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Netflix CEO: Why Even $8 Billion Investment in Content Isn't Enough (axios.com)
Netflix expects to spend about $8 billion on content this year. For Hollywood studios, that's a reasonable figure. But for Netflix CEO Reed Hastings, it's not enough. From a report: The company is competing against a range of traditional entertainment companies around the globe, and of course, against the need to work, sleep and do other things. Speaking at TED in Vancouver, Hastings noted that $8 billion is about what Disney spends. "That's spread globally," he said. "It's not as much as it sounds." Hastings noted that House of Cards wasn't really the company's first effort at original content. It had tried back in the days when it was still mailing out DVDs. "It didn't work out because we were sub-scale," he said.
How much do HBO invest because they've consistently produced watchable "content". Netflix, Disney... not really.
I am truly sorry for my two spam posts, including the parent post. I will refrain from spamming Slashdot about Donald Trump in the future. Please accept my humble apology.
- Ivan
The valuation is insane and the service has gotten worse. This is not a company built to last.
would forget about Adam Sandler and swear to never create any content with Musical Contests, Batchelor* shows, or "deep hitting" news stories, they can save money and grow viewership.
What kind of site is that ?
Seems Slashdot editors are scooping stories from their which doesn't have any more detail.
Their shows are shit. That's a lotta change to dump into the toilet.
>It had tried back in the days when it was still mailing out DVDs
Um, newsflash. The DVD/Bluray service has never ended. It is still quite popular, and the ONLY way to go if you want any choice in movies from Netflix (or if you have little or metered Internet).
"Iconic since 1998. Celebrate 20 years of movies in your mailbox with behind-the-scenes videos, great movie recommendations, fun trivia, and the chance to win." http://dvd.netflix.com/
It had tried back in the days when it was still mailing out DVDs.
What does that mean? They are still mailing DVDs today, in April 2018, but that quote makes it sound like something they no longer do.
How much do HBO invest because they've consistently produced watchable "content". Netflix, Disney... not really.
Yeah, how much you actually spend on the thing has no direct relationship with how much money it makes. (See: Cutthroat Island, any one of the many enjoyable B-movies.) What you want is to spend the money well, on things people will actually want to see--throwing more money at a bad project will not actually help anything, unless the only thing that is wrong is it being painfully obvious that the budget for some key element is in the "~$5 found in a couch" region.
No one wants to hunt content on different services and maintain multiple subscriptions. This is arguably even worse than pay channels on cable, since as awful as that is, at least it's all on one bill. Rather than serving the customer something palatable, piracy still wins for content accessibility and ease of use. As it gets more difficult, people won't be looking for legal options, but for alternatives to TV all together.
Why is it so difficult to address the clear conflict of interest between delivery and content? These companies need to be split into pieces, just like ISPs.
You don't understand the meme. Ivan is pro-Trump, because that's Putin's line of control of the US adversary. That's why he videotaped whores peeing on him, not because Putin gives a fuck, because he OWNS a fuck- pause -ing dumbass.
The astute reader may notice that Netflix carries less and less network shows / movies and continues to push "Netflix Originals" -- all in an order to minimize a key expense.
What expense?
One of the secrets of the cable / streaming industry is that license costs continue to go up. In turn this gets passed onto the consumer.
So when Netflix says Disney spends $8 Billion --- is that to _produce_ content or to _license_ content? And is that ALL media such as TV Shows AND Movies, or strictly JUST TV shows? And is that JUST Disney or does that include ALL of its subsidiaries ?
Content cost are spiraling out of control.
i.e. The ten episodes of the first season of Westworld were reportedly produced on a budget of approximately $100 million.
Assuming that the $8 Billion Disney spends is solely to create content for TV shows -- that might seem like is a drop in the bucket compared to the budget of a few "blockbuster" movies. Here is a list of All the Disney films -- and here is a snippet of 2017 / 2018 movies:
Let's actually tally the budget -- assuming Disney foot the bill for all of its 2017 movies ...
* Dangal, $11 million USD
* Beauty and the Beast, budget $160 million USD
* Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 2, budget $200 million USD
* Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales, budget $230 million
* Cars 3, budget $175 million USD
* Thor: Ragnarok, budget $180 million USD
* Coco, budget ???
* Star Wars: The Last Jedi, budget $200 million USD
* Black Panther, budget $200 million USD
* A Wrinkle in Time, budget $100 million USD
Ergo it looks like $8 Billion was for BOTH movies AND TV Shows.
What's really stupid is that the cable industry STILL relies on the inaccurate, archaic Nielsen ratings. Via the STB / DVR boxes they already have (relatively) accurate metrics of what people are watching but for some reason continue to use an idiotic Nielsen rating to bargain licensing costs -- because they aren't in the content creation business -- only the content licensing business.
Since Netflix is in the process of migrating from strictly licensing content to producing content this $8 Billion figure shouldn't be a surprise.
What I DO find surprising is that since Netflix can tell _exactly_ which shows are popular -- one would think they would use this "hard data" to lower licensing costs to carry multiple network shows. Instead we get few and fewer selections each year it seems. Has anyone tracked the quantity of content available on Netflix over the years?
I don't have a huge issue with the service, my girl uses it and it is pretty simple and reliable.
I will say, I wish the darn comedy section could be split up from
Comedy : standup
Comedy : TV shows
Comedy : Indian Bollywood stuff.
Don't get me wrong, the occasionally Bollywood video is actually fun, as is stand up, but for goodness sakes they're so mashed together.
Also be nice to just have a Kodi style filter
Movie, over 6 IMDB, less than 10 years old, action / adventure / crime / thriller, etc
I know I'm asking for a lot since Slashdot still can't handle unicode in 2018, but it would be nice if we could set a list of words in our settings to not display posts containing those words.
#DeleteFacebook
They need to focus on quality content and not just throw money at every liberal extremist with a bad idea for a movie or show.
Even in my specific preferred Genre's.
I'm years behind. I fall more hours behind every week.
I've been retired six years.
I don't see how this glut is sustainable at high price levels.
I long ago shifted most of my consumption down the price curve since I was behind anyway.
I could not consume the available categories of entertainment I like if I started when I woke up and watched all day every day (and good lord I did a lot of that when I first retired).
And there are many categories I don't even have an interest to consume.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
Netflix has no other choice, it's not the expense of content. The deal is, Netflix can only present what it is POSSIBLE to buy.
Take Disney for example. Past a certain date, Disney content will leave Netflix. It's not that it has grown too expensive, Disney is just telling Netflix that content cannot be had at ANY price, because Disney wants people to use it's own streaming service.
The fact that Netflix is not ONLY Netflix only programming at this point, is actually kind of a minor miracle.
Luckily for me (and Netflix), I find enough Netflix content interesting along with Blu-Ray rentals that I'll not be leaving Netflix anytime soon. Netflix is also helped by the abomination that is most other streaming video sites/apps, which tend to send you crying back into the arms of Netflix.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
10 show seasons are NOT enough.
Jack of all trades,master of none
I have a list pushing 700 titles of feature films/documentaries that I've viewed over the years (which I started to fill out retrospectively about six years ago, as it became harder and harder to sift the seen from the unseen).
And I have another list of 400 titles with decent critical regard that I have yet to see (few unseen epics remain, but the list is not terrible).
My local library has about 80% titles on DVD and my local video store (20,000 item catalogue) has another 19.5% (long may it thrive). Total expense: about $30 per year, plus those annoying trips to the library, where I also borrow books, at least weekly.
Our total television consumption is the roughly 50 movies we rent/borrow each year. It has no other hookup.
The whole point of the long tail (for me, anyway) was that finally I could make my own list primary to the choice process (instead of the shifting sands of offered catalogues). For my purposes, the long tail has always been the only killer media app.
Any prospect of the average, unthinking sod toppling into my camp makes Disney very unhappy. And so they are busy feeding long-tail gremlins into the wood chipper, out behind Burbank's aged Annette Funicello building.
The mouse never forgets it's original business model.
I watch all their shows through the magic of media piracy. You can too.
Why? Because Netflix is a jerk company run by jerks.
If they dissolved the company tomorrow I would be jubilant.