I’m bored of Netflix. They have simply gone the assembly line direction instead of the direction of art, at least for some big niches. For example, every True Crime docuseries on Netflix is the same crap. Once you’ve seen three, you’ve seen them all. They get each cop involved in a big empty room, sit them on a solitary chair, put a dramatic light above them, and shoot them in 4k. Then they direct it at a pace to bore the hell out of you.
My business produces storytelling videos for e-commerce and we almost got into the television/entertainment business at one point, as it is simply so cheap to pump out middling quality documentaries. Stock photography and interviews and cheap-but-good editing. You’ll notice solo YouTubers are making great documentaries. I don’t know how they are spending so much money considering the quality of much of the crap they make. High schooler YouTubers make similar quality with their iPhones.
There must be thousands of talented directors who haven’t been given their big break yet who have artistic ideas and would almost work for free to be given a chance to make a name for themselves. Give them resources and a chance and see who has what it takes.
This is only one relevant factor, ofcourse.
Unrelated: I’m currently trying out CuriosityStream so I feel less guilty for the time I spend watching TV. At least I’ll be learning something.
> …it is simply so cheap to pump out middling quality documentaries. Stock photography and interviews and cheap-but-good editing. You’ll notice solo YouTubers are making great documentaries.
> My business produces storytelling videos for e-commerce and we almost got into the television/entertainment business at one point, as it is simply so cheap to pump out middling quality documentaries.
Funny, I stumbled upon a documentary “Meltdown”, which is about the Three Mile Island nuclear incident in 1979.
I expected something along the lines of HBO’s Chernobyl, but it just seems like a very cheap, Discovery-style documentary?
It’s very poorly done, and I stopped watching after 2 episodes.
> There must be thousands of talented directors who haven’t been given their big break yet who have artistic ideas and would almost work for free to be given a chance to make a name for themselves.
You're assuming the general population wants artistic, fresh ideas rather than the same re-hashed tried & true stuff.
Disney pretty clearly proves rehashing the exact same thing over and over again is a never ending gold mine.
Isn't this true of the broader media marketplace? If you look at Prime, once you're past some recognisable movies, you'll see a hilarious list of 3-4/10 IMDB movies you've never heard of before. They're out there and they get no buzz and are largely ignored.
On Netflix, they're throwing stuff at the wall to see what will stick. And they're doing it in various genre because it's a diverse world out there (an Indian soapie is different to a British one, for example). While your bar might be high, someone starved of space x zombie crossovers will like something just enough not to cancel their subscription for a couple more months.
I had CuriosityStream for a year, and used it for about two weeks. It's also just formulaic drivel accompanied by stock B-roll. My day is much better, and bears more fruit, when I don't waste any of it in front of a TV.
Our family cut off all of Netflix, Disney, etc. and now I have just CuriosityStream[1] (I think after hearing it on Curiosity Daily Podcast). I watch that. Our family rarely watch TV.
Maybe something like Steam Greenlit for Netflix. But as some have pointed out already Netflix is in the streaming business, not the risky content creation business.
(I still fucking miss the OA and Sense8 if you follow my comment history)
> I’m bored of Netflix. They have simply gone the assembly line direction instead of the direction of art, at least for some big niches. For example, every True Crime docuseries on Netflix is the same crap.
My benchmark for this genre is Forensic Files. I have yet to find another one that is this concise and informative.
I thought I noticed this in one of the Netflix movies I watched with my wife:
* audio sounded odd, like it was dubbed but it did match facial expressions. It lacked any reference to culture or geography, like it was made to simply swap out sound tracks in another language.
* the settings were minimized: house, hospital, vet… and not much else. This also was unnerving because it felt like it may as well have been shot in another planet.
I assumed the dialogue and the sets lack of references resulted from an effort to make it really easy to just swap audio tracks and launch it in another country with as little work on their end. I understand they’d want to do that but their cookie cutter formula resulted in a terrible movie.
“Content is King”
We all know this, Netflix knows this. And yet for some reason for years they have been aiming for quantity and not quality.
Money is not enough in this department and baseball metaphors don’t do justice illustrating just how hard it is to put together a team that has that special thing going on. Some would argue it’s impossible - teams like the one behind Better Call Saul are just extremely rare and can’t be rushed. The traditional system has sort of known this for a long time, I think.
Netflix tried rushing. I’ve personally worked on a failed series season made by the company and it was a chaotic clusterfuck. So are their efforts in ordering and buying content haphazardly to stuff their library with something. Now they’re probably going to have to learn the slow quality development and bring back many of the traditional practices they threw out the window.
This is a good thing for audiences though. I think we’re going to be seeing Netflix settle as one of many big content delivery platforms in the long term.
There's a legend of when Sony bought Columbia Pictures which is probably not true but the story is, after Sony bought Columbia Pictures, some Japanese executives flew over to meet with the top management at Columbia. The Columbia management explained to the Japanese execs that only 1 in 20 movies makes a profit. The Japanese executives talked to each other in Japanese and then turned back to the Columbia management and said "Please only make the profitable movies" (lol)
Just to spell it out in case the point wasn't clear. The Columbia management was trying to explain they don't know and have no way of knowing up front which movies will be good and which movies will sell and make their money back. Instead they're always gambling by funding a bunch of movies and it only works out because the few hits pay for all the non-hits.
I think they realized a few years back that HBO, Disney and the other major IP holders will be pulling out entirely and setting up their own streaming services, not because Netflix didn't give them a big enough cut of the pie, but simply because they saw how well Netflix did and realized that tech was no longer an issue they'd work hard to resolve in 2020+.
Once Netflix saw that on the horizon, they went into panic mode and bought anything half decent to have something to put on their library. In particular, it seems like the main thing driving one special niche Netflix created - the movie packed with multiple A and B list stars that has great production but a mediocre story at best - it gets views and attention, even though it's boring as hell...
Yeah, I agree. I mostly gave up on netflix because their SFF catalog has been underwhelming for so long.
SFF genre has outstanding authors like Brandon Sanderson, Will Wight, Jay Kristoff, Jim Butcher etc. who are producing amazing content for an adult audience at a much faster rate than I can consume with a busy schedule. In contrast Netflix titles simply fail to catch up - there are few good titles (100 & Arcane are the last ones I enjoyed) but for those too the storylines come nowhere close to as interesting as the best works by aforementioned authors.
At some point I realized I was spending almost all of my free time in books and 0% on Netflix and cancellation was a no brainer at that point. Likely I'm just too niche for mainstream streaming services.
Nobody knows how to reliably create "quality"--the definition of which will vary by person. Take a dozen of the top quality series on Netflix or streaming services generally and I'll probably be meh on at least half of them.
Add to that the fact that for many, TV, whether streaming or otherwise, is essentially background and they'll immediately cancel your service if all they have is a relative handful of prestige must-see TV.
> And yet for some reason for years they have been aiming for quantity and not quality.
Even if we were to assume a good quality, there is still too much quantity. Netflix drops new shows so often that they never have time breath or get legs. I may see an interesting trailer, and then a week later there's another trailer, and so on. There's just so much stuff.
I agree that the content is not very interesting (to me at least), they still seem to produce a ton of it though. But companies like Disney, Paramount etc. building their own platforms and withdrawing their content from other streaming services makes it hard for Netflix to compete. Especially for families Disney+ is much more attractive due to their large catalog of AAA titles. Netflix just can't compete with that it seems, and all their self-produced movies were at most B+ in my opinion, not a single blockbuster there. I think right now Disney+ is well positioned to take the market lead, they just need to acquire a few more studios (and maybe Netflix itself) and they will have a moat that's impossible to penetrate. Personally I would hope that the market will consolidate, it's just annoying to have content I'm interested in spread out over 5-6 platforms, all requiring separate subscriptions.
Netflix is 'all you can eat', and all you can eat is about quantity ('good enough'). Also, it is a given you are not going to like/want everything. The quantity is in such abundance that they try to please everyone somewhat. I suppose you could call it spreading.
Imo the reason for this is because there isn’t one perfect show for everyone. If they have to cater to the world, then they have to cater to everyone’s tastes.
Content is king. But so is IP. Disney competes based on its IP. Disney has multiple studios that can create series that people will automatically see based on their IP - Marvel, Pixar, Star Wars, and Disney.
Netflix really had a value proposition a few years ago before all the other players came in. A good selection of rotating movies and shows, sharing accounts with a good model (# of simultaneously running screens). This was way better than cable TV and more convenient than torrent.
Now it’s mostly quite mediocre content across services that easily cost $100+ a month, so we’re back to the old cable days in terms of cost and content and instead of switching channels we’re endlessly browsing the library for something interesting.
The consumers just aren’t complete idiots.
- lower quality productions (not the necessarily the cost, just not interesting)
- less good external content
- at the same time constantly increasing prices and/or charging for things that were free at a given tier
If you keep charging more for less, people eventually will get off their lazy asses and cancel the subscription.
One other thing that may have contributed: trying to keep users on the platform for long makes it more difficult to have good content left that hasn’t been watched.
So the problem with media conglomerates (including big studios) is they want predictable returns. More specifically, they want a formula. Let me introduce you to Save the Cat [1]. This book has become so influential that you can read this book and then watch pretty much any movie and you'll be able to tick off everything in the movie to this structure.
It's why studios love sequels and franchises. They have a built-in audience ie predictable returns.
The biggest innovation we've had in this industry is the advent of highly serialized TV shows, made possibly in large part due to (at first) DVRs and then streaming. 30 years ago it just wasn't possible or practical to do somethin glike this when people had to tune in at a set time. The audience drop off would've been too severe.
For me this has been the true Golden Age of TV. But movies? It's all superhero films now and dull, dull, dull for the most part.
So the lesson Netflix is learning here is you can't just scale up a content business by throwing money at it. Studios would love if it this were true. Netflix has thrown many billions at this problem and not spent it wisely. You can't just write a check for $10 billion and become HBO.
Movies in particularly just don't make economic sense without theater releases. We've seen this durin gthe pandemic with movies that have skipped theaters out of necessity. It just doesn't work.
I agree Netflix needed to create original content given the inevitable "me too" streaming platforms from all the studios would otherwise rob Netflix of their catalog. But they may have just saddled themselves with so much debt that they're forced into ever-increasing sub prices because of decreasing subscriber numbers, which just accelerates the need for more price hikes and so on.
Ironically this is exactly what is killing cable TV.
I would add that "a formula" doesn't mean it's bad. I regularly drank beer since like when I was 14 until when I was like 35 or something? I do it way less now but still sometimes drink beer.
My favorite style changes. Sometime I just drink a new one because like dopamine hits and I get excited about the potential novelty and discovery. But it's beer, and I think there's nothing wrong with it. From bud light to like whatever quadruppel or super IPA monstrosity someone in the Bay Area decided to brew and that may work as an antiseptic, I like them all. There's a formula and I like it, and I also like Marvel movies. Maybe I'm a basic bastard and I'm making a cardinal sin by spending my money on non innovative things and I should be only watching surreal pieces shot in a single take where at least one actor committed suicide or got addicted to opioids while shooting the movie. Don't get me wrong, those are great too and specially the followup documentaries. I also can then participate in high stakes intelectual debates. But that's a formula too.
And maybe I should drink sours but fuck that.
But yeah I think your analysis is great but I also think it's important to say that milking successful formulas is not wrong or morally reprehensible. If you scam people or whatever while doing yeah that's bad, but letting the chicken lay the golden eggs and not changing anything about it is pretty much ok in my hierarchy of sins.
I kinda wonder how long movies will continue make economic sense, at all.
What we call movies are 1h30 or more of continuous contents, and in this day and age this becomes an increasingly long time to be stuck in one place doing one thing. If it’s a full hobby, like pottery or bordering why not, but for “casual” people I feel the proposition is less and less attractive.
Netflix has worked to infer predictable returns by using ratings and habits from its 222MM subscribers. They model potential market size against production and marketing costs, assess risk, and make decisions informed by all of it. Lots that can go right and wrong, but it’s a solid approach.
Bubbling customers in one or two genres of content with the addition of some "trending" original series that Netflix is pushing at the time. Their support suggests creating multiple profiles to avoid bubbling. You can't even delete/replace/reset main profile - just need to skip it all the time.
Most of original content is just crap produced to fill the library. Netflix creates more and more titles, not watching material. They are cancelling their own shows with such pace that I started avoiding investing time in their new content, assuming they will promptly fuck it up.
Abundance of unnecessary sex scenes. It's almost like watching bad porn: -Ma'am, have you called about cable TV not working? (oh, they're gonna bang now); -Oh, I'm stuck with my head in the washing machine (he's gonna bang her now); -Teacher asks student to stay after class? (banging in 3.. 2...); Opening Netflix (ridiculous, out-of-place sex scenes no matter the content). Just create "soft porn" category already and let people choose.
Production aiming at 100% engagement, giving viewer no time to think. Whatever the genre, every movie or show is unnecessarily action-packed like "Speed" (1994) or "Crank" (2006) making watching feel like work, not relax. Refreshing, thought-welcoming productions like Apple's "Severance" have little place on Netflix platform.
> "This show was so good I couldn't stop watching. But would I watch it again? Hey, this wasn't good at all, I got played"
I was expecting to see some discussion over Netflix's depreciation models, which is (apparently) over 5 years, 20% per year.
While Disney (and other producers) do something like 90% depreciation over the first year, the famous "Hollywood accounting" that gets a lot of criticism.
But "Hollywood accounting" might be closer to the truth than Netflix's model. 20% of the movie "Bright" (released in 2017, the Will Smith + Orc buddy-cop movie) is still being "paid for" on Netflix's books this year.
--------
Since Netflix's growth has slowed a bit, the effects of depreciation are now going to start hurting it. But it seems like everything discussed in this article is about the fundamental viewership issue, which might be worse.
It's clear they are just outclassed by Disney+. People thought the hard part was creating the streaming platform, the content was mostly licensed with a few exclusives. It's now clear that exclusive content is everything. Disney have new content every month (ie. Moon Knight -> Obi-Wan Kenobi) and high quality movies like Luca and Turning Red.
Netflix's strategy seems to be just get big name actors and mediocre creatives and hope it works. The Adam Project might have a lot of viewers but how many of those are just because it's there? How many people would say "The Adam Project is my favorite movie" and how does that compare to Luca?
Netflix has been essentially making the equivalent of direct to DVD movies as its whole strategy while Disney has been bringing their best. They are becoming The Asylum of the streaming world.
The quoted "competing exec" is 100% wrong when he says Netflix is making a mistake ending shows after three seasons. Shows need to be pitched and run for three seasons max, period. Everyone has a life other than the show that's "hot" for the moment, from cast to writers to the source of money - the viewers. Shows that get dragged out inevitably suck.
The mistake for Netflix was the price increase - I've had a bunch of online video subscriptions kicking around, and when I got the notification that prices were going up, it served as a reminder that I really wasn't getting much value out of Netflix at the current price, so it made zero sense to put up with a price increase. This actually made me cancel Hulu while I was at it.
It definitely doesn't help that it's about 99% certain that if there's a mainstream movie you want to watch, Netflix won't have it.
No regrets, haven't felt like I was missing anything. After the pandemic the last thing I want to do is spend more time shut indoors staring at a screen.
One comment about the article:
> While Netflix has taken small steps to evolve its release model, particularly with unscripted shows, it refuses to experiment with weekly releases on its original scripted shows. One exec at rival streamer I talked with yesterday believes this is a huge mistake, if only because it makes it harder for Netflix to build those reliable franchises it so desperately needs more of.
The only thing dumber than this idea is adding commercials, which they're planning, so I assume they'll also be dumb enough to start listening to idiots telling them to do weekly releases.
> The only thing dumber than this idea is adding commercials, which they're planning...
I will immediately cancel any service that has advertisements. One of them (I think Amazon) did not immediately show the video I asked for, but a preview of another video they think I might be interested in. Even that got my delete finger twitching.
> when I got the notification that prices were going up, it served as a reminder that I really wasn't getting much value out of Netflix at the current price
A perfectly reasonable reaction. Netflix is still generally my primary streaming service, but mainly because the others are either a terrible UX for my setup (Hulu), won’t ever get me as a customer for ethical reasons (Amazon), or have content/catalog models like Netflix, only smaller catalogs (basically everything else that isn’t a cable provider).
Netflix becoming a studio was great when it still offered licensed content I love. I could watch their originals and my favorites and things I’d put off watching. Now it feels like I have an HBO subscription I never asked for, where the only thing they offer is original content I don’t want to sift through to find out if it’s worthwhile.
I quit because I didn't like how all of their shows pushed an ideological message. I'm quite left leaning on most issues, but Netflix writers appear to believe that preaching progressive messages is all that's required to make a compelling narrative. If they had the compelling narrative too it might be more tolerable, but they don't.
This is starting to look like a generic problem for companies which are valued on the basis of future growth, but may have in fact reached their mature size. Suddenly they have to be priced as ongoing operating companies, which is based on revenue and profits right now. Facebook. Uber. Netflix. Tesla. They all do something that people will pay for, but they aren't going to get a lot bigger.
> Problem is — and again, this is not some massively deep observation — wanting more hits and actually making them are two very different things. Netflix until now seems to have believed the best way to produce them is to throw all the money it can find at Hollywood and wait for the successes to start rolling in.
This is basically the VC formula applied to entertainment, and just like how sometimes you get a Dropbox, sometimes you get a Stranger Things. And sometimes you don't.
Of course the key in both is having people with a developed enough market savvy and eye for talent to spot the future Dropboxes and Stranger Things. In VC, it requires a deep understanding of market forces, founders, teams, and tech, and in entertainment, it requires an understanding of both popular tastes and critical tastes as well as the intricacies of production.
Smart people can make bad bets and anyone can get lucky, but the part that's so much harder than it looks is to improve that batting average. Everyone has an opinion on what Netflix should do – I certainly have my own thoughts on things that ought to work (sign Ian Hubert to make a Dynamo Dream series! Adapt Alfred Bester's The Stars My Destination with The Rock as Gully Foyle!), but ultimately, it's just my guesses about the cultural marketplace. What Netflix needs is people with greenlight power who have a better feel for that marketplace than anyone else.
I think Netflix is learning a hard fact about the content business. Hits are hard.
All the shows I’ve gotten into on netflix get cancelled once the cast demands to much money around season 4. This strategy makes sense if you can turn around a new hit next year to replace it, but having to deliver an exponentially growing set of hits is really hard. At this point just getting cast and crew who want to work with you is a challenge with 5 other major content streamers. If given the choice, I’m sure hot talent would prefer a studio that won’t fire them once it’s a smash hit.
>Netflix is further eroding its connection to audiences through its unwritten mandate to end the vast majority of its new shows after no more than three seasons, with only the very biggest (or most cost-efficient) scripted hits lasting longer.
One of my favorite shows by far was Disjointed. It was a very silly Stoner take on Roxanne. Cancelled after 2 seasons.
I get the feeling Netflix doesn't want niche shows, everything needs to be Squid Game.
I imagine experimenting with other rev models might work. You can already buy Stranger Things on DVD.
Let me buy the shows I want a la carta.
I've found Disney Plus / Hulu to be a better deal. Surprisingly stuff like Marvel What IF tends to be much more enjoyable compared to whatever animation Netflix is putting out.
Hulu has a better back catalog,
HBO Max has a better bang for buck when it comes to investing my time. The shows have decent writing.
Half the Netflix shows feel like you took a 20 year old English major, paid them in Blue Moon and asked them to write a script.
The best thing ends up being the show premise, once I have to sit down and watch it I'm not having a good time
Netflix is not dead but they focused too much on the R rated content for grown ups and relied too much on algorithms for content too. The reason why cable and free television stays PG-PG13 is that is where the bulk of the population wants to stay. Watching television really is really a family thing even with the explosion of screens. Of course they unearthed and exploited the lack of content for grown ups but it’s obvious they exhausted that market. Once Disney showed up with family content it was a no brainer for people like me who stopped watching Netflix a long time ago and just kept paying to cancel
Interesting how we don't hear much about "big data" which - we were told back in 2013 starting with House of Cards [1] - was key to Netflix's success in picking new shows to produce.
This part of the article is telling:
>It’s why five or so years ago, anybody with a hint of success in TV (or movies) started getting a call from their rep saying, basically, “Netflix would like to write you a big check.”
I hate it when people who have no context of the economy throws in the stock price as a point of data. Author is clearly bias. What tech stock has not plummeted in the last few months?
If you want to include financial data maybe consider that Walmart and Target both had lower profits, lower revenue resuting their stock price plummeted the most in decades?
What "bad habits" do they have? Target and Walmart are bellwether for consumer spending. If consumers are buying less essential items, maybe a stresming service is going to get cut too? Maybe....just maybe....people can't spend as much money anymore?
>Its stock price collapsed by more than 35 percent Wednesday, erasing more than $50 billion in value in a single day.
For people who want to be able to tax unrealized gains like stock, what is the plan for these kinds of events? Would stockholders receive a credit from the IRS when the valuation dips?
The reason for Netflix lost subscribers in 2022 is the same as the reason Netflix experienced a growth spurt in 2020: work from home. When people work from home, on average they gain an extra hour or more per day, because they don't have to commute. (Not to mention, the boss can't walk up behind you and catch you enjoying a movie!) Now that work from home is over, they no longer need the Netflix subscription.
The main reason I avoid Netflix shows is that their formula insists on a cliffhanger season finale, but there is no promise of another season. Many shows quite literally have no conclusion, ending in their version of the second act.
Sci-fi nerds are somewhat used to this; it was a problem even when cable tv was the dominant model. Netflix has somehow managed to bring this sour note to every genre.
[+] [-] 55555|3 years ago|reply
My business produces storytelling videos for e-commerce and we almost got into the television/entertainment business at one point, as it is simply so cheap to pump out middling quality documentaries. Stock photography and interviews and cheap-but-good editing. You’ll notice solo YouTubers are making great documentaries. I don’t know how they are spending so much money considering the quality of much of the crap they make. High schooler YouTubers make similar quality with their iPhones.
There must be thousands of talented directors who haven’t been given their big break yet who have artistic ideas and would almost work for free to be given a chance to make a name for themselves. Give them resources and a chance and see who has what it takes.
This is only one relevant factor, ofcourse.
Unrelated: I’m currently trying out CuriosityStream so I feel less guilty for the time I spend watching TV. At least I’ll be learning something.
[+] [-] russelldjimmy|3 years ago|reply
Reminds me of this hilarious video - https://youtu.be/9BUrNe3Vhtk
[+] [-] stingraycharles|3 years ago|reply
Funny, I stumbled upon a documentary “Meltdown”, which is about the Three Mile Island nuclear incident in 1979.
I expected something along the lines of HBO’s Chernobyl, but it just seems like a very cheap, Discovery-style documentary?
It’s very poorly done, and I stopped watching after 2 episodes.
[+] [-] onlyrealcuzzo|3 years ago|reply
You're assuming the general population wants artistic, fresh ideas rather than the same re-hashed tried & true stuff.
Disney pretty clearly proves rehashing the exact same thing over and over again is a never ending gold mine.
Disney probably makes $1M for every $1 A24 makes.
[+] [-] prawn|3 years ago|reply
On Netflix, they're throwing stuff at the wall to see what will stick. And they're doing it in various genre because it's a diverse world out there (an Indian soapie is different to a British one, for example). While your bar might be high, someone starved of space x zombie crossovers will like something just enough not to cancel their subscription for a couple more months.
[+] [-] theodric|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Brajeshwar|3 years ago|reply
1. https://curiositystream.com
[+] [-] johnchristopher|3 years ago|reply
(I still fucking miss the OA and Sense8 if you follow my comment history)
[+] [-] AnonCoward4|3 years ago|reply
My benchmark for this genre is Forensic Files. I have yet to find another one that is this concise and informative.
[+] [-] d136o|3 years ago|reply
* audio sounded odd, like it was dubbed but it did match facial expressions. It lacked any reference to culture or geography, like it was made to simply swap out sound tracks in another language. * the settings were minimized: house, hospital, vet… and not much else. This also was unnerving because it felt like it may as well have been shot in another planet.
I assumed the dialogue and the sets lack of references resulted from an effort to make it really easy to just swap audio tracks and launch it in another country with as little work on their end. I understand they’d want to do that but their cookie cutter formula resulted in a terrible movie.
[+] [-] chrisseaton|3 years ago|reply
What’s the issue with 4k?
[+] [-] the_only_law|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] truthwhisperer|3 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] scyzoryk_xyz|3 years ago|reply
Money is not enough in this department and baseball metaphors don’t do justice illustrating just how hard it is to put together a team that has that special thing going on. Some would argue it’s impossible - teams like the one behind Better Call Saul are just extremely rare and can’t be rushed. The traditional system has sort of known this for a long time, I think.
Netflix tried rushing. I’ve personally worked on a failed series season made by the company and it was a chaotic clusterfuck. So are their efforts in ordering and buying content haphazardly to stuff their library with something. Now they’re probably going to have to learn the slow quality development and bring back many of the traditional practices they threw out the window.
This is a good thing for audiences though. I think we’re going to be seeing Netflix settle as one of many big content delivery platforms in the long term.
[+] [-] gernb|3 years ago|reply
Just to spell it out in case the point wasn't clear. The Columbia management was trying to explain they don't know and have no way of knowing up front which movies will be good and which movies will sell and make their money back. Instead they're always gambling by funding a bunch of movies and it only works out because the few hits pay for all the non-hits.
[+] [-] WillPostForFood|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] int0x2e|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lf-non|3 years ago|reply
SFF genre has outstanding authors like Brandon Sanderson, Will Wight, Jay Kristoff, Jim Butcher etc. who are producing amazing content for an adult audience at a much faster rate than I can consume with a busy schedule. In contrast Netflix titles simply fail to catch up - there are few good titles (100 & Arcane are the last ones I enjoyed) but for those too the storylines come nowhere close to as interesting as the best works by aforementioned authors.
At some point I realized I was spending almost all of my free time in books and 0% on Netflix and cancellation was a no brainer at that point. Likely I'm just too niche for mainstream streaming services.
[+] [-] ghaff|3 years ago|reply
Add to that the fact that for many, TV, whether streaming or otherwise, is essentially background and they'll immediately cancel your service if all they have is a relative handful of prestige must-see TV.
[+] [-] matwood|3 years ago|reply
Even if we were to assume a good quality, there is still too much quantity. Netflix drops new shows so often that they never have time breath or get legs. I may see an interesting trailer, and then a week later there's another trailer, and so on. There's just so much stuff.
[+] [-] ThePhysicist|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Fnoord|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] chaostheory|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] scarface74|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] harha|3 years ago|reply
Now it’s mostly quite mediocre content across services that easily cost $100+ a month, so we’re back to the old cable days in terms of cost and content and instead of switching channels we’re endlessly browsing the library for something interesting.
The consumers just aren’t complete idiots.
- lower quality productions (not the necessarily the cost, just not interesting)
- less good external content
- at the same time constantly increasing prices and/or charging for things that were free at a given tier
If you keep charging more for less, people eventually will get off their lazy asses and cancel the subscription.
One other thing that may have contributed: trying to keep users on the platform for long makes it more difficult to have good content left that hasn’t been watched.
Edit: formatting
[+] [-] jmyeet|3 years ago|reply
It's why studios love sequels and franchises. They have a built-in audience ie predictable returns.
The biggest innovation we've had in this industry is the advent of highly serialized TV shows, made possibly in large part due to (at first) DVRs and then streaming. 30 years ago it just wasn't possible or practical to do somethin glike this when people had to tune in at a set time. The audience drop off would've been too severe.
For me this has been the true Golden Age of TV. But movies? It's all superhero films now and dull, dull, dull for the most part.
So the lesson Netflix is learning here is you can't just scale up a content business by throwing money at it. Studios would love if it this were true. Netflix has thrown many billions at this problem and not spent it wisely. You can't just write a check for $10 billion and become HBO.
Movies in particularly just don't make economic sense without theater releases. We've seen this durin gthe pandemic with movies that have skipped theaters out of necessity. It just doesn't work.
I agree Netflix needed to create original content given the inevitable "me too" streaming platforms from all the studios would otherwise rob Netflix of their catalog. But they may have just saddled themselves with so much debt that they're forced into ever-increasing sub prices because of decreasing subscriber numbers, which just accelerates the need for more price hikes and so on.
Ironically this is exactly what is killing cable TV.
[1]:https://www.amazon.com/Save-Last-Book-Screenwriting-Youll/dp...
[+] [-] pvarangot|3 years ago|reply
My favorite style changes. Sometime I just drink a new one because like dopamine hits and I get excited about the potential novelty and discovery. But it's beer, and I think there's nothing wrong with it. From bud light to like whatever quadruppel or super IPA monstrosity someone in the Bay Area decided to brew and that may work as an antiseptic, I like them all. There's a formula and I like it, and I also like Marvel movies. Maybe I'm a basic bastard and I'm making a cardinal sin by spending my money on non innovative things and I should be only watching surreal pieces shot in a single take where at least one actor committed suicide or got addicted to opioids while shooting the movie. Don't get me wrong, those are great too and specially the followup documentaries. I also can then participate in high stakes intelectual debates. But that's a formula too.
And maybe I should drink sours but fuck that.
But yeah I think your analysis is great but I also think it's important to say that milking successful formulas is not wrong or morally reprehensible. If you scam people or whatever while doing yeah that's bad, but letting the chicken lay the golden eggs and not changing anything about it is pretty much ok in my hierarchy of sins.
[+] [-] makeitdouble|3 years ago|reply
What we call movies are 1h30 or more of continuous contents, and in this day and age this becomes an increasingly long time to be stuck in one place doing one thing. If it’s a full hobby, like pottery or bordering why not, but for “casual” people I feel the proposition is less and less attractive.
[+] [-] smcnally|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tomrod|3 years ago|reply
Streaming services are equivalent to MVNOs on cellular networks.
[+] [-] jakear|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hericium|3 years ago|reply
Most of original content is just crap produced to fill the library. Netflix creates more and more titles, not watching material. They are cancelling their own shows with such pace that I started avoiding investing time in their new content, assuming they will promptly fuck it up.
Abundance of unnecessary sex scenes. It's almost like watching bad porn: -Ma'am, have you called about cable TV not working? (oh, they're gonna bang now); -Oh, I'm stuck with my head in the washing machine (he's gonna bang her now); -Teacher asks student to stay after class? (banging in 3.. 2...); Opening Netflix (ridiculous, out-of-place sex scenes no matter the content). Just create "soft porn" category already and let people choose.
Production aiming at 100% engagement, giving viewer no time to think. Whatever the genre, every movie or show is unnecessarily action-packed like "Speed" (1994) or "Crank" (2006) making watching feel like work, not relax. Refreshing, thought-welcoming productions like Apple's "Severance" have little place on Netflix platform.
> "This show was so good I couldn't stop watching. But would I watch it again? Hey, this wasn't good at all, I got played"
[+] [-] dragontamer|3 years ago|reply
While Disney (and other producers) do something like 90% depreciation over the first year, the famous "Hollywood accounting" that gets a lot of criticism.
But "Hollywood accounting" might be closer to the truth than Netflix's model. 20% of the movie "Bright" (released in 2017, the Will Smith + Orc buddy-cop movie) is still being "paid for" on Netflix's books this year.
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Since Netflix's growth has slowed a bit, the effects of depreciation are now going to start hurting it. But it seems like everything discussed in this article is about the fundamental viewership issue, which might be worse.
[+] [-] t8y|3 years ago|reply
Netflix's strategy seems to be just get big name actors and mediocre creatives and hope it works. The Adam Project might have a lot of viewers but how many of those are just because it's there? How many people would say "The Adam Project is my favorite movie" and how does that compare to Luca?
Netflix has been essentially making the equivalent of direct to DVD movies as its whole strategy while Disney has been bringing their best. They are becoming The Asylum of the streaming world.
[+] [-] thrill|3 years ago|reply
And yeah, go to weekly releases.
[+] [-] mullingitover|3 years ago|reply
The mistake for Netflix was the price increase - I've had a bunch of online video subscriptions kicking around, and when I got the notification that prices were going up, it served as a reminder that I really wasn't getting much value out of Netflix at the current price, so it made zero sense to put up with a price increase. This actually made me cancel Hulu while I was at it.
It definitely doesn't help that it's about 99% certain that if there's a mainstream movie you want to watch, Netflix won't have it.
No regrets, haven't felt like I was missing anything. After the pandemic the last thing I want to do is spend more time shut indoors staring at a screen.
One comment about the article:
> While Netflix has taken small steps to evolve its release model, particularly with unscripted shows, it refuses to experiment with weekly releases on its original scripted shows. One exec at rival streamer I talked with yesterday believes this is a huge mistake, if only because it makes it harder for Netflix to build those reliable franchises it so desperately needs more of.
The only thing dumber than this idea is adding commercials, which they're planning, so I assume they'll also be dumb enough to start listening to idiots telling them to do weekly releases.
[+] [-] rendall|3 years ago|reply
I will immediately cancel any service that has advertisements. One of them (I think Amazon) did not immediately show the video I asked for, but a preview of another video they think I might be interested in. Even that got my delete finger twitching.
[+] [-] eyelidlessness|3 years ago|reply
> […]
> when I got the notification that prices were going up, it served as a reminder that I really wasn't getting much value out of Netflix at the current price
A perfectly reasonable reaction. Netflix is still generally my primary streaming service, but mainly because the others are either a terrible UX for my setup (Hulu), won’t ever get me as a customer for ethical reasons (Amazon), or have content/catalog models like Netflix, only smaller catalogs (basically everything else that isn’t a cable provider).
Netflix becoming a studio was great when it still offered licensed content I love. I could watch their originals and my favorites and things I’d put off watching. Now it feels like I have an HBO subscription I never asked for, where the only thing they offer is original content I don’t want to sift through to find out if it’s worthwhile.
[+] [-] Gareth321|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Animats|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mortenjorck|3 years ago|reply
This is basically the VC formula applied to entertainment, and just like how sometimes you get a Dropbox, sometimes you get a Stranger Things. And sometimes you don't.
Of course the key in both is having people with a developed enough market savvy and eye for talent to spot the future Dropboxes and Stranger Things. In VC, it requires a deep understanding of market forces, founders, teams, and tech, and in entertainment, it requires an understanding of both popular tastes and critical tastes as well as the intricacies of production.
Smart people can make bad bets and anyone can get lucky, but the part that's so much harder than it looks is to improve that batting average. Everyone has an opinion on what Netflix should do – I certainly have my own thoughts on things that ought to work (sign Ian Hubert to make a Dynamo Dream series! Adapt Alfred Bester's The Stars My Destination with The Rock as Gully Foyle!), but ultimately, it's just my guesses about the cultural marketplace. What Netflix needs is people with greenlight power who have a better feel for that marketplace than anyone else.
[+] [-] lumost|3 years ago|reply
All the shows I’ve gotten into on netflix get cancelled once the cast demands to much money around season 4. This strategy makes sense if you can turn around a new hit next year to replace it, but having to deliver an exponentially growing set of hits is really hard. At this point just getting cast and crew who want to work with you is a challenge with 5 other major content streamers. If given the choice, I’m sure hot talent would prefer a studio that won’t fire them once it’s a smash hit.
[+] [-] 999900000999|3 years ago|reply
One of my favorite shows by far was Disjointed. It was a very silly Stoner take on Roxanne. Cancelled after 2 seasons.
I get the feeling Netflix doesn't want niche shows, everything needs to be Squid Game.
I imagine experimenting with other rev models might work. You can already buy Stranger Things on DVD.
Let me buy the shows I want a la carta.
I've found Disney Plus / Hulu to be a better deal. Surprisingly stuff like Marvel What IF tends to be much more enjoyable compared to whatever animation Netflix is putting out.
Hulu has a better back catalog,
HBO Max has a better bang for buck when it comes to investing my time. The shows have decent writing.
Half the Netflix shows feel like you took a 20 year old English major, paid them in Blue Moon and asked them to write a script.
The best thing ends up being the show premise, once I have to sit down and watch it I'm not having a good time
[+] [-] yalogin|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gpayan|3 years ago|reply
This part of the article is telling:
>It’s why five or so years ago, anybody with a hint of success in TV (or movies) started getting a call from their rep saying, basically, “Netflix would like to write you a big check.”
1. https://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/25/business/media/for-house-...
[+] [-] fma|3 years ago|reply
If you want to include financial data maybe consider that Walmart and Target both had lower profits, lower revenue resuting their stock price plummeted the most in decades?
What "bad habits" do they have? Target and Walmart are bellwether for consumer spending. If consumers are buying less essential items, maybe a stresming service is going to get cut too? Maybe....just maybe....people can't spend as much money anymore?
[+] [-] daenz|3 years ago|reply
For people who want to be able to tax unrealized gains like stock, what is the plan for these kinds of events? Would stockholders receive a credit from the IRS when the valuation dips?
[+] [-] petilon|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] somehnacct3757|3 years ago|reply
Sci-fi nerds are somewhat used to this; it was a problem even when cable tv was the dominant model. Netflix has somehow managed to bring this sour note to every genre.