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Netflix To Start Creating Original Content
olsmeister writes "Netflix may be known for offering some of our favorite TV and movie streams, but the company is about to step up its game and begin offering original content. Netflix has allegedly outbid a number of major cable networks for a new drama series produced by and starring Kevin Spacey called House of Cards, and may be about to close a deal at more than $100 million, according to a report on Deadline.com."
I can't believe that i took this long for an organization to show original content over the Internet considering there were companies in the late '90s that tried to offer an Internet based substitute for tv. Hulu needs to start offering some original content(to bad they dont have deeper pockets)
I don't have a Netflix account. I never had any motivation to get a Netflix account. But if Netflix bought up the rights to produce some new episodes of old cult classics such as Firefly, Stargate (SGU does not count as part of that series), Earth 2, Rugrats, Doug, Transformers cartoons, and, hell, maybe a new good Star Trek series, then I would seriously consider subscribing to an account.
In other words Netflix, current networks are broadcasting crap, crap, and more crap. Broadcast something not-crap, and you might get a few more subscribers.
Motorcycles, Robots, Space Gossip and More!
What they really need to do is make it so that your instant queue can have directories or something. For a company that says they were planning on the direct stream thing all along, they sure don't have that sophisticated of a saved queue.
What would be really cool if there was an area were people could submit their own films and shorts and netflix users could rate them. Obviously they would be in the Not Rated section. I feel like I reached the end of all their streaming stuff so I wouldn't mind seeing a bunch of dumb shows people make. It wouldn't be too hard to make something like Trailer Park boys. Netflix could also make it so only valid accounts can submit content and perhaps after a period of time has passed. This way it would weed out spammers somewhat, or at least Netflix would make money off the spammers.
from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netflix: "Through a division called Red Envelope Entertainment, Netflix licensed and distributed independent films such as Born into Brothels and Sherrybaby. As of late 2006, Red Envelope Entertainment also expanded into producing original content with filmmakers such as John Waters. Netflix announced plans to close Red Envelope Entertainment in 2008, in part to avoid competition with its studio partners."
There's a reason I don't watch TV anymore, the creativity of the medium is approaching zero. Movies are pretty well already at zero, unless you indulge in the independent cinema, which is still capable of surprising you.
Will Netflix go with risky indy thinking or will it hedge with Tried and True Copy-Cat entertainment?
Someone else let me know, 'K? I'll be outside watching for rattlesnakes along the trail.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
If they're smart, they'll keep the ads hidden. Things like product placement, or offering to sell fans pieces of the set after production. (Yes, that's really happening. There are companies that provide movie companies dozens of identical items for filming, just so those items can be sold as having been on-screen in Movie XYZ.)
All ideas^H^H^H^H^Hprocesses in this post are Patent Pending. (as well as the process of patenting all postings)
I doubt they could get away with traditional ads that interrupt a show. However, it is quite likely that they would consider product placement advertising in their original programming to help offset the costs of the show's creation.
This move puts Netflix in even more direct competition with traditional broadcasting/media companies than ever before--as if NBC-Comcast wasn't already looking to throttle YouTube and Netflix traffic to hell and back. Real net neutrality seems like it aligns with Netflix's business model--they may become a true defender of how many people here think the internet "should" work on top of their apparent desire to be a true independent alternative to old media.
Is there a negative here that I'm not seeing? Does one of the big media companies secretly own Netflix?
I was wondering how many comments it would take before someone raised the "BRING BACK FIREFLY!!!" banner.
Ok, time to be even more pedant. (:-) Most patent trolls aren't in the business of making what they have patents on. If the MPAA could get the patent on "MoSEVvBM", they would.
All ideas^H^H^H^H^Hprocesses in this post are Patent Pending. (as well as the process of patenting all postings)
Earth 2? Really? Really. And not a single mention of Babylon 5? Ugh.
Netflix isn't stupid. They want advertising revenue just like every other network. Why else would they do this? $100 million is a lot of money, if you are going to just "give it away" to Netflix subscribers.
My guess is that the show will have ads. If you don't want ads, you can pay extra. Never mind that you are ALREADY paying for Netflix.
Sorry, but you're way off and too hopeful. Netflix will join the cable club and screw us. You much be young. Both cable and satellite TV was cheapish to start with, but more than free OTA TV. We paid more for it to avoid averts. How much is a standard TV cable bill now? $100/month for basic HD, some shitty DVR and a wad in fees and taxes?
Just you watch. Netflix will start increasing prices to cover buying crap TV shows instead of streaming the walmart bargain DVD bin. After a while they'll be losing customers over it, so they'll start creating tiers of service. See where this is going?
You're probably correct about the ads, when they start, that'll be one service canceled.
By what criteria did you decide that Netflix is not big media?
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
Netflix had to shutter its own entertainment division, Red Envelope, a few years ago. It was just a small studio that probably never outbid a much larger one for the indie films they invested in, but they were competing with their own suppliers. It's not clear to me how this is different, although I suppose the three years since it closed is a long time ago.
Also, doesn't this raise the issue of Netflix both producing and being the main distributor for this series? It seems that this show is only going to be offered through Netflix. Having content exclusive not only to their competitors but their suppliers seems foolish.
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/14.09/netflix_pr.html
http://www.hackingnetflix.com/2008/07/netflix-closing.html
Don't tempt the devil!
WOOOOOSHHHHHH
I have found lots to see already and they seem to be adding more content all the time. It works perfectly in Canuckistan for me. $8. a month is well worth it, especially if you have little kids. There's lots of kid stuff and I love the fact that there is no commercials and they keep track of which episodes you've watched.
They do have their fair share of stinker movies too, but I also like to support their efforts. Hopefully this will be the tv of the future.(Cause the damn satellite sure sucks)
I'm not anti-social, I'm anti-idiot.
That's easy! They don't make their own original content! Oh...wait.
Adding the firefly episodes to netflix is completely different thanproducing new episodes.
Thanks for giving them the idea jerk, why don't you just sell our nuclear launch codes to Al-Quaeda while you're at it.
I got here through a series of tubes
What?! You mean, if Netflix spent a few more tens of millions of dollars just to purchase the rights to some old shows, not to mention the marginal costs associated with making them available on their platform, you might be willing to consider giving them $8 a month?!
Hold on, I've got the CEO of Netflix on the line. He's obviously very intrigued by your generous offer; I think you guys just need a contract to make this commitment official, and he'll get his top people on this right away!
I won't be watching that piece of fei-oo. Finish Firefly. I can kill you with my brain.
I love these types of comments: "If random company spends tons of money doing everything I want, I would consider paying them a small fee." The implication is the poster would also consider not paying for any of it. Not the most persuasive of arguments.
I would gladly watch a few ads if I could watch the shows that I wanted when I wanted to watch them. DVRs are nice, but Netflix's streaming is 100 times better. I need a break to get up and make a sandwich anyhow.
Then again, I don't mind ads so much. I buy things all the time, being informed of potential choices is not necessarily a bad thing.
The biggest problem for some of the shows you mentioned is that the brain dead morons at the networks moved them unpredictably around to different time slots during a season and sometimes showed them out of order. It seems to be a repeated strategy to strangle ratings and kill a show.
With Netflix, all of that BS goes away: you can watch when you want and in the order you want.
He was probably just using a passive, unassuming, meek voice.
(SGU does not count as part of that series)
You may jest, but if I recall, the producers of SGU haven't entirely given up, and are looking for someone other than SyFy to possibly pick up the series. I think they even mentioned "alternative venues" or something like that. Really, even though it's not your fav, the way they've picked up in this last season, SGU may be a great fit for Netflix.
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
Babylon 5 is a completed story. Ditto Farscape. As much as I would love to see more of both, they're done. They told the story they were meant to.
Now, if you want to do something else in the same universe... Crusade, for example...
Poor means hoping the toothache goes away.
Is nothing sacred? Why do these shows have to be re-made? House of Cards was a masterpiece and I fear that too much will be lost in translation to an American setting. Please don't talk to me about The Office. The original series looked like a documentary, now they've completely given up on that by bringing in too many camera angles and taking the documentary look away from it. Losing that essential element makes it difficult to watch.
Drill baby drill - on Mars
The implication is the poster would also consider not paying for any of it. Not the most persuasive of arguments.
Well that's not true. I've already paid for most of it already. I own the boxed sets of DVD's of many of the shows I listed. My problem is that no companies are funding the development of new content that I like. So I don't pay current companies money because they don't provide anything of value to me. In other words, I am not one of their customers. The point of my post was to illustrate that there is probably some market out there for folks like me that are willing to fork over cash for the development of certain types of content (cult classics). The fact that no company is currently creating that product is the only reason I am not spending money on it.
The content that Netflix currently provides is not worth the value of a subscription to me. If Netflix starts providing content that is more valuable to me, then I would start purchasing their content. I don't think my position is as unreasonable as you seem to make it out to be. Don't let that stop you from making shit up so that you have a soap box to rant from:
The implication is the poster would also consider not paying for any of it.
The implication of your post is that you are a pissed off, bitter, lonely person. See! I can make shit up too! Yay!
Motorcycles, Robots, Space Gossip and More!
I would watch it. If it airs globally. I'm in Europe. If thats ok. I can't wait four years before it airs over here. I suppose so, because this is original content and releasing it globaly would only be in your benefit. Yay! Yay? Or is this wishful thinking..
Hivemind harvest in progress..
How about you add streaming to all the stuff you currently have first.
Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
Are you a Hulu watcher? They've got ads. You'd love it.
Buy the rights to firefly and pump that shit out!
"Consider" is the word you used. Perhaps I was wrong to assume you knew what it meant.
Ditto. The sooner serial video transitions from broadcast/cable to standalone, the better. You'll still have somebody with big pockets funding them based on ratings, but at least we can continue to break the "timeslot" mindset where shows "win" or "lose" because of the time of day they are scheduled.
Not having shows interrupted because live events will be nice too.
Agreed I'm surprised it took a whole 3 minutes.
It's okay! They're just 1-2-3-4-5.
(1-2-3-4-5? That's the stupidest combination I've ever heard of in my life! That's the kinda thing an idiot would have on his luggage!)
Bio questions? Ask me to start a Q&A journal. Computer analogies available for most topics!
/me changes luggage combination.
I am Bennett Haselton! I am Bennett Haselton!
The Wire, Season 6!
They could buy up the rights to do something new, and then produce complete trash. Owning the rights to any of those shows doesn't guarantee the resulting new production will be worth a damn - sets, actors, crews, locations, budgets, effects - all could very easily change, and those changes aren't guaranteed to be improvements on the originals that you so fondly remember.
I'd rather they go find new, interesting stories and focus on telling them well, rather than suffer through two years of "A FIREFLY CLASS VESSEL DOES NOT LOOK LIKE THAT INSIDE, AND THAT'S NOT THE ORIGINAL KAYLEE FRYE! THEY RUINED THE SHOW! DIE NETFLIX DIE!"
I thought someone just bought the rights and the online community was told that there would be no new episodes.... which does suck.
I'm not anti-social, I'm anti-idiot.
Netflix is simply positioning itself to be acquired by somebody like Comcast (ie Kabletown). By proving they are capable of making these kinds of deals, they suddenly become a bigger player. (The Netflix team has worked pretty hard these last few years and they are ready to retire in big luxury.)
it depends on what the ads get you. i'm seriously considering hulu plus for $8/mo. just for their complete Criterion Collection (which is now exclusive to them). yeah, exclusives are lame and annoying, but still...
"They were pure niggers." – Noam Chomsky
I'll try not to shock you too badly, but the fact is that Netflix gets ALL of its revenue this way. One subscriber at a time. Netflix invests vast sums of capital to pursue new revenue. I've watched a few things on Netflix on my brother's Mac and did not find it quite compelling enough to subscribe. If new Firefly episodes were available I would be all over it. So would many, many more who discovered it on DVD after the fact. Enough to make it worthwhile to Netflix (or Amazon, Hulu, or Apple)? Hell yes!
Sadly I'm on AT&T so I'll have to pay both netflix and ATT to watch this...
(based on their 150GB cap I'm headed for doom)
tangent though: anyone know of a not comcast, not ATT broadband provider in sac county norcal? (Surewest, while expensive is awesome, but alas I live too far away from them).
whois gawk date unzip strip find touch finger mount join nice man top fsck grep eject more yes exit umount sleep dump
They may be, but as long as I can watch their content based on my subscription to them, without commercials, (_possibly_ a leader commercial would be ok) I'll be happy.
The promise of cable TV so many years ago was content without commercials. That never happened.
If this takes off (Internet only content providers), and I can't watch it because my ISP (ATT) won't carry competitor content on == footing with their IP content then this should get interesting.
-nB
whois gawk date unzip strip find touch finger mount join nice man top fsck grep eject more yes exit umount sleep dump
"House Of Cards" wouldn't be a political black comedy now would it?
original content indeed.
though i wouldn't mind seeing Spacey in the F.U. role.
you can add me to the list of people who found it on DVD after it was cancelled
and to the list of people who would buy new episodes (even at a premium over my current $18/mo netflix sub).
-nB
whois gawk date unzip strip find touch finger mount join nice man top fsck grep eject more yes exit umount sleep dump
Please help Marina Sirtis and Jonathan Frakes to make The Rikers In Space a real sitcom.
"MPAA Sues Netflix, Claims to Own Patent on "Monetization of Serialized Entertainment Video via Broadcast Medium""
Who do you suppose is going to produce content for Netflix?
In 1954-1957, when ABC Television was an infant competitor to NBC and CBS, the gates were opened to Disney and Warner Brothers.
Maverick and Zorrro.
In the fifties and sixties, Desilu produced iconic TV shows like I Love Lucy, Star Trek, The Andy Griffith Show, Mission: Impossible, The Dick Van Dyke Show, The Untouchables and I Spy.
But the financial burden on a small independent studio is crushing. That is why you outsource production to the big boys. That is why you forge global partnerships in production and distribution.
There is always a nerd who thinks he has a high tech hit machine. Give him the megabucks or put him on a starvation budget and he'll tell you he can deliver a "Rango."
But what you will probably get will look more like "Mars Needs Moms" than "True Grit."
Don't they do that for first run shows they show very close to the air date? I thought they started that already (could be wrong).
Netflix updates their content nearly daily... might be worth taking another look at what they offer. Their streaming stuff is good enough that we don't subscribe to cable any more. OTA for news and sports, otherwise everything is Netflix or on discs we own (that I ripped to our media center)
My blog. Good stuff (when I remember to update it). Read it.
/. seems to be off by a ways here. Netflix already offers original content. There is a Zach Galifinakis special that is streaming and put out by Netflix.
How old? http://www.imdb.com/company/co0144901/
Producing content since 2005
The world is how you make it
People pay much more for Cable Television, and it's chock full of advertising too.
An important difference is that the cable company has to build and maintain huge networks of lines all over the place. Netflix doesn't.
Space game using normal deck of cards: http://BattleCards.org
in 3,2,1...
Netflix has all of Stargate, Sliders, Firefly, earth2, and many other things..
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
But if Netflix bought up the rights to produce some new episodes of old cult classics such as Firefly, Stargate...hell, maybe a new good Star Trek series, then I would seriously consider subscribing to an account.
The reboot is from scratch and it costs a lot of money up front.
The original sets and props have been sold or destroyed. The cast and production crew are retired or dead or have long since moved on to other projects.
Production values of the original may be five to twenty-five years out-of-date or more.
That is good enough for the audience of a Star Trek fan flick - but not good enough for the paying customers on an HBO subscription plan.
Yes, the MPAA and Al Quaeda look to \. for all their ideas, of course!
Balderdash!
Kind of reminds me of the path that movie channels like HBO, Showtime and AMC took. They all started out as just showing movies, but began to differentiate from each other by producing exclusive original content. And a lot that original content has been high quality stuff, like The Sopranos, The Wire, Mad Men, Breaking Bad. Maybe this will be the same way that distributors of online content will start to compete for customers?
How do they keep track of which episodes you've watched? You can only remove an entire season at a time.. not one by one.
I am in Canada, so it may be different from the states. I don't have anywhere to bookmark things I'd like to watch other than in Firefox. But once I've started watching something, Netflix puts it in my history which I can access anytime. The last three shows I watched are displayed at the top of the home page and there is a link to access everything I've already watched or am in the process of watching.
I'm not anti-social, I'm anti-idiot.
Episodes in a season you've seen will be marked as such. Also, if you start one but don't finish it, it will tell you how much you've seen and give you the option of starting where you left off. At least on the Xbox 360 and Sony TV clients, I assume the others (that I haven't used) have similar functionality.
All AT&T customers affected by this need to get together and file a lawsuit before this becomes the norm for all ISPs. This is nothing less than entertainment/cable providers attempting to kill the competition before it gets too rooted. Cable companies are scared shitless of streaming content, and the majority of U.S. entertainment customers don't know its even possible yet.
There is no way this should be l eagle, but without customer challenging NOW, it will be too late to do anything about it later, and you know damn well the DOJ doesn't give a shit about us.
--- Keep the choice with the user..
Idiots! Should have bought the rights to Firefly.
"On a scale from 1 to 10, people are stupid"
With the continuing fall in the price and continuing increase in the quality of CGI animation, the independent studios will make a major comeback and that's with direct distribution, studio to consumer, all middle men eliminated.
The current CGI houses are in the best position to start producing direct to consumer content. They can even fiddle with the content investment model, selling micro investments in the particular piece of content to be distributed, now that will require some real regulatory monitoring.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
Summer Glau, the unpredictable River Tam in Firefly, has proven to be the kiss of death for any show she works. Her latest role as "Orwell" in The Cape pretty much morphed this from theory to fact. Although I like Summer Glau, she brings dark clouds of doubt to any project she works on. However, I do think her role in Firefly was legitimate...Firefly was the victim of network morons. And I think she's hot...in a waif-ish, I-want-to-do-my-best-friend's-sister sort of way.
Windows assumes you are an idiot...Linux demands proof.
Don't they do that for first run shows they show very close to the air date? I thought they started that already (could be wrong).
I watched Legend of the Seeker and the first season of Spartatus on netflix. They would play the Starz logo before starting the episode but that is all I remember as far as commercials. And that is similar to the studio logos you see before a movie starts.
You may jest, but if I recall, the producers of SGU haven't entirely given up, and are looking for someone other than SyFy to possibly pick up the series. I think they even mentioned "alternative venues" or something like that. Really, even though it's not your fav, the way they've picked up in this last season, SGU may be a great fit for Netflix.
I don't get how people crap on syfy for canceling a series that they funded for 10 years. (I know you didn't actually say anything negative and that I am just rambling.)
24 season 24. Just skip to season 24. It's needed for the symmetry.
.. look to \. for ...
Wait, what? Have I fallen into a bizarro dimension where this site is called backslash dot?
The Quirkz Handbook of Self-Improvement for People Who Are Already Pretty Okay
yes escape dot. I'm tryin to get outa here!
Balderdash!
I'd rather the content creators and the distribution stay separate. This goes even for companies that I enjoy such as Netflix. There is just too much conflict of interest down the road when one company is both.