over and over again, I
think, might make more business sense than going up against the more
experienced competition for mass-appeal.

"Stranger Things" is a good example, it was a pitch-perfect, nuanced thriller
series. I dare say it was an 80's period piece. That's niche. Definitely not
everyone's cup of tea, but damn it was cool.

By appealing to the long tail, Netflix can make smaller demographics VERY
HAPPY with their product, one demographic at a time. This is perhaps better
than trying to please everyone at once with a blockbuster hit.

~~~
6stringmerc
I think you just hit the nail on the head - for years and years, the MPAA and
RIAA business model is "Bet Big and Big Wins Cover Big Losses" and there
wasn't much market share or ability to use a different approach.

If there's not as much big margin, but conversely lacking a major bleed out of
funds by failure, it's a much more even, perhaps sustainable model as tastes
change in entertainment (or by expanding into other regions).

Very interesting point, nicely noted your way.

------
lefstathiou
Netflix was forced into this. For a while (I no longer look at the data)
content costs were increasing at 8-10% per year which is unsustainable for
distributors. The CEO of DISH once suggested on an earnings call that there
should be anti trust inquiries into content pricing.

Additionally, Netflix's international growth was hampered by their inability
to efficiently negotiate international distribution rights.

~~~
snarf21
Right, this is the whole end game. They own the content so they can sell it
forever to everyone and their library only grows. The Studios and traditional
movie powers saw all the interest and decided to squeeze out as much juice as
they can. I wouldn't be surprised to see Netflix and Amazon eventually start
releasing their movies to the theaters directly and then they later add it
exclusively to their streaming platform.

~~~
ajmurmann
They are already releasing movies to cinemas. Just the exclusive part isn't
happening which made cinemas unhappy. I think they mainly release to cinemas
to qualify for the Oscars.

~~~
nojvek
I wonder if I have a hd movie, how much does it cost to put them in the
cinemas?

~~~
vermontdevil
[https://drafthouse.com/news/see-your-film-on-the-big-
screen-...](https://drafthouse.com/news/see-your-film-on-the-big-screen-this-
year-with-a-special-filmmaker-rental-o)

Seems the Drafthouse offers this deal.

------
Belphemur
When you see that the content holder make it harder and harder for Netflix to
license their content, it makes senses to invest so much money on creating
their own content.

It seems in the end, we're really returning to the cable era.

Be ready for packages giving you access to Netflix, Amazon, and channels...

~~~
thinkMOAR
For what i know, that is already happening in NL with HBO Go. It disappeared
from the market as separate, independent service and now only available via
bundle package of one of NLs largest cable providers, Ziggo.

~~~
menacingly
At least in the states, HBO Go was always bundled with a cable subscription.
HBO Now is the standalone streaming product, although standalone is a bit of a
stretch because it's frustratingly tied to some other platform's billing
system.

------
Fishman343
I thought this number seemed absolutely nuts to begin with, but actually,
given their ~100 million subscribers, it's pretty much inline with what the
BBC might spend in the same sort of set up.

As an observer, what still seems odd to me is the low number of shows or
movies they are producing with that massive budget - last year "The Get Down"
apparently cost $16 million per episode while the entire, huge hit, first
season of "Stranger Things" cost $13 million.

I would have thought that would inspire them to look for more of these low
budget, low risk, big payoff shows, especially when you run a subscription
service - surely a series that people binge over 2 weeks, with the potential
for more seasons to keep people subscribing is better for you than a one time
film? Nope, $100 Million on a single film this year.

~~~
soneca
I believe that is a lot to gain in branding and awareness from top notch
movies. When I started to see high quality (ie expensive) productions with
a-level Hollywood actors (eg House of Cards), it changed my perception.

I believe the next step is having "blockbusters" feature movies, with top
notch CGI, a-level actors, maybe some Oscar contenders.

My impression is that low risk, big payoff shows would be optimizing for a
local maxima. Big bets like the Will Smith movie might take them to a new
maxima. And Netflix is basically a success history about reaching a new maxima
one after another since its beginning.

~~~
rhino369
>I believe the next step is having "blockbusters" feature movies, with top
notch CGI, a-level actors, maybe some Oscar contenders.

That is probably too expensive unless they release to theaters first.

What they could do is create the missing midrange movie that Hollywood just
doesn't make anymore. Hollywood makes huge expensive movies and indie studios
make cheap movies. Netflix could make the 40 million dollar style of movie
that nobody makes anymore.

In fact, they sort of are, they just do it in a longer form.

------
aresant
That's about $65/member per year at most current count of ~92m members.

(1) [https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/01/18/business/netflix-
profi...](https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/01/18/business/netflix-profit-
rises-56-percent-to-67-million.html)

~~~
ceejayoz
Not a bad return, considering it'll sit their library forever.

~~~
meric
If they ever give up the digital platform they can still license this content
out, sell DVD's...

~~~
bpicolo
And they definitely do product placement.

~~~
manmal
Yes, I think "Love" season 2 has a subtitle in the beginning that says so.

~~~
ClassyJacket
Also the fact that every second line of the script was obviously an ad for a
certain ride sharing company.

~~~
rhino369
The first time a character said "I'll get us an uber" it was pretty realistic
for a millennial. But it got annoying the 8th time it happened.

------
yk
Well, the sane way to distribute content when the only thing that has non-
negligible costs is production, not distribution, [1] is to have some kind of
infrastructure provider that provides distribution and billing and finances
production. However having a monopoly has ugly economic effects and having a
single entity that dictates media production has ugly social effects.

I guess both Amazon and Netflix try to capture precisely that role, in that
case they could charge almost whatever they want while they are not forced by
competition to have high quality (and therefore expensive) content. Plus I am
afraid that the market tends to produce a monopoly, because a individual
subscriber will look for the service that has more content.

[1] Hetzner currently charges EUR 1.40 / TB of additional traffic, so marginal
distribution costs are in the range of EUR 10^-3 / Movie.

~~~
merb
> Hetzner currently charges EUR 1.40 / TB of additional traffic, so marginal
> distribution costs are in the range of EUR 10^-3 / Movie.

you can't just use the traffic cost. also if they would on hetzner, their
network would be so bad that nobody could've watch netflix. (not that the
hetzner network is bad, but it wouldn't withstand the amount of traffic from
netflix (especially inter-region traffic is not as cheap as it could be, and
also they need to talk with amazon/google about their traffic ("public
pricing" is 0,01 USD per GB)))

also there are other things that needs to be paid, servers, developers and
other staff and stuff.

it's not just that you write 20 lines of code and put it on hetzner and can
scale globally.

~~~
yk
Of course not, but I am only using Hetzner as some measure of current network
costs, because I know Hetzner pricing quite well. So of course I would
additionally need server costs, staff, and so on. But if we assume that
everything included we end up at a order of magnitude more, your .01 USD/GB,
that is still a movie a day for the entire month before we really have to
worry about distribution.

------
tboyd47
> TV stars are demanding “movie star” salaries of some $250,000 per episode
> when they previously were content with half that

One major result of Netflix's rise is that the TV format for entertainment is
starting to be seen as on par with or better than the feature film format.

There's something obvious about this from a viewer's standpoint. People are
naturally drawn to abundance and regularity. Rather than having 100
discussions about which movie to watch together with my wife over the course
of a year, then find that only 20 or so of them are on Netflix, and maybe 5 of
them turn out to be stinkers, we can simply pick a show we both know is about
a B+, and watch 100 episodes, not ever being disappointed. Also, if I watch
the pilot of a great show, then I know I have a whole season to go through,
with days of entertainment. If I watch a great movie, then welp, I've just
watched a great movie and maybe in a few years there will be a sequel.

From an artistic standpoint, there are freedoms that open up due to having
established characters, routine plot conventions, etc. There was an article on
HN a while back where Conan O'Brien mentioned that this is why he did exactly
the same walk to the stage every single night, or something of that nature.

~~~
qznc
> watch 100 episodes, not ever being disappointed

Well, except for the last season. I have yet to see a series where the last
season was the same quality as the rest.

~~~
ghshephard
Breaking Bad. Personally found it the most rewarding (by far), and, from
Wikipedia: (Season 5)

 _After receiving three nominations for seasons two, three, and four, both
halves of season five won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Drama
Series in 2013 and 2014. The second half of the season also won the Golden
Globe Award for Best Television Series – Drama and the Screen Actors Guild
Award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series in 2014.
The season 's Metacritic score of 99/100 led the show to be listed in Guinness
World Records as the most acclaimed television series in history.[5] _

------
jessriedel
Re:paywall, the story is also syndicated on Business Standard. Here are the
AMP

[https://www.google.com/amp/wap.business-
standard.com/article...](https://www.google.com/amp/wap.business-
standard.com/article-amp/international/netflix-the-monster-that-s-eating-
hollywood-117032600023_1.html)

and non-AMP versions

[http://wap.business-
standard.com/article/international/netfl...](http://wap.business-
standard.com/article/international/netflix-the-monster-that-s-eating-
hollywood-117032600023_1.html)

~~~
harperlee
I would suggest changing the link to one of these, as neither the original
link nor the Google trick seems to work for me (also, the title change voids
the usefulness of the 'web' link).

------
TylerH
I love Netflix, but they really need to invest in some more depth for the UI.

Let me curate my own lists and my own history per profile, including removing
stuff from dynamic lists. I don't want to have to go into my account settings
(something only the account owner can do) to remove recently watched items
from my account history _and then have to wait 24 hours for it to actually
happen_.

Let me build new lists and manually dump a tv show or movie into them.

Let me search all offerings, sortable _and_ filterable alphabetically and/or
by release date.

Let me view my profile's total viewing history if I'm interested. Even for
titles that are no longer viewable on Netflix. A neat feature would be to
group these by title. So you can show just "The Office" or "Game of Thrones"
or "The West Wing", which can be expanded to a list of seasons, each of which
can be expanded to a list of episodes, showing which ones I've watched and
which ones I haven't.

\--- --- ---

As enjoyable and useful as Netflix is, the fact that it still remains
essentially a completely non-customizable list of "what's popular" is just
incredibly lazy on their part.

------
deegles
We've already hit "peak content" for Netflix, which I define as "more hours of
new content released that I'll watch in a year."

I would estimate I watch about 200 hours a year, Netflix is releasing 1,000
hours of content this year[0]. This trend will only accelerate, especially
considering all of the other providers pouring money into content.

I wish that video content licensing could be regulated similar to radio music,
where the license holder receives a flat rate per play (this could be adjusted
to be per-minute with modifiers for SD/HD/etc). That would open up a whole new
market of streaming websites that could focus on cataloging and recommending
content, instead of me having to pay for many websites full of content that I
cannot physically spend the time to find the best of. Some streaming devices
have cross-service search functionality built in, but it could be much better.

[0] [http://bgr.com/2016/10/19/netflix-originals-1000-hours-
progr...](http://bgr.com/2016/10/19/netflix-originals-1000-hours-programming/)

~~~
e40
That may be true, but there aren't more hours of content I care to watch. I
often can't find anything to watch on Netflix, because I'm picky. I welcome
them spending more on content, then I might be able to find something to
watch.

------
anothercomment
I often find it a bit funny when the streaming providers advertise their
exclusive content. As if it was a bonus for subscribers, when really it is
part of their fight for becoming a monopoly and tying users to them.

Best for users would be to have all content available everywhere, not having
to subscribe to multiple streaming providers.

That said, if that is the game they have to play, I am happy if at least it
results in some worthwhile series.

------
JohnJamesRambo
I don't want this. I just want them to make more good movies available. I
don't like Netflix originals and I hate series type shows. I know everyone
doesn't feel this way though.

------
6stringmerc
As a writer, I want as much industry competition inflating screenwriting
demand and prices accordingly. If it ever gets unsustainable, okay, I'm sure
the market will react accordingly. For now though, I think it's a great time
to be in Content Creation and what Netflix is doing is, no doubt, certainly
one definition of "industry disruption" that gets noted frequently. Messy
business, that, and risky, but here we are and Netflix is still chugging
along.

~~~
dmix
> For now though, I think it's a great time to be in Content Creation

Do you have to be in LA to do this for a living still?

~~~
6stringmerc
Fundamental answer is yes, as I'm not doing it for a living nor living in LA,
but working through other Digital / International Channels and markets for
work, options, opportunities, etc.

LA will probably always be the capital of US film though. It took a lot of
effort to move all the way out there to avoid paying patent royalties. The
business is super entrenched there - Netflix and Amazon barely put a dent in
the grand scheme of productions made annually though (then again, Bollywood
cranks out more than Hollywood nowadays).

------
JackFr
The Netflix version of A Series of Unfortunate Events was orders of magnitude
better than theatrically released abomination starring Jim Carrey.

------
barking
I got rid of sky last year. I was paying a multiple of what netflix costs and
had to put up with what seemed like 5 minutes of ads for every 10 minutes of a
show. It made GOT completely unwatchable.

I am under no illusions about how netflix might behave if they ever achieve a
monolithic dominance but so far it's great.

~~~
exar0815
Sky is a useless hog of idiocy, just selling lots and lots of advertising.
Most cringeworthy thing to tell about is Sky Bundesliga (the german soccer
league). Its the only way to see the most popular sport in germany. You pay
for Sky Entertainment, which you MUST have to get the basic soccer package (no
other sports or international soccer) which already amounts to a whopping
42€/Month. When you have that, you can either watch via Cable at your specific
address, or can use the abysmal Sky Go system. That runs on Silverlight(sic!)
and allows only 3 different devices in 6 Months to connect. When you surpassed
THOSE hurdles, you need to hope that Silverlight works on your OS (good luck
Linux), doesn't crap out (what a coincidence with unmaintained software). Then
you can watch the "Game". Except the commercials extend to 30s before the ref
starts the game, during the game you get 2-3 times a framed commercial, the
commenting person has to advertise multiple of sky's services during the game,
the half time is 12 out of 15 minutes commercials, and the second half is the
same. Disgusting. The 2-3 games a year I watch, I freely admit to using other
means of watching.

~~~
justaman
You should see how bad American Football is. $50 USD for "Sunday Ticket" and
literally half the game is advertisements. Its gotten so bad the NFL actually
took notice that viewership is dropping.

~~~
barking
Sky show nfl in the UK and for a lot of the breaks over there they have a
studio discussion of the last play. So they show maybe half the amount of ads
you have to watch there and it's still way too many.

------
rdlecler1
I find it hard to believe that NetFlix should be worth $60b on $8b of revenue
when Time-Warner (which owns HBO) has a $75B market cap in $25b of revenue.
NetFlix had higher EPS in 2014 so scale is not a great argument here.

~~~
mikulas_florek
Price of shares is often based on faith in future value, which I guess is
higher in case of NetFlix.

------
maverick_iceman
I think Netflix is diluting the quality of their original content in the race
of creating more and more minutes. Initial Netflix offerings like House of
Cards were awesome, it has gone downhill since then. The Marvel offerings are
awfully slow paced and boring (except maybe season one of Daredevil). I've
been on the verge of cancelling my Netflix subscription recently and will
probably do unless they significantly improve their original content.

~~~
ConceptJunkie
I disagree with your assessment of the pacing of the other Marvel shows... not
the slow part, they are slow, but that it's boring. I watched "Iron Fist" over
the last several days and I found the pacing refreshing. It was very much
character-driven, rather than action driven, but there were all kinds of
twists and turns that kept it from being boring. Ditto for "Luke Cage" which
I'm partway through.

Yes, I loved the first season of Daredevil, too, especially with its more Hong
Kong style fight scenes, whereas Iron Fist's were more of the up-close quick-
edit American style, but it was a really good show nonetheless.

------
thomastjeffery
I'm happy about the prospect of Hollywood's death, but I'm disappointed with
Netflix's current direction. Since House of Cards they have been creating
fantastic quality work, but due to senseless DRM constraints, I can't even
watch any of it in 4k without spending ~$100 on specialized hardware, even
though my PC is more than proficient enough at video playback.

------
ctdonath
The promise of Netflix was "the long tail": an ultimate video library of all
but perhaps the very latest content.

I'm not interested in "Netflix originals". Focus on the core competency of
archiving & delivery; let others make the content.

I've worked at IBM, Smith Corona, Kodak, CNN, AT&T, others - a major takeaway
is: businesses which don't stick to their core competency/purpose die.

~~~
throwaway729
That's a surprising take-away for Kodak.

As far as I understand, they died mostly because their core competency (film)
became obsolete in a huge fragment of the market.

I'm not saying that they could have successfully pivoted to digital, of
course. But inability to pick up a new competency doesn't mean that the
business won't die anyways... in which case, might as well try.

IBM under-went a similar "try or die" evolution away from various computing
technologies (punch card machines, then some number of generations of main
frames) over the last century, with more success than Kodak.

AT&T seems to be doing pretty well.

~~~
Tostino
I think the issue with Kodak was not realizing that the market they were in
was "photography" instead of "film".

~~~
ctdonath
This - and the fact that button-pushers were the actual customers. I realized
the end was nigh when told Kodak wouldn't dive into the digital market because
retailers didn't want that move disrupting their film & processing sales. (If
Kodak had pivoted fast to digital, retailers threatened to retaliate by
dropping Kodak film products entirely, killing the main revenue source).

------
literallycancer
Too bad the quality is pretty bad[1], even with the most expensive
subscription. I'm surprised people don't mind somehow. Perhaps most of their
users are watching the content on laptops?

And since you can only watch it in the browser, you can't use things like
madVR or frame interpolation tools to get smoother panning scenes.

1 - Even a blu ray rip of around 3GB looks better. Think a 2 to 2.5 hour
movie.

------
jccalhoun
Looking at this list, I haven't even heard of at least 1/5 of the English
language shows Netflix already has released
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_original_programs_dist...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_original_programs_distributed_by_Netflix#Acquisitions)

------
echelon
Is there room for new challengers in this space, or are all of the media
incumbents going to lock down the rest of the digital entertainment space?

I live in Atlanta, and the cost of production here is much cheaper than
California. I've been mulling over the merits of someone here launching a
streaming platform for some of the locally-produced content.

------
Jedd
> “You just can’t compete with someone coming in with fresh money, low
> overhead and a lot less baggage than you,” said Darrell Miller, an
> entertainment lawyer ...

That's such a delicious juxtaposition of wistful observation, and observer's
job title (or 'contribution to society' if you prefer).

------
1ba9115454
For me the sweet spot is a season with around 10 episodes that tells a
complete story.

Bosch over on Amazon was pretty good.

------
sgwealti
Hopefully they'll green-light another season of MST3K.

~~~
ConceptJunkie
Joel has stated that there's a good chance we'll see a Season 12. :-)

He didn't give specifics (as usual), but it makes me happy.

------
jordanpg
Whatever you might think about their streaming listings, their DVD listings
still contain virtually everything, and they stay there indefinitely. And yet
I hear that their DVD business is hemorrhaging cash and has numbered days.

This DVD business is the only place I am aware of for renting a great many
movies. RedBox has very limited offerings. If it ever does fold, consider that
for movies that don't appear in anyone's streaming catalog or a catalog you
subscribe to, the _only_ other (legal) option you'll have is to buy the DVD
somewhere.

I don't know what things will look like in 10 years technologically, but if
the Netflix DVD business ever goes away, there will be movies that are
permanently inaccessible for rental.

------
matteuan
From what I understood, Hollywood is complaining about positive competition.
The prices are higher because there are few actors and scarcity of good staff,
and this is a normal supply and demand reaction. So basically, they are
complaining that there is a business model that works better than theirs.

------
erelde
That's 1.3 shows a week. 15 hours. Podcasts and tv blogs will have work for
quite some time.

------
junto
I'm very much looking forward to when they finally release the second season
of "The Expanse" and "Sense8".

I don't understand why the Expanse series two is being held back from Europe.
Is it already available on Netflix in the US?

~~~
efficax
Expanse isn't on netflix in the US, at all. It's on Amazon Prime in the US, on
a 1 season delay, or $3 per episode (only season 1 is available for free).

~~~
junto
In Germany, the first season was on Netflix. There is no Syfy channel here, so
I'm not sure there is any way to get legally at the moment.

------
smaili
I wonder if their focus on original content will open the door for a
Blockbuster-like revival. It was nice growing up knowing there was always a
reliable place filled with the latest movie releases as well as all of the
classics.

~~~
dragonwriter
> I wonder if their focus on original content will open the door for a
> Blockbuster-like revival.

No, their focus on original content is entirely because once you have a
situation where other content producers are cognizant of the proven value of
streaming and their is robust competition in streaming, it's no longer
practically possible to have a profitable one-step shop for high-value content
from other owners' catalogs, since the high-deductible content is either being
used to secure exclusive deals for the highest bidder or held back to anchor
the content owner's own streaming service.

The same thing happened with HBO once it proved the value of cable as a
premium content delivery venue.

------
kingmanaz
>Netflix expected to spend over $6B on original and acquired programming in
2017

...yet all I watched was Columbo, Poirot, Midsomer Murders and Murder She
Wrote.

If only some of this "original content" was original in being upbeat or
uplifting.

------
dghughes
I'd settle for fewer shows with earlier release dates. It's crazy waiting over
a year to watch the next season of a show.

I guess I'm a dinosaur from the olden days of TV where once per week you
watched a show. Then a break for summer and the new season started in the
fall.

These days it's binge watch an entire show and wait 18 months for the next
season. I can't stand that who can sit still for that long?

I bet Netflix would prefer a slower production and release schedule rather
than a blast of a dozen episodes. Even the actors must hate that they must
also have to wait until production starts again.

Production quality is suffering too which may indicate shows are being made
too fast. On Iron Fist I noticed in each episode a red laser dot and grid
shining on the actors. And in one episode you could see water dripping off the
camera lens housing.

~~~
jcrei
The way they released "Designated Survivor" was similar to "old school" TV
shows. With one episode per week being released. So I guess they are testing
with that model

~~~
jghn
Designated Survivor is a show on NBC airing weekly, I don't get what you mean.

~~~
Jtsummers
Netflix has distribution rights for it in many countries. Outside the US, with
shows like this, they release it one episode at a time with some delay (days
to weeks) from the initial US broadcast date.

~~~
jghn
Ah thanks, I had no idea

------
Keyframe
At $2-3m (double on the high end and established) production cost per episode
of anything, we're looking at a massive amount of TV content. Unless they opt
for films - if so, good luck.

------
ulfw
So what differentiates them from HBO? I am confused. With HBO Go it's Cable
going Internet and with Netflix it's Internet going Cable. Just that both
distribute over the Web

~~~
izacus
I can actually order and watch Netflix in EU (for 12EUR/month for 4k/HDR). I'm
not allowed to pay for HBO Now (which is even more expensive at 15EUR/month
and features only HBO shows) and HBO Go requires me to subscribe to a min
50EUR/month cable service full of crappy content.

------
MisterBastahrd
IMO, the best sort of series are miniseries. Tell your story and be done with
it. I'd rather remember something for how great it was than how great its
decline was.

------
hkmurakami
As the HBO CEO once said, (and I paraphrase) 'It's a race between whether HBO
can become Netflix faster [1] or Netflix can become HBO faster[2]'

[1] distribution

[2] original content

~~~
jerhinesmith
I think it was Netflix that said that:

[https://gizmodo.com/5980103/netflix-the-goal-is-to-become-
hb...](https://gizmodo.com/5980103/netflix-the-goal-is-to-become-hbo-faster-
than-hbo-can-become-us)

~~~
hkmurakami
Whoops appreciate the correction!

------
mschuster91
Happy Netflix user but the quality especially of old-ish series is beyond
infuriating.

I have untouched-DVD rips from Star Trek Voyager. Single episodes run around 2
GB of data, while the same Netflix episodes are ~200MB.

Not only does Netflix not carry the bonus stuff, but the quality is seriously
braindead - weird moire effects in the intro, for example, and it just looks
pixelated.

In fact, the "scene rips" tend to look better than what Netflix offers! And
it's certainly not due to low network quality, I've got a 100/20 connection
and stuff like Shadowhunters is clear HD.

------
shmerl
They also supposedly are becoming more paranoid and legacy media like
(piracy!! and the like). Influence and size corrupts.

------
nilanjonB
I wonder what bump in revenue streams they are expecting to justify billions
in programming every year.

------
vwbuwvb
great - because their originals are the only thing worth watching because
their choice of non-netflix content is rubbish

------
grabcocque
The self-pitying language from Hollywood is hilarious.

How DARE people want to work for Netflix intead of us, just because it pays
better, is sexier and cooler, is technologically cutting edge, and allows much
greater freedom from executive meddling?

NOT COOL GUYS.

~~~
josefresco
I was also amused by this quote:

"You just can’t compete with someone coming in with fresh money, low overhead
and a lot less baggage than you"

Might as well just give up then right?

------
JCharante
Too bad most of their original & acquired programming is terrible.

------
krupan
But I still can't stream Goonies.

------
michaelmcneff
Long shot, but if anyone from Netflix sees this, I'm looking for finishing
funds to complete one of Sir Christopher Lee's last films, The Hunting of the
Snark, based on the Lewis Carroll story and I would be happy to exclusively
license it to Netflix.

[http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1887901/?ref_=nv_sr_1](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1887901/?ref_=nv_sr_1)

~~~
harigov
I am surprised that you would have to post it here. Don't they already provide
some way to contact them? Given the small number of movies and shows that get
produced, I expect that they would have responded to everyone.

~~~
michaelmcneff
As far as I know, there isn't an open channel to pitch projects to Netflix.
This is because 1) they would get overwhelmed by pitches for projects and 2)
because most studios don't accept unsolicited pitches for legal reasons (so
that someone who sent them a pitch doesn't later sue Netflix for producing a
similar project.

So I think you still have to go the more traditional route of knowing someone
within the Netflix development department that you can pitch your project to.
Or your agent/manager/producer will need to have that connection to get you in
the door. I've been stuck in indie film limbo trying to finish this film
because it has a lot of complicated visual effects (which are close to being
finished) so I currently don't have a manager or agent who can help to get me
in the door at Netflix.

~~~
Quarrelsome
have you considered trying to find out who in that department has recently
_left_ Netflix? That way you can pretend you were in touch with them thereby
promoting you from unsolicited to solicited.

~~~
M_Grey
...Yeah, and when that comes out, how will that end for you?

~~~
Quarrelsome
by that time the foot is in the door. The rest of the approval will be based
on the merit of the work itself.

Remember that if all salesmen had the ethics of developers.... well the world
would actually be a much better place but if some do and some don't then those
that don't are not seen. Something like that... its just the old cold calling
salesman within me looking for ins :).

~~~
M_Grey
Maybe, but for me, I'd mark that person out in my mind as someone not to be
trusted, and I'd be looking to get rid of that person post haste. Not only
would would they be sneaky, but they'd be _bad_ at being sneaky.

~~~
Quarrelsome
for sure but how else does one penetrate a clique? Perhaps one might find out
under closer analysis that everyone got into the clique through such
skulduggery.

Generally I would not recommend such behaviour but in regards to cliques and
arbitrary walls where meritocracy is unwelcome I would recommend skulduggery.

------
barking
looked interesting, shame it's paywalled

~~~
jrullman
If you use Chrome, try this extension —
[https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/xray/dgkdfehohjdbm...](https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/xray/dgkdfehohjdbmnldpcegekjakcdjlnkg)

~~~
barking
That's great, thank you very much for making this

------
malloryerik
Dear Netflix: New Game of Thrones series, pleaze!

~~~
malloryerik
Just playing...

