Slashdot Mirror
Netflix Plans To Spend $7 Billion On Content In 2018 (streamingobserver.com)
According to the Streaming Observer, Netflix plans to increase its budget by $1 billion dollars over the next year and spend over $7 billion on content in 2018. Previously, the company paid $6 billion in 2017 and $5 billion in 2016. From the report: While the internet freaks out about Disney ending its streaming agreement with Netflix, the company continues to forge ahead signing high-profile talent and throwing an enormous budget at its original programming. Just days after the Disney turmoil, Netflix's visionary Chief Content Officer Ted Sarandos stated that the streaming leader plans to increase its budget by $1 billion dollars over the next year. As of now, Netflix currently has $15.7 billion in outstanding obligations in deals for new series and films over the next few years. With such an astronomically-large budget, media analysts are already beginning to wonder if Netflix is "rescuing" or "ruining" Hollywood by creating such a singular creator-producer-distributor model. Sarandos counters those claims, however, stating that Netflix is merely on the forefront of what's already a growing trend throughout the media industries: "I would say that the relationship between studios and networks has always been that of a frenemy. Everyone is doing some version of it already. They just have to make a decision for their companies, their brands and their shareholders on how to best optimize the content. We started making original content five years ago, betting this would happen."
Yes Disney has some nice content. But looking over things it's not that much compared to what I get from Netflix in terms of original programs...
Also the stuff from Disney tends to be in a certain style, while the Netflix content has been way more varied and differing in topic or target.
I wish Disney good fortune in striking out on their own but I wonder if these days they are as valuable a content commodity as they imagine themselves to be... especially with Netflix spending some percent of that money on original YA programming with more freedom of creative control than Disney is willing to give.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Or a why not 800 episodes at 3M/episode, and you pick what you want, but there is nore choice, you shulld be able to produce decent stuff for 3M /episode right?
So, like most others, I assume Firefly will finally be coming back???
Because most of us only have a few hundred hours per year to spend watching anyway.
Get a browser addon that plays video at higher speeds. They're miracle workers. I usually have mine set at 1.2x to 1.4x depending on the content. You quickly get used to it, and you save tons of time.
Is it their budget only for content creation, or is it the budget for content creation AND buying licenses for 'old' content.
To me, Netflix is going in the wrong direction, it was a good idea of having all old series (and movies) in one place, but now they are becoming more and more a boring content creater like any other network and we still can't see all the great series from the past which are a lot of times much better than the crap that's put out today.
I don't follow the argument, yes Netflix has more "channels" because it's on demand.
But I don't get why a channel can't appeal to multiple types, do channels need to have some image what shows they have? America in the 70s vs reality tv channel ?
This must spoil the show though, no? Do jokes and emotional moments still work when the timing has been artificially changed?
I hope they don't cancel too many shows when they turn interesting.
For example, "Defying Gravity" started out lame, but it got better. And the last episode was great - lots of momentum and "What will happen now?". And in that episode, the characters on the spaceship found out what the mission was about, and they reacted with astonishment and delight. And that was the last episode that was shown in the US! We (the US viewers) never found out what the mission was.
And the show "Alphas" ended on a cliffhanger. Everyone in Grand Central Station (or in NY City?) was killed, except Gary Bell, who was played by Ryan Cartwright. Cartwright is a terrific actor, and it looked like his character was going to save the world single-handedly. I was looking forward to seeing him do lots of acting to save the world in later episodes. But then I found out that that was the last episode, and that the show had been cancelled.
Grrr!!
Yes, it spoils the timing of everything. And since it's already spoiled at 1.2, I play everything at 60 to save even more time. Three hours movies only last three minutes. It's a real time saver!
#DeleteFacebook
Integrate a one click purchase into the Netflix apps so that you can buy a physical copy from them directly. My wife and I have seen some shows there that we'd buy a blu ray copy to give away to relatives who don't want Netflix.
Yeah! What the hell are we supposed to do? Read books or go outside?!
#DeleteFacebook
Danish women make the trip worthwhile, though.
#DeleteChrome
It works pretty well for genres that don't depend on jokes, emotion, and timing. Documentaries, history, educational stuff.
It may be true that the outside content providers that Netflix licenses with are not producing the greatest stuff; not only that, but the most desirable stuff doesn't end up on Netflix streaming service for a very long time, if at all. I will stick with Netflix for now, I like some of the original content, but that's not why I signed up with Netflix years ago so, on the whole, I've been very disappointed with streaming services in general. The divergence of content (providers like Disney forking off their own service) doesn't help matters any.
Stupid sexy Flanders.
No denying they have a large hold on things today.
But doesn't it feel like that is slipping? When most of the major movies are sequels it starts to look more like a retrograde action where Disney spends more more money on propping up aging IP than creating new things. Meanwhile Netflix plots another BILLION dollars down on new content...
I mean at this point who seriously cares about another Marvel movie?
I love Star Wars myself but after just a few more years of new Star Wars every year, even that will probably start to get old (I'll be among the first at Star Wars land though!!!).
Over time the people creating new IP will win, because even if 90% of everything sucks (which it does) when you are willing to spend several billion dollars on throwing shit on a wall you will come up with some cherished masterpieces, and create new IP that will be equally beloved for generations to come... across many categories.
Unfortunately even some of Netflix's originals are based on Disney IP, so Disney pulling out puts some of their best original content at risk.
The Netflix Marvel stuff is great, but it's just a handful of other great stuff Netflix has at this point... it's only at risk depending on how adept Netflix was at working up contracts. My guess, is they are very good at working contracts with IP owners... I don't think we'll ever see that stuff go offline.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I disagree, I think it's a really bad development that the streaming service providers are starting to license exclusive content.
In an ideal world, the fact that digital content is not naturally scarce should lead to an environment where I can pay X$ per year and get access to "all" available content. Spotify is pretty close to this model, and I know some people who have huge CD and record collections who prefer to listen via spotify because it is just easier.
The value of X is hard to determine, but the 'old' model was to create artificial scarcity by charging very high prices for content (20 euro for a CD, for example), thus causing most people not to have access to most content. However, if we have multiple streaming service providers who each negotiate with the various content right owners the market might be able to determine a sensible price per month that allows most people to view most content while giving decent renumeration to the rights owners and (hopefully) content creators. This model is not perfect, but a lot better than pricing individual items that cost near zero to reproduce. The goal of free market capitalism is to allocate capital and other scarce goods in a good way to maximize (some measure of) utility, not to create artificial scarcity and hence lower global utility.
However, if the streaming providers become right owners or have exclusive licensing deals, suddenly the market is no longer a commodity market where it doesn't really matter if I subscribe to service X or Y. Of course, this is exactly what Netflix et al want, because commodity markets don't have the kind of profits they would like.
I would be in favor of government action to force Netflix et al to be simple distributors, i.e. forcefully decouple content creation from content distribution.
(sorry for the self-reply. Maybe slashdot should wake up to the 21st Century and allow edits, at least within e.g. 5 minutes of posting. Or maybe I should think before I submit)
In addition to forcing Netflix to not produce their own content, all content providers should be forced to do non-discriminatory licensing. So if the allow Netflix to show X for Y$ per view or month or whatever, they should offer those terms to any interested distributor.
I am all for free markets, but companies don't necessarily act in a way that is good for the market. As Adam Smith famously said, “People of the same trade seldom meet together [..] but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices.”
Can we please have the 1st 5 seasons (and the movies) of Futurama back?
It could be worse, it could be Monday.
Not really, because the timing scales for everything. Like I said, you quickly get used to it. Dropping down to 1x seems like I'm watching in slow motion now.
YouTube has built in options at 1.25x, 1.5x, and 2x. I watch at 1.25x for anything longer than a couple of minutes, and often bump it up to 1.5x.
Sometimes I crank it to 2x until it gets to the part I care about if I'm worried about missing something. For example, if I'm following a tutorial I don't want to skip around haphazardly but I also don't need to sit through the shit I already know.
For Netflix, the addon I use lets me choose in increments of .1, I believe, so I normally do 1.2x to 1.4x.
Of course, I wouldn't watch Game of Thrones at high speed.
Just try 1.25x on YouTube for a bit and a similar setting for Netflix/etc. (there are tons of addons that do this). Weigh the impact it has on the content vs. time saved.
Yeah. Because quality is about nothing other than budget...
It's this very mentality that's killing Hollywood right now. They confuse razzle-dazzle with content.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
> Exactly! And why doesn't developer who's been out of work for more than a few months take a minimum wage job? They aren't making any money sitting at home so why not make a few bucks.
Why? Normal people have to eat. They don't get paid money for doing work they did 20 years ago.
None of the stuff we're talking about here should even be under copyright any more. The whole lot of it should be in the public domain. The only reason it isn't is because Disney BUYS laws to suit them.
This is only an issue because Disney is the great evil of the industry making this situation a problem.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
> Don't go to Denmark. Everyone is white.
So you haven't been to Denmark lately then?
You're far better off going to Ireland or Spain. Poland has also taken a hard line against non-white immigration.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
> Yeah! What the hell are we supposed to do? Read books or go outside?!
No need. There's 50 years of TV and 100 years worth of cinema to chose from. You don't need to do anything silly like "read a book".
if you are interested in the back catalog, you don't have to bother with Netflix or any of the streaming services.
When Hollywood comes out with a bad remake, just watch the original. Sometimes buying the remake is a cheaper way to aquire the original.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Netflix, Disney, Amazon Video, Apple, CBS (Star Trek) and other legacy networks seeking relevancy. https://www.theverge.com/2017/... All of your screens are belong to us..
You can either (1) make your own content and get licenses in perpetuity (even if NF folds as a movie place, their content is still valuable) or (2) license content from studios which can change their prices on a whim.
By depending on the whims of studios, Netflix makes a decision not to be subjugated into irrelevance when studios raise their prices (as they've been doing). Think of them like HBO now or something.
-- Political fascism requires a Fuhrer.