
America has never had so much TV, and even Hollywood is overwhelmed - maguay
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2016/11/07/america-has-never-had-so-much-tv-and-even-hollywood-is-overwhelmed
======
Throwaway23412
>The networks are gambling big in a risky industry where only the most
prominent shows survive. While top-rated hits can garner millions of viewers,
FX research found that the bottom 20 percent of shows averaged around 380,000
viewers, a daunting prospect for networks that depend on big audiences for ad
revenue.

Only the prominent shows survive in the ads business model that currently
governs these networks. If an Amazon or Netflix show gets 380,000 viewers and
this show convinces the majority of those viewers to keep their subscription,
then the respective streaming giant has already accomplished their goal.
That's another $3.8M (or whatever the average subscription amount is) in
monthly subscription revenue. They're not beholden to advertisers. A typical
"Black Mirror" viewer might not overlap with a typical "Marco Polo" viewer or
a typical "Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt" viewer, but, as long as each viewer has
a reason to stay subscribed, Netflix doesn't care if said shows were to have a
low average number of viewers.

~~~
thenomad
It's probably not quite as rosy as you state here, I'm afraid.

Let's look at a 380,000 viewer show. It's very unlikely that ever single one
of those viewers paid for Netflix for a solid year just to get access to that
show (which will have all its episodes released at once).

So let's assume it has significant cult appeal, meaning a full 25% of its
viewers are primarily subscribed for that show and things like it. (I'd say
that's likely to be very high, based on my experience in the narrative video
world, but let's be optimistic.) And let's say, based on subscribing for that
show and forgetting to cancel for a couple of months (or subsequently being
retained by another 380k viewer show), that Netflix gets 3 months' worth of
revenue from them.

So that's 380k/4 = 95,000 * $7.99 * 3 = $2.28m revenue attributable to that
show.

Of the shows you mention:

Marco Polo cost $90m to produce for the entire season.

Black Mirror doesn't have figures online, but it'll be around $3m per episode
if it's similar to other BBC shows. So that's $18m.

Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt doesn't have figures available, but based on Tina
Fey's fees for other shows and general knowledge of how much TV costs, I'll
guess at about $3m an episode. (Might be cheaper if they're being clever about
it, so could be as low as $2m) So that's $39m.

So, assuming that Netflix are just getting revenue from retained subscribers,
and they get the figures above, we're looking at losses of:

$88m for Marco Polo.

$16m for Black Mirror.

$37m for Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt.

Obviously the situation is far more complex than that - they'll be financing
with coproduction deals, they're looking for growth rather than revenue, they
also acquire a lot of content cheaply (very, very cheaply in some cases)
through licensing - but it's certainly not rosy enough that they'll be happy
with 380k viewers for shows they're making.

~~~
matwood
It would be interesting to know how many people subscribe and unsubscribe to
Netflix for a single show. I tend to think it is a small minority, but without
numbers it is hard to know.

Also, the up front production costs do not need to be recaptured on first
watching. The 90M to produce Marco Polo creates and asset that can be sold,
traded, etc... Eventually Netflix will have so much good, custom content that
a new person joining will take years to go through it all if possible. What we
are watching now is them bootstrap that process, but it will not always be
that way.

~~~
thenomad
Yes, usually you'd have to consider syndication rights, DVD sales, merch, etc
when looking at a show's overall profitability.

OTOH, it would appear in many cases those rights aren't going to Netflix
directly. See

[https://www.wired.com/2014/03/comcast-bites-netflix-
snagging...](https://www.wired.com/2014/03/comcast-bites-netflix-snagging-big-
show/)

, for example.

(Of course, this is how Netflix is getting so many shows made - they're
trading those rights to the production company in exchange for not footing the
entire production cost.)

It's worth noting, though, that those will scale strongly with the initial
success of the show. Breaking Bad DVD sales were huge. The sales of DVDs of,
say, "Alphas" on Sci-Fi will not be nearly as impressive.

As for subscribe numbers - I don't have hard figures, but based on years of
persuading people to watch video-based narrative content I'd guess 5% of total
viewers for a weak show, 10% for a strong show or one that's capturing a new
audience, 18% for one that's both very strong and targeted at a radically new
audience. Occasional outliers like Breaking Bad and Game Of Thrones will
probably provide higher capture for the subscription services showing them,
but they're 1-3 times a decade phenomena.

------
ranebo
I think it's being consumed though, and it's not just Hollywood/America. I've
noticed that streaming apps have completely changed my parents (Australian)
viewing habits. The ability to sample something then quickly change if
desired, has them experimenting constantly. This experimentation has them
binge watching a new Scandinavian/French series every week.

------
pryelluw
I wonder why they left out the elephant in the room: web video not from
netflix, amazon or Hulu. There are thousands of YouTube, Facebook, Twitch and
other types of channels replacing regular tv shows. What most don't realize is
that TV is dead. It was replaced, not by netflix, but by YouTube and the rest
of the online video portals. Even Snapchat aims to take away from the video
content cake with its stories.

Let me say it again: TV is dead. Entertainment has changed. People want a 2
way relationship with entertainers. They want to like, snap and follow. As
technology makers we should take action and build escuche for that. Hell,
musica.ly showed that there is a segment of the population who will pay
attention to their peers in short self made music videos (this is the new mtv,
btw).

~~~
mtberatwork
> People want a 2 way relationship with entertainers. They want to like, snap
> and follow. As technology makers we should take action and build escuche for
> that.

I don't think your average viewer really cares that much about social media
interaction when it comes down to it. No one is not going to watch Stranger
Things on Netflix because they couldn't snapchat with the show's creators.
People just want to easily access content on their own time (on-demand, on
their devices) and without a lot of intrusive interruptions (ads). Netflix,
Youtube, etc are successful because they achieve both of these, not because
they are creating "2-way relationships with entertainers".

~~~
pryelluw
My post about is content created on the web in the form of text (which could
easily be video if HN allowed embedded video responses). You replied to it.
Two way relationship created. :)

Note: I'm not being snarky, sarcastic or rude. Just proving a point in a
friendly way. :)

------
throw2016
I think Westworld is perfect example of a powerful new show with a large
canvas that could struggle. The writing is delicate and nuanced, the cast a
tour de force and the acting sublime.

However the plot development of the AI by Nolan is a bit complex and layered
which in many way makes it intriguing but also I think leaves casual viewers
struggling to engage. A core fan base is already engaged but the numbers show
that inspite of being clearly imho some of the best television in a long time
it might not be renewed because its too expensive to develop.

I personally think the weekly format is not friendly to this kind of complex
show, viewers are not able to hold the strings together in their head or have
no desire to keep track. At least 2 episodes a week or more can help alleviate
this but that changes the economics and dynamics of how these shows are
written and shot and in the interim there is room for HNs favourite word
'disruption'.

~~~
izacus
> I personally think the weekly format is not friendly to this kind of complex
> show, viewers are not able to hold the strings together in their head or
> have no desire to keep track. At least 2 episodes a week or more can help
> alleviate this but that changes the economics and dynamics of how these
> shows are written and shot and in the interim there is room for HNs
> favourite word 'disruption'.

Eh, people aren't as stupid as you make them to be. Remember, even an average
housewife could follow the utterly complex web of a 1000+ parts of Santa
Barbara soap opera. Asking people to follow a < 20 part show isn't anything
special.

~~~
joncrocks
I think when he says "viewers are not able to hold the strings together in
their head or have no desire to keep track." I heard "it's quite tricky to
keep small details/nuances in ones head over time, and they don't want to have
to keep re-watching episodes/take notes to remind themselves"

There are some shows that hint at things, imply things, and don't outright
scream "remember this it's important" which can make bringing the threads
together over the course of weeks hard without continual "last time on
[showname]".

These stories are served better when the episodes aren't spread out over the
course of half a year.

------
staticelf
Hmm, big money that pours into small companies/studios in hopes that they will
become _the next big thing_ , I wonder where I recognize that from..

~~~
oblio
I dub thee: HollYwoodCombinator.

~~~
teddyh
Maybe “HollYCombinator”, to avoid trademark issues.

------
makecheck
The future is still no “ad revenue”, at least in the traditional sense.

They clearly sell rights for prominent placement of products in TV shows that
have no commercials. It’s kind of funny sometimes (e.g. in The Punisher there
was an interview scene with a prominently placed can of “Country Time”
lemonade, and the thing magically rotated each time the camera moved so the
full logo on the can was always visible). And this is fine; it’s silly but it
doesn’t detract from the enjoyment of the show.

Conversely, the aggressive nature of traditional commercials has been
destroying regular TV. The commercials themselves are stupid of course but
networks behave obnoxiously and desperately too. I recently decided to watch
an old Star Trek: TNG episode (where I definitely remember how the episode
went) and they did some _serious_ editing to jam in as many commercials as
they could! They honestly damaged the story line: at times, characters would
directly refer to something that I _know_ was in the _original_ cut of the
episode but omitted from the oh-god-make-more-room-for-commercials version.
Hey, networks: when you start removing plot elements or making obvious edits
that even break the background music, you are being desperate. When your ad
for the next show is now taking up like 1/6 of my television screen and never
goes away, you are being desperate. Don’t CRANK up the volume during
commercials and make them go on and on and on for many, many minutes. And
don’t disrespect the hundreds of people who work on TV shows by making it
impossible to read credits.

------
nstj
One can binge on cheap food from Blue Apron subsidised by VC money and cheap
TV from Netflix subsidised by cheap public capital.

God bless 0% interest rates.

~~~
draugadrotten
The romans knew: _panem et circenses_
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bread_and_circuses](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bread_and_circuses)

From outside America it is easy to see what's really going on with your
abundance of food and TV.

~~~
emodendroket
Oh please.

~~~
sametmax
That's probably what romans would have said though :)

Thing is, not only this is stating the obvious, this is also true outside of
america.

------
planetjones
It always amazes me that humankind can find enough ideas to produce original
content. Sure most of the plots have similar themes but this year I have
watched Gotham, west world, daredevil, Jessica jones, the fall and currently
designated survivor. Yet I am not bored and each series has something
captivating about it. Something will have to give on the financial side I am
sure, but perhaps on the creative side there is an infinite supply.

~~~
throwawayReply
Putting a tv critic hat on for a second:

I'm surprised to see Designated Survivor listed there, watching it felt like
it was yanked from network TV and stuck on netflix. It has frequent recaps,
obvious gaps where commercial breaks should be, and the same few ideas hyped
through the season.

But I guess that's why netflix works, one person's trash is another person's
treasure. We all find something that interests us.

~~~
in_cahoots
Designated Survivor is a network show, at least in the US.

~~~
throwawayReply
That explains it, in the UK I thought it was branded as a "netflix original"
which surprised me because as I said, it didn't feel like one. I could be
wrong and perhaps it was just in the same list but styled as "netflix
exclusive".

I'll be sure to check more closely next time I'm logged on.

------
WalterBright
> Much of that cash has flowed to the armies of decorators, drivers, caterers,
> painters and other workers who are irreplaceable behind the scenes.

People always wonder what will happen to jobs that get automated. New jobs
that cannot be automated will be created as labor gets freed up.

For example, a significant entertainment industry cannot exist when 90% of the
population needs to work on the farm to stave off famine.

~~~
TeMPOraL
How does that list prove your point?

>> _flowed to the armies of decorators_

Replaceable by better CG.

>> _drivers_

Replaceable by autonomous vehicles.

>> _caterers_

Do they even get paid much?

>> _painters and other workers who are_

... mostly replaceable by better CG.

If big studio will end up having to _really_ cut down costs, they surely will.

~~~
WalterBright
The more automation has come to Hollywood, the more elaborate the movies
become. (And more expensive.)

------
6stringmerc
Boom & bust is the business model for TV/Film/Music unfortunately, but it is
what it is. That's what creates opportunities for "new" things - shows, up and
coming musicians, film stars, writers, directors, producers...on and on.
Tastes change and the business and money go where they can get a return on
investment - or a chance to do so. Risk vs. Reward.

For context though, I saw a really well respected Executive Producer
discussing how he invested in films (recently "The Revenant") and was getting
critical acclaim and doing well. He was grateful for his partnership with Fox
for distribution...then noted that revenue wise, Fox Studios for film was
approximately $700 Million of revenue in a given year, whereas Fox News was
$1.X Billion and Fox Sports was also $1.X Billion.

In the big picture competition is extremely fierce and spread out even beyond
the Sitcom-with-Kevin-James / NCIS-Your-Mom's-Backyard / Zombies-who-break-
into-song-and-dance-numbers pieces that get cranked out year after year and
don't stick.

------
tshibley
So much of the history of T.V. shows has been dictated by the cable bundle,
which force you to pay a network whether you are interested in it or not. And
while I think that ultimately this content bubble will pop (or at least fizz
out), in the end the average consumer will be left with a much leaner media
offering that is more targeted to what they actually want to pay for.

------
gaur
Am I the only one who is slightly grossed out when people use the word
"consume" to talk about media?

~~~
noselasd
What else would one call it ?

~~~
vincnetas
Do you "consume" paintings in art galery?

~~~
pjc50
You're consuming content in a physical content delivery platform!

(Yes, I hate the word "content" in this context too)

~~~
_h_o_d_
There are more productive dislikes.. I'm afraid you'll have to learn to be
content with it, or the anger will consume you.

------
mtw
I've never watched so many series - but I would really like more feature
films. I'd pay $10/m for a service that delivers original films

~~~
maldusiecle
Mubi is worth considering. They don't produce their own films, but they tend
to find films that are rare or unusual enough that they'd might as well be
original.

------
agentgt
A long time ago Hollywood studios used to literally own actors. The studios
would have long term contracts with the actors. This lowered the cost of
making movies while also increasing the speed. [1]

I wonder if we will see something similar with the steaming companies.

[1]:
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Studio_system](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Studio_system)

------
TheAceOfHearts
A bit weird, once the article loaded it automatically scrolled me to the end
for some reason.

The article strikes me as a bit unfocused. Although I only skimmed it.

I've personally grown a bit tired of most TV shows and movies. I still consume
my fair share of media, but I've slowly been shifting my focus more towards
book series (or more specifically, audiobooks). I'm not interested in watching
TV shows that don't have an overarching plot or direction, with the major
example of this being Lost. So far my experience has been that you tend to get
a more cohesive story.

If you've grown weary of watching TV, I'd suggest trying out audiobooks. You
can even listen to em while you're out walking about, driving, or eating
alone. I've had an Audible subscription for a few years now, and I seriously
love it. Maybe I still have really shallow tastes, but so far I've found that
if you pick up any book with a few thousand ratings and 4 to 5 stars, it'll
probably be really good.

With that said, I'm a huge sucker for movie adaptations and I'd probably watch
the adaptation for most of the books I've read. Even though they'll often
butcher huge parts of the story (totally understandable, different mediums),
it's really enjoyable to contrast your own imagination with that of the
creative staff in the production. The most recent example of this for me was
The Martian. My mental image of the main character was consistent while I read
the book, but when I watched the movie I realized I hadn't accounted for the
fact that he was starving.

~~~
mrighele
> A bit weird, once the article loaded it automatically scrolled me to the end
> for some reason.

It's because the link has the #comments anchor. The submitter probably didn't
realize this.

------
aikah
Some people say it's the "golden age" of TV-Shows. So much than even A list
movie stars now play in series.

------
danmendes
scroll to the sixth paragraph to get to the point. modern journalism...

------
satysin
Can somebody modify the URL and remove the #comments from the end. It is
annoying for it to jump right to the comments.

~~~
dredmorbius
Decrufting of URLs generally would be a Good Thing.

------
hackaflocka
Depends on the definition of TV.

YouTube is the new TV. And that's 1000x the number of "traditional" channels.

------
the_duke
Aaand most of it is mind numbing garbage.

Which is apparently what the masses yearn for (and always have).

~~~
telesilla
There is some lovely stuff out there, but you have to be open for trying
something that's not above the fold, which tends to be targeted towards the
mainstream.

If you have netflix, there is for example a charming mini-series about real-
life modern-day Chicagoans. I found it just delightful but it was something I
saw by chance.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Easy_(TV_series)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Easy_\(TV_series\))

~~~
croon
I love Joe Swanberg and really wanted to like that show, but couldn't. It just
wasn't funny, and it didn't scratch my drama itch either.

I guess I just don't like the comedians-acting-serious-and-not-being-funny
genre. I had the same issue with Togetherness, and numerous others I'm not
getting off the top of my head. I think they to me just fall flat somewhere
between funny and warm, and succeed in neither.

For counterexamples, Louie was both funny and "real", and his subsequent shows
Horace & Pete as well as Better Things are not really funny, but just
genuinely good, and have substance.

But as always, YMMV.

~~~
telesilla
Goes to show, horses for courses.. I loved Horace and Pete dearly, mostly for
what they were trying to do, and I watched it as if it were live theater or an
old 60s british sitcom, where budgetary concerns meant they had to focus on
intent.

But back to your point: YMMV. A strong part of me thinks a realistic
recommendation engine will never work: the human brain doesn't know if it
likes something until it encounters it, given environmental, emotional and
cultural cues at the time.

~~~
TeMPOraL
> _the human brain doesn 't know if it likes something until it encounters it,
> given environmental, emotional and cultural cues at the time._

That's what I keep repeating to people who say that "oh, we're just making
what our customers want!". No, customers don't want shit by themselves; it's
mostly the options available and marketing effort around them that _create_
shopping patterns.

~~~
VLM
A somewhat impolite yet factually correct (and funny, therefore memorable) way
I've heard the same idea expressed is given some factoid that the average male
brain thinks about sex every fifteen seconds (or minutes or whatever bogus
factoid), any product that isn't hard core pr0n is not what at least half the
customers actually want. Obviously this has much more psychological impact
when stated in a high school drama theater class than when stated at an actual
pr0n shoot where I guess people are more open minded to the reality of it.

"The audience really wants to feel Cleopatra's anguish when she's talking to
Antony" well, um, no? I mean we all know we're supposed to feel you'd like to
think that, and its clear how you want to direct the part, but WRT the
audience...

