Streaming's Future isn't Good (and we're still stuck with it)
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- Опубликовано: 19 апр 2024
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A couple of things that have happened since I shot that which ABSOLUTELY feed into my points:
1) Netflix has announced that starting in 2025 they will no longer report subscriber numbers. Translation: PLEASE stop measuring us by growth, we can't get any bigger, we need you measure us by profitability.
2) Sony is in talks to bid on Paramount. Remember how I said "I expect more merger and buy out attempts"? Yeah, well I don't like being right about that.
Better another studio than VC.
@@AceOfSevens What’s "VC"?
@@adamdavis1648 Venture Capital.
@@adamdavis1648 Venture Capital. It could get bought by someone with no connection to the movie industry & sold for parts.
Yeah, Netflix’s tandem announcement of “we finally had a quarter of growth!” and “no more public data, shh” was not lost on me. I can just picture execs waiting for some decent investor news to yeet subscriber data so it wouldn’t look like they had their tail between their legs.
Streaming Services constantly removing movies and shows, is a major reason why I still buy and collect DVDs and Blu-Rays.
The problem there is the vast quantity of stuff that never seems a physical release.
@@CouncilofGeeks Fun-Fact: Over the past year HBO Max began removing many classic Looney Tunes shorts… which sucked because many of them were newly restored and had never been previously available on DVD and Blu-Ray.
George Feltenstein who runs the Warner Archive Collection (I.e the in-house boutique label at WB) and his accomplice Animation Historian Jerry Beck - both of whom are responsible for many previous Looney Tunes home media releases - retaliated to Max’s idiocy by launching a new Blu-Ray series called Looney Tunes Collector’s Choice, that contained many of shorts removed from Max that were previously unavailable on DVD/Blu-Ray.
@@CouncilofGeeks There may be a growing effort to pirate and sell bootleg DVDs of series that aren't available in physical form. It won't save everything, but it's something in case of junking.
...I am probably dumb, but I kinda wish the "removing a show for tax writeoffs" meant the completed shows were given to public domain early, with state/federal library archives or streaming services set up so one could watch them.
@@elizawulf8180 That wouldn't happen because that means the companies will lose money and lose their justification for tax write off of ips in the first place.
People never seemed to realise that the streaming service replaced the physical rental market with an exact digital equivalent.
As someone who works in film professionally...
_I... HAVE... LITERALLY... BEEN... SAYING THIS... for YEEEEEEEARS_
Seriously, my peers always looked at me like I was crazy, saying I was "objectively wrong/this is for sure the trajectory it's going and nothing will change that," and as usual my extensive knowledge of the industry I _literally work in_ has been proven right... again. Like, exclusivity is not sustainable, it's why studios owning theaters and making them exclusively play only their movies (and nobody else's) failed as a business model in the 1940s. Audiences don't want to have to choose only one companies movies they get to see at the exclusion of anybody else's, and they won't buy from every single "exclusive outlet" to get everything for economic reasons, so then every studio simply doesn't make profit. This also failed in the video game industry, which is why multi-platform releases are slowly becoming a thing again.
How it took this long for literally every other person to figure out what I laughed while realizing years ago is beyond me.
EDIT: also, to throw in a "yes and" (not a counterargument), I wouldn't say streamers "killed" video stores... so much as the outlet for that became libraries. Like, yeah, you can't make MONEY lending out physical copies anymore, so I suppose they killed _commercializing_ disc loaning, but disc loaning/physical media loaning definitely still exists strongly in actual practice as a preferred way a lot of people access the canon of cinema and film works. Though I will say libraries, in my experience, are slow to get their titles from DVDs to Blu-Rays (let alone 4K) which is why a lot of people are buying if "top notch quality" is their thing.
I'm just here to validate you fam. I saw SO MANY PEOPLE try to warn 'em. Hell we were sayin' it BEFORE IT HAPPENED. like we got Netflix and we were like "this is cool... but it only works if it's JUST Netflix." Hulu comes itn and we're like "okay... some competition is probably fine, good even, but like we should really stop here." Etc Etc. And having seen professionals speak about their interactions with those in decision making positions, I get the impression that they probably WERE warned directly. But you know, the decision makers are not the ones who *actually* work in the business & they're all too happy to dismiss actual experts when they see dollar signs they perceive to be rightfully theirs.
"Like-- why would we care what some 'film professional' *thinks* will happen? uhhh, we LITERALLY have the numbers?? netflix is gettin' more outta this deal than we are??? so like. OBVIOUSLY we're gonna just do the shit ourselves. smh. this is why we make the big bucks amirite boys?" fuckin five years later and now they're definitely out here like "WHY DIDN'T ANYONE TELL US. JERRY. WHAT THE FUCK. HOW'D YOU GET THE MATH SO WRONG???"
Also, to add onto your Edit: I also believe that for as much as they want to try to push us away from physical media, they're actually going to push us back toward a demand for it. Like. You can't watch your favorite show on streaming? Okay so ur gonna go buy it. This won't work for more recent shows that are intentionally being made without a physical release. But older shows? MOVIES?? I would NOT be surprised to see people seek to own their faves now that these companies are showing that they will just... nuke content on what often feels like a whim. While I know a lotta ppl will just don their pirate hats (and I for one will not judge in these trying times; especially when some of the mediums have no other options), maybe we'll get lucky and see this bring people to libraries. That's uh... okay maybe that's pushin it but it would be NICE!!
If only capitalists could understand the concept of finality
They probably think they can buy immortality if they squeeze customers hard enough.
Wouldn’t it be absolutely lovely if companies could be like “Yeah, we're holding steady and making enough profit to give our employees a living wage, let's just hold steady like this, we don’t need more,” instead of chasing a fever dream of infinite growth that is by the nature of our finite world utterly impossible?
That can happen for a private company. But for any public traded one like these massive corporations, it's impossible. If you're the sole owner of a company and your company has a steady income that allows it to function, then you have very little incentive to try new income generators that put your company at risk. But if you have a public traded company helmed by faceless bureaucrats that only care if line goes up and don't really get affected when the company goes down, then it's almost impossible that they don't push the company to the point of breaking in order to squeeze a 1% growth. As an invester you lose very little and stand to gain so much.
Ps: I'm not saying that private companies will always have better consumer and employee policies, just that they have less incentive to be complete shit.
@@AgusSkywalkerYup, 100% agree. Take Valve for example; They have a really good service called Steam that often gives great deals for PC games and they've been steadily maintaining the line for a while now. They don't have shareholders and, hopefully, never will.
However, Epic games aptly named, Epic Store, aimed to compete with Steam Specifically. Safe to say, Epic Games is publicly owned, with a major investor being Tencent, and they have been struggling to make a profit with it, while Valve has the money to invest in a VR platform (The Steam Index) and more importantly, The SteamDeck, their answer to portable PC gaming that, surprisingly, works shockingly well.
Trying to teach finality and entropy to a capitalist is like trying to teach a dog thermo-dynamics. It can technically be done, but they won't understsnd beyond the concept of "Ouch! fire hot!", and even then Capitalists won't understand that finality also applies to them.
Paramount is dropping a *ton* of Star Trek shows:
- Picard ended last year
- discovery is ending this year
- they cancelled prodigy last year
- they cancelled lower decks this year
Literally the only ongoing show right now is strange new worlds.
Yes, they have a new show in production right now (starfleet academy), but they equally refuse to green light Star Trek legacy, which people in front and behind the screens have been eager to do.
My only real conclusion is a) paramount is *fucked*, they have no money, and b) it’s going to be bought out sometime this year.
Here’s hoping whoever buys them invests in Trek 🤷♀️
I believe Paramount was struggling even before Paramount Plus launched. They re-merged with CBS to kick start some growth and kick the can down the road
@@SLPrawn65 CBS was dying too, but Paramount just made things worse, because it was already drying up itself, and I can't see why didn't the Redstones didn't see that. lol
There’s an unspoken irony in the fact Paramount practically choked everyone on Star Trek stuff at the beginning because they had *shit* but now they’re treating it like absolute doodoo.
It's wild because the world of PC gaming storefronts/launchers went through this exact rigmarole over the last 10 or so years. Big publishers began pulling high profile games from Steam (the Netflix equivalent) in favor of making them exclusive to their own in-house platforms: Epic Games Store, EA Origin, Uplay, BethesdaNet, Microsoft Store, etc. For a while it became legitimately dizzying trying to determine which games were available where because everything was so divided up across countless services. And you know what happened? The majority of these services flopped, and publishers went crawling back to Steam, because they realized Valve's established userbase and infrastructure was probably worth the 30% revenue split they took from each sale. It's pretty much the same situation with these movie studios and licensing.
Bottom line is: there's only so many accounts and services people are willing to sign up for before inconvenience starts to outweigh the convenience and it becomes too much, and companies are learning it the hard way across every sector.
A big thing working in Valve's favor is that they're not very interested in vertical integration. The few games they produce are kind of like "reference material" producers on the distribution platform can use as examples of how not to suck on the various hardware platforms. Even the hardware ventures focus on leading the industry only where and while it's failing to innovate. Giving a shit about platform quality, it turns out, is a viable alternative to market capture through content exclusivity.
A truly principled consumer would still stick to GoG. But Steam stays good enough to satisfy the vast majority of consumers with relatively minor gripes (like difficulty filtering out games with DRM, not reporting 1st party DRM, and negligence in handling offline behavior).
PC gamers have a notoriously high tolerance for industry BS and will happily compromise their security, privacy, the gaming experience itself, and even content ownership. The failures at leveraging vertical integration there give me hope that the video streaming model will itself also collapse and at least not be the only mainstream option. Without content exclusivity, they'd have failed ages ago already.
I think Newells understanding of piracy also helps a lot. The movie industry doesn't see piracy as the competitor like they should, but something evil and unknown
@@xWood4000 "Piracy is not a financial issue, it's a service issue."
I think that's more or less what he said. But yeah, 100% agree. I have never pirated anything because money was an issue. It's usually because I can't get it reasonably otherwise.
Fun fact about me, there are three games I pirated back when I built my first computer. Tron 2.0, Psychonauts, and Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood.
The very first game I bought when I discovered Steam, was Psychonauts, followe by Call of Juarez, and then once Disney put Tron 2.0 on Steam, I was able to finish my collection of Pirated PC Ports.
I pirated these games originally becaue I couldn't find them anywhere else and I didn't feel like paying a "collectors fee" searching Ebay for an old copy of these games that I wouldn't be able to play anyway because I 1) don't own Xbox consoles, and 2) My PS2 died years prior.
Man, when streaming first started out I treated piracy like, “You wouldn’t download a car.” because I expected streaming to be better than that, but now that it’s clearly much worse I hate having ever complained about piracy and now pirate all my movies and stuff.
It’s like Futurama, where streaming is now known to disrupt shit instead of being a benefit.
They've also "broken" customer expectations. I was once willing to pay $5 to rent a movie. Now I expect to stream movies 24/7 for $15 a month.
I think these are my favourite type of videos on the channel. As good as most of the content is, I feel like these discussions in particular are something I can't find elsewhere, at least without them being either incredibly shallow or straight-up clickbait.
Which is probably why they underperform relative to my other stuff but I’m glad to hear people like them.
Another important note: at present, I don't think a lot of people are willing to pay for content that ALSO includes ads. I am happy to watch stuff with ads on Tubi and Pluto because I don't have to pay for those. If I'm paying for a streaming service, I don't want to have to see ads. I don't want to have to pay MORE for no ads. It's no ads on all tiers or I will not be using your platform.
My local library was known for having a great physical media section, and I was devastated recently when I found out they got rid of a ton of DVD/Blu-rays and completely trashed their CD section cause many artists don't even put out physical CDs anymore. I'm glad I've been collecting certain movies for a while, because now I'm having to really build out my physical media collection cause of the increasing digital-only media empire....
I like to get DVDs from the library and even CDs occasionally. Even if I'm the only one doing it, I'll keep doing it
I think too that they are coming to the realization that not everybody can be subscribed to 75 platforms. Often, I just want to pay $20 for one single TV series. Or I frequently sign on for a platform for just a month and then cancel to watch one show only.
I do this as well. I’ll subscribe after a new season of a show I want to see finishes and watch it. Then I unsubscribe. Works pretty well. Did that with Starz for each season of Outlander. Then there are shows I watch often like Classic Who and Buffy. Britbox and Hulu keep me subscribed for those two shows alone. I should probably just buy the seven seasons of Buffy. It would be way cheaper. For Classic Who, I’m not willing to spend that much money for all the many many season so Britbox will keep my subscription.
I'm getting so tired of Netflix pumping out shows, without knowing if they're going to get cancelled or not. It's not worth getting invested in. I still have Netflix but I watch older shows, mini-series, or good things I've already seen.
Btw Vera, your glasses are so cute! 💖
Yeah, those glasses really work.
Niche streaming services are an idea I actually think can work pretty well... the problem is that bigger services keep wanting to interfere and take content away.
Like having a service like Crunchyroll for Anime or Shudder for Horror makes sense to me as those have niche but dedicated fanbases who will keep subscribing... but companies are now dividing up that content so you can't say 'I'll sub to CR to see all the new anime' because Netflix and Disney have snapped up some shows (and in Disney's case, not told anyone and killed a show's chance of western success) or 'I'll sub to Shudder and watch a bunch of classic horror, oh wait all the big names are on other services like Paramount and... wait Lionsgate has a service now?!'
Back when it was 'here's two big services and also some smaller ones for more niche things', it was so much more pleasant (and it had it's issues as well) but now researching where something you want to watch is available is just a *nightmare* and that's before you even get into the region locking.
I agree and what’s really frustrating for me is that you see season 1 or 2 on one service and then 3 or 4 on another. You have to buy a sub for crunchy and prime to watch all of one show.
It is happening a lot!
I am currently thanking HiDive for having all seasons of a few of there shows but I’m still seeing it on others which crunchy or HIDIVE don’t have rights to or something I don’t know it’s so confusing…..
And disney really dont has to, disney should work pretty good even whats in the disney vault.
And I heard Shudder recently got bought out by a bigger company and the quality declined massively. Which is why mergers also suck, since the big titans that keep gobbling up smaller platforms but don’t want to actually invest money or manpower in the niche thing they bought.
Didn't Crunchyroll do a merger where they told people who bought stuff from the mergie company "you don't get to keep your stuff and we're not giving refunds - too bad, so sad"?
@@Alverant Sadly, yes, and it's why even when I use them as example here, I should've clearly said that, my bad.
I have extremely mixed feelings on CR and do not really like them potentially being a monopoly so in theory I welcome them having competition in the form of HiDive after they ate Funi and don't even really have an issue with Netflix *that* much these days as they seem to be better about promoting the anime they pick up - the issue is largely with Disney and Amazon who are/were scooping things up with seemingly no care for the customers they are supposed to be appealing to. Disney+ is where anime goes to be forgotten and that used to be true of Amazon before they just gave up entirely.
Essentially my issue is one of archival and convenience for customers - Amazon has proven there are shows they will licence, forget about it, never physically release and then said show can go poof from western audiences reach - this just happened with Re:Creators and, frankly, I expect this to happen sooner rather than later with the anime Disney+ has (not the SJ stuff but Summer Time Rendering, Heavenly Delusions, that type of thing)
Yeah, I didn't mean my comment to be an endorsement of Crunchyroll as a perfect angel who should have all the anime - they're a bad company who I am in favour of seeing get more competition but I'd rather that be niche services than massive services who aren't actually interested in platforming anime.
This video coming right after the Watcher announcement is hilarious.
Good luck to those guys I guess. RIP
What's the "Watcher announcement"?
They're a RUclips channel that's leaving youtube to start their own streaming service for their own content. let's just say that people aren't happy with this move.
I SWORE that would have played a part in the vid lol
@@adamdavis1648 I think they meant "Witcher".
Piracy will just make a comeback so as usual who will suffer more are the creatives.
I really hope that streaming becomes less and less successful. It should always be an option, but it shouldn't take away from physical releases which are a far better option for the fans.
After watching everyone get in to this whole Streaming War, I always thought it was going to come down to this. Everyone knew there were too many separate streaming services, but nobody wanted to admit they lost - they wanted to be left as a winner at the end. But of course, taking your stuff out of a bundle made getting all the services more expensive, which made consumers even more reluctant to pay for all the services. In my view, there were (and are) only two guaranteed winner: Disney and Netflix. Netflix was in such a lead that they were going to be among the last standing. Disney has two things - it was clear they were going to get Hulu, Comcast wasn't going to want to be the junior partner in that endeavor while also backing Peacock, their competitor. Plus, they were going to get some money from the sale. 2. Disney ALSO has a recognizable bunch of shows/movies that people know is from them. The Disney back catalogue, which parents with kids are going to love to have for a bit, Star Wars, and Marvel. Plus some other important things. Disney will be fine. They will be battered, but Disney Plus will continue to exist in some form.
The others are all up in the air. I thought Max had a shot, but through a combination of their rebranding and other problems, it's become clear that Max is a much longer shot at winning than we thought.
Sony has played a very canny game here. They didn't set up a streaming service. They were like "hey, we'll license out these things to you, that's money we'll be taking on! And we aren't spending money on infrastructure that might end up being worthless!" This seems to be a smart play in this market.
The number of subscription services I refuse to get out of sheer spite grows by day 😂
I'm a longtime MMO addict and a former, 14-year, WoW player. Fortunately, there are two fairly big MMOs that have managed to survive ... Elder Scrolls Online and Final Fantasy XIV. Neither has exactly eaten WoW's lunch, but they're hanging in there and, thankfully, giving other options to those of us who can't quit the genre, but don't want to support Activision/Blizzard. I suspect their survival is primarily due to the fact that they're both connected to major, preexisting franchises with large fanbases, so the companies who own then don't have to rely on the MMO to be all that profitable. Similar to why Apple and Amazon will probably survive longer in the streaming space.
There are a couple of others at that scale, too, like Guild Wars 2 or Old-School Runescape. And the market is absolutely littered with smaller, "AA" MMOs that have been quietly trucking on for years. Star Wars the Old Republic, the Lord of the Rings Online, even Everquest still gets regular content. The MMO is honestly in a much more healthy place than Ms Wylde implies in this.
Disney has already started releasing some of their exclusive shows on physical media already, and some of their cut projects have also wound up on digital stores too. Another thing I noticed is that they’ve licensed out some of their Fox properties to other streamers like Netflix.
One of the sad parts of Disney Plus for me is that Disney is just sitting on a bunch of really great content for no discernable reason. You ever notice that shows like The Jersey or The Famous Jett Jackson aren't on Disney Plus? Because I have.
That weird horror movie Disney made too. I’ve been trying to find it on streaming for years
Okay, so I learned some information about this: I don't know if the same is true for The Jersey, but apparently the reason they have not released The Famous Jett Jackson has to do with distribution rights. Although this aired on Disney Channel, this is apparently one of the rare things that Disney does not own outright. They no longer have distribution rights to it, so they cannot put it on Disney Plus.
I have been saying this for the better part of a couple years. There are simply players in streaming that never had any business being there. CBS/Viacom (Paramount) licensed the CW content to Netflix for one billion dollars. That's billion with a B. That was a huge chunk of change to leave on the table by locking content behind your own paywall streaming platform. I don't know about mergers as long as the Biden Administration is in power (hopefully the next 5 years). They have been pretty hostile to most mergers (with good reason). Paramount, WBDS, and any other companies that are also in the business of MAKING content will still be able to license it out (like they did before). The other ones though...they might end up just folding.
Thank you for the video, Vera!
It is almost funny how libertarians and capitalist apologists would say "competition between corporations is good" (to be fair, monopolies are also awful) or "the free market will self-regulate and become healthy and self-sustainable". But that is the problem: it is all a lie. The actual point is the infinity growth by any means necessary. "The line must always go up." That is why we are seeing corporations taking so many anti-consumer and anti-employee measures: to make the financial books to appear slightly better.
As a libertarian leaning fellow I disagree. Capitalism and especially the kind we have in the US specific to streamers isn't actually about infinite growth. Growth is one metric to determine success by the view of capitalists, investors, and shareholders. But market share has been a far greater measurement. Or profitablity. But due to regulations i.e. the government which I assume you are a lefty, you presumed lefties champion, growth was prioritized. Now growth is again because of the government and regulations is falling in importance.
Don't forget that Paramount Plus already made two modern Star Trek shows that that it doesn't show on it's own servers but licences out to others - Picard and Progeny (the latter from season two onwards).
I appreciate the pedantry of saying someone "drank the FlavorAid." Kudos!
Yes! Making a movie and then scrapping it (Batgirl, etc) and taking a write off is exactly like arson! I’ve been thinking that for a while now. And, what would stop studios from making this part of their business model? How many movies can you write off? Thank you ⭐️
I think they did think they could severely cripple Netflix because I mean. It makes sense from a certain point of view. Take your toys and go home. I think it might have even worked had it not been such a naked cash grab and if they’d taken their time. Disney+ started pumping out original stuff immediately and aggressively. WB was…well frankly it was baffling. They had a stellar library of films, some excellent series out there gate, and built a decent reputation when it came to docuseries. I wasn’t rooting for any one streaming service, but I thought HBOMax had a pretty bright future. Idek why considering their other abandoned streaming projects. Honestly, for me. It’s just made me decide to start acquiring things I want to keep and watch again and again instead of rely on streaming sites to show them. Hell, my favourite movie is never on streaming and can’t even be purchased digitally. Physical copies generally run around $50 retail. Something something capitalism bad indeed.
Anddisney plus, why didnt it use the disney vault?
Now I’m curious what your favorite movie is?
Something obscure that was never findable unless you had one of those really amazing non-Blockbuster video rental stores, but the deep back catalog of Netflix initially made it seem plausible?
Or something popular that you’d think would be easy to find, but the rights-holders apparently would rather make $0 than whatever they’d get from licensing fees for streaming?
One word Zaslav --- Zaslav is the reason WB are struggling so massively, because his way of doing things led to microscope being put heavily on them because of his nonnsense with Batgirl.
Paramount is already licensing out Star Trek. Not all the movies are on Paramount+. Some are on Max instead. Plus, they sold Prodigy to Netflix.
Basically we traded traditional cable for internet version of cable where every channel is now a premium channel like hbo showtime and Cinemax is for traditional cable and satellite companies it was pretty obvious when the binge model for watching shows failed and the other main stream services didn’t adopt the binge model and left it to die with Netflix and went back to the weekly release model cause it kept the shows discussed longer than with the binge model and the wait time usually isn’t as long cause they can be working on the next season while airing the current season if there will be a new season
While I do binge sometimes, I hate the binge model as the default. I like waiting for a new episode of a show to premier
@@Dave102693 I don’t mind the binge model for completed shows but not for ones still being produced cause there is a longer wait time cause of having to write and shoot the next season to get all episodes out at once instead of the better option the weekly release and it keeps fan engagement longer
The weekly release is just done to hide the fact that they don't have very much content.
I remember when Hulu was free with ads. That was back when this all started. Now they all realize that ad supported tiers are required because since the dawn of TV - ad space buys are literally how they actually make money
I feel like prime will be fine since it's Amazon. And crunchyroll is the anime place. Netflix, Hulu, prime and crunchyroll will likely be the only remaining services.
Disney plus internationally has a lot of the Hulu stuff so I wonder if they might merge in the US as well
The bigger issue with CR for me is the other bigger companies keep taking shows, not doing anything with them and then these things just sit forgotten - Re:Creators just left Amazon Prime and now... there's no way to watch it outside of Japan cause of no physical release.
Reminds not Eminence in Shadow on HiDive and Bleach on Hulu/Disney+
Which is bs
Just to clarify, i am not saying this is right or good. Just a guess.
Fun fact: here in Europe, I can watch the Titans series and every Star Trek series on Netflix.
Netflix’s big disruption was running an entertainment company like a tech company. That is where the idea of streaming even came from. What the studios didn’t understand when they dove headfirst into these waters is that tech companies often don’t run at a profit. They run on potential profits to draw in investors. The studios never worked that way. They run off actual profits, which they are very good at quantifying (and often even fudging, but even they can’t fudge this). Rentals, physical sales, TV/cable licensing were all known entities and were factored into the P&L estimates for a given project. And then add the pandemic on top of it which removed much of the initial box office and you’ve really pulled the rug out from under the studios. That is why we’re seeing so much floundering now. These are death spasms for the old way of doing things.
And you’re absolutely right that what we’ve been left with isn’t sustainable and never was and the studios gleefully threw away the thing that worked and was predictable for this big promise that was always a lie.
And consumers have had enough too. Because now it’s not just Netflix or Hulu or even just movie streaming services. There are subscriptions for music streaming, for various types of software we use regularly, for food delivery, for package delivery, for all sorts of things. We’ve got subscription fatigue and as the economy continues to suck the entertainment is what’s going to go first.
What’s really funny is they went so all in on streaming that the studios have stopped releasing many titles on physical media. Then they pulled those titles from streaming too. The new Willow series is a great example of that. Fantastic show, had already developed a dedicated audience, then it got pulled from Disney+ and no physical release was ever available, or even digital downloads. So what’s left if we want to watch it? Piracy. There’s no other option. Studios used to crow and crow about how piracy was going to destroy the entertainment industry and now they’re making piracy the only option. It’s hilarious how much they’re cutting off their nose to spite their face.
I love the wonderland necklace
That combined with discussing how all the studios and networks started their own platforms, when the problems with the approach were pretty obvious if they'd just stopped to consider they weren't the only ones doing it, feels...
well
"We're all mad here. I'm mad, you're mad. You must be mad, or you wouldn't be here."
One of my favourite (paraphrased) quotes because it seems to get more and more relevant to the real, actual world every day :)
I'm so glad I haven't once touched a streaming service. Though Disney+ is tempting just because it's included in with my cable and everything. Though if that deal ever ends, I'm not subscribing to it again.
Honestly, I question if whether public broadcasters akin to the BBC may be the answer long term? Not privately funded and aiming for profit, and providing platforms for this content to be hosted. The main issue with the BBC specifically on this is that they are currently already underfunded and would obviously have to pay a lot in licensing alone, but that can be supplemented with negotiating a proportion of merch sales and such (at least for that region). Idk, not a perfect option but could be something that ends up happening down the line as a means to try to reduce total numbers of services but avoid the issues of private monopolies
Yeah a PBS/BBC styled streaming service would be a great idea.
Over here (UK) the main broadcast channels are buying up content for their 'free with ads' tier of platform. That Andrew Garfield Mormon cop show which previously had only been on D+ is on ITVX. The Anne Rice series are on BBC.
As streaming prices rise I can easily see people just moving back to broadcaster platforms because they will only need to pay for ad free or exclusive content options.
I equate the current streaming situation to what would have happened if instead of VHS winning the format war, every Hollywood studio had their own format and you had to buy a dozen different VCRs to watch everything.
Another problem with the big streaming services is the carbon footprint. They require massive servers that are on all the time all around the world.
I so miss Netflix DVDs. I had a huge list of documentaries, films, etc that are just not available with streaming. All these split up streaming services is a nightmare to keep track of and forget finding movies from before 2000. Let alone Oscar winners from before 1970.
Surprised that you never brought up Disney Plus considering adding channels with ads akin to Amazon's Freevee channels or Pluto TV. Although that's fair depending on when this was filmed.
The only thing I really care about is where modern Doctor Who will go once the license is up next year. Will Disney distribution scoop it up? Will it go to Tubi?
Doctor Who on Disney Plus is multi-year
Yeah I can't imagine Disney would have invested in it so heavily just for like 12 episodes
When it comes to burning completed projects for tax deductions and to screw people out of royalties, in the long term, if I'm a director or an actor, I would be hesitant to work for Warner Brothers given their habit of doing this. It might work in the short-term, but their relationship with the people who make the content is damaged.
If you keep burning down your own factory for the insurance money at some point I'm going to have to stop selling you insurance.
I really like your comments about the "disruption" model and the negative effects of what is occurring (like the scrapping of shows without ever airing them). I think that there are too many streaming services competing and it isn't sustainable. Obviously there will be a shakedown in the number of the streamers and more mergers. We started out with Netflix but they don't carry any content we're interested in anymore ever since they dropped their British dramas. Most of the streamers we subscribe to are niche streamers (BritBox, Criterion). As well, I wish Doctor Who fans in North America didn't have Doctor Who episodes split among 3 different streamers - here in Canada, Classic Who is on Britbox, NuWho from Eccleston to Capaldi is on Amazon Prime (Whittaker's episodes aren't currently available to stream) and from the 60th anniversary going forward on Disney+. I only subscribe to Disney+ periodically to see Doctor Who and then cancel it afterwards, (I'm not interested in the rest of their content & I'm completely tapped out on Marvel.) BTW if I love a show (and will rewatch it multiple times), I still buy the physical media on DVD so I will always have it.
As a massive Looney Tunes and Chuck Jones fan… I love the thumbnail for this video.
I have mixed feelings about the streaming market. One the one hand, having so many different platforms thins it down to much and makes it to expensive for anyone to subscribe to them all. On the other hand, Netflix already has issues. They cancel good shows because they feel they make more money making something new instead of with an established property. Maybe I'm to cynical to see any good from either end of the business. Then again, capitalism.
Why would mire streaming services drive prices up, and why would feeling they can make more money on something new motivate them to cancel shows? Shouldn't the opposite of both of those things happen?
@@adamdavis1648 Netflix's thought is that new shows bring in more viewers than making a new season of an existing show.
@@tunafarrell2067 What the new shows stuff sounds better than making a new season of an existing show because it means they aren't relying on nostalgia and might be able to create more creative shows.
@@tunafarrell2067 Shouldn't they be afraid that canceling shows will cost them viewers?
@@adamdavis1648 that's what I would think, but apparently the Netfix executives have different opinions.
I actually got rid of Netflix *and* Paramount Plus in one fell swoop when they took DS9 (the only Trek left on Netflix in my region at the time). It didn't matter to me that I could still watch it on Paramount Plus, the market manipulation pissed me tf off, and DS9 is my comfort show. To the high seas! 😂
Amazon already added ads. It’s insane that this was everyone thinking ads in TV was something they could remove from the industry when it is literally what funds it.
The WWE network last year went to Peacock in the US. For the rest of the world it moves to Netflix from next year. Perhaps more streaming services merging is inevitable.
Warner Bros. inner dialog, "But I was going to be a Nabisco, and replicate their OREO success, eclipsing Netflix's Hydrox, and we would have gotten away with it, if it wasn't for those dang meddling kids."
Yeah, that's because Hydrox seemed to have sucked and Oreo was the first to do it well and stayed on top. It's never the precise first to win, but first, to do it well, lol
It's funny that due to Streaming, I've started to lose track of potential shows and films I was interested in. Missing the last few DC movies at the cinema for example. Seeing one film only available on a separate platform to one I have, means that if I'm still interested in it. I'll await a physical release. Because I'm not going to waste money buying into a streaming service for one show or movie. I've been interested in the odd trailer from Shudder or Crunchyroll. But I had enough Netflix trials in the past to realise that by and large streaming isn't worth it.
Also doesn't help the dick move of region locking that many of these platforms enjoy.
We don’t need one or two streaming platforms (mono or duopoly) but we also don’t need 10 of them. A comfortable 4, maybe 5 will maximise profits for most of the streaming/creation business without exploiting the consumers.
Also…. Economic forces mean people have less spare cash to pay for things like streaming so not only does slicing up the pie into smaller chunks not make sense but also the pie is naturally shrinking right now (and will grow again the future), so many of the assumptions of the new streaming platforms are so uninformed.
So what about RUclips? It's the original streaming service. It's the only one I pay for and that's to avoid ads. I use it enough to justify the cost. I could buy TV shows and movies, but what guarantee do I have that the licenses are going to stick? I can buy permission to watch a show, but tomorrow the owner can change their mind and revoke that permission and not give me a refund. YT isn't perfect, but it gives me the best value. I'm not sure if they're profitable, but it's become one of those "too big to fail" things due to how many people use them.
One thing that i think they didn't take into account is people can only spend so much on streaming services and since it seems like every channel out there has one, most people would only be able to afford a handful of them.
Having been in board room meetings (granted not entertainment industry, but I find corporate environments are pretty similar across the board) I feel comfortable in saying that they are not unaware, they just make it a mission to "be sure they pick ours." A mission that is frequently failed.
What some people do is a revolving door approach. When a new show debuts on a streaming service, people just pay for a one month subscription and then cancel it after they watched whatever it is that they wanted to see. Then they wait for another season or a new show before resubscribing. That is why so many studios pump out content for the sake of content. That's not really sustainable regardless of the quality.
We've kinda already seen it start too. Paramount started airing Yellowstone on CBS. Disney (hulu) started airing Only Murders in the Building on ABC.
Granted, that was more a side effect of having no new outputs because of the WGA & SAG-AFTRA strikes, & they did still only air it on channels they owned. But I imagine that was the start of this pivot
You realize that Paramount owns CBS and Disney owns ABC right?
This was super interesting!! I love peeking behind the business curtains.
I can't say I'm surprised. Frankly, my biggest frustration with streaming services recently was the launch of Paramount+ in Canada - until that moment, it licensed Star Trek and some other stuff to a Canadian-based service that also had licensing deals with Warner Bros. (giving it HBO shows and some movies, like DC superhero films, etc.), but I can't justify the subscription for Paramount+, it doesn't have enough I want (also, it may have cost the Canadian service my subscription, too, as it had already been a razor-thin margin of being worthwhile). Licensing is definitely a major aspect of why Netflix succeeded and what has caused some trouble for it since the splits began - it was built on being the "one-stop for all you want to watch" and isn't anymore but little else can properly supplant it because they just fractured the market instead.
You should also add into the equation that new media like streaming wasnt covered by contracts. So it was a chance for studios to screw unions on who gets what and when and how. But given the recent strikes by actors and writers... that's been nailed down and now everyone knows who gets what.
My favorite part of this video is you saying “drank the flavor-aid” like a fkn queen, having none of that historically inaccurate colloquialism.
I never agree with the UFC's Dana White on much of anything. But when the WWE was setting up it's streaming site and fans wanted the UFC to do the same Dana White has always said no because, in his words, it cheapens the product. If you charge $10/mo to watch anything on your platform then people think that everything you produce costs $10. They lose any kind of perspective on just how much title, money, and man power goes into some projects. And on the other end how little a lot of other things cost (i.e. Joe Rogan's podcast is super profitable, as well as problematic, because it's just a guy in his studio giggling with his friends about psychedelics and how things were so much better when they could make fun of gay and black people openly). And I think all these networks should have taken that advice. Part of the reason why streaming is so unprofitable for most of these platforms is that they treat their programming like it's all interchangeable. A big theatre release is priced the same as old syndicated shows. New shows & movies pop up on services with very little notice (I'm old enough to remember when entertainment sites & blogs would cover the new titles coming to Netflix and leaving the platform back in the late 2000s-2010s). It's unsustainable because the biggest cost to these streaming platforms, producing content, has the lowest value. I pay Apple $10/mo for their 2 TB storage plan bc I have too many photos and videos on my devices and I couldn't bare to delete the old crappy photos that I never look at because -- nostalgia. All these streaming platforms have hundreds if not thousands, of times more content available on their platforms and charge $10. It doesn't make sense. And now that they've conditioned audiences to streaming on demand, you can't really go back. I'd love it if Blockbuster did make a comeback. Going to a rental place and finding a good movie, ordering some pizza, etc. used to be a great, chill weekend. That's now the norm. And maybe that's part of the problem. Maybe we consume too much content and we should get back to watching titles that really excite us and not just doom scrolling through all these platforms trying to find something to watch.
So I've noticed that for a while that prime HAS been removing things, just mostly from its "X-ray" parts, basically removing the special features that was one of the big reasons I've always preferred to view things on it... Also they added ads
ok, it isn't just a bigger piece of the pie. the studios saw what Jobs did with Itunes. Jobs (and others) eventually forced the music industry to accept cheap music. the studios saw the breaking of the music industry insiders, and even the business press at the time (this is before Spotify and its like got big), saw Netflix basically able to do the same thing to Hollywood, and that was not going to fly. so yes profitability is important, but the streaming wars were always going to end at the Capaldi point and getting into a stronger position (or a seat at the table) is critical. they knew this was going to kill some of them, they each hoped it would be the other guy.
Great video! Love your level-headed analysis as always 👍🏻 It’s amazing how big business is losing so much money; they somehow forgot how to do it chasing trends. I still don’t understand how all these tech companies are kept afloat, when they seem to be simply money pits. 🤷♂️
Just watched Fallout. Quite liked it, told a couple of people to watch it. It's not available in the UK. Not even on Amazon. Glad I never stopped using torrents.
Great video! I do love your anti-capitalism rants though! 🎉
I've noticed a lot of original shows from different streaming services started to be sold on Amazon Prime. I pay for like 5 different streaming services and I'm not signing up for another one, so I've bought the series I wanted to watch on there instead. So I think you're spot on, they are liscening out to other services.
Just keep in mind that if we're talking digital, then "bought" on Amazon is really just a single payment rental that can be revoked at any moment.
After all the mergers have happened what is the most likely next step? Removing the stuff that doesn't get views or isn't as popular and before you know it the whole market place is diluted with super hero and Star Wars franchises. What happens after that when people get bored with Superman MDC(1600)?
Another fantastic Video, can see this with ITVX especially
And people laughed when I kept buying physical media.
While I can understand the benefits of exclusive content only found in certain places, one has to know when enough is enough instead of making things get blown out of proportion....and unfortunately for big name companies they are now just learning this the hard way due to so many of them going the 'Exclusive to their service" route in a world where everything is getting more and more expensive........
I wonder how many of these streaming ventures were actually just positioning for mergers (either by padding the apparent value, or presenting a market threat to extort a neutralizing buyout).
With the exception of Disney, all of them were made for mergers, so the successor corporation could make a streaming service that beats Disney and Netflix.
25:41 things might be worse than you think: Star Trek Prodigy just showed up on Netflix.
It may not be their top-tier Star Trek , but it’s not “old” either.
Feels to me like Paramount recognizing that they basically have Star Trek, and people aren’t going to sign up for Paramount+ _just_ to watch Star Trek - and particularly not for an animated Star Trek aimed at kids with the only tie-in being callbacks to the least-popular TNG-era ‘Trek.
It's my impression that Disney largely wanted to spoil the streaming Market while having a platform for their intended lines of shows that they planned to fall back on with the closing of the Marvel gen 1 timeline they were going to take a loss but also feared what not having their toe in the market would represent for their theater releases and knowing that they would largely focus on merchandise for profit recuperation over streaming subscriptions. The way that Disney is structured they functionally have a vertical Monopoly over their IP the rest largely seemed to be cash grabs or investor hype
*glances over awkwardly while playing WoW*
WoW is currently running a limited-time event, which is a weird battle-royal. Acti-Blizz-Microsoft wants that Fortnite money bad... they just can't figure out how.
re: WoW, there is one that, while not the huge fad WoW was, is very solid and healthy, namely Final Fantasy XIV online. Check out that story sometime for an interesting deep dive!
That's like Funimation and Crunchyroll. Crunchyroll is the name being used. Crunchyroll started out as a pirate and ended up basically being better than Funimation as far as streaming is concerned. The membership tiers are a pain though. How much you can watch depends on how much you can pay. But how long can they do that? Not all of us can afford to keep paying more.
Have to say... I love your cheeky timing on making this video.
In the case of Warner it is not so much less stuff but less residuals that have to be payed out.
25:39 Paramount has already taken off Star Trek Prodigy from their streaming service and now Netflix has it, so other star trek shows are not out of the realm of possibilty
Thank you for not suggesting things were better when Netflix had a defacto monopoly on streaming, as a lot of people fall into the trap of doing when talking about Streaming's present and future.
Good video, it amazes me with these services. Glad I start purchasing physical media now.
The reintroduction of mid-role commercials is so upsetting when you are already paying a company a pretty penny. I’d rather cancel Prime than pay them another 36 bucks a year.
thank you. this explains a lot about why streaming services seem sol acking. I will stick to buying physical media of things that I want to watch, where I can.
What doesn't help is people like me who cycle through the different services. I subscribe to maybe 2 or 3 at a time for a few months, once Ive watched all I'm interested on those, I drop them and move onto a couple of others for a while. I keep Paramount because its linked to my Walmart+ membership. I wonder if maybe they might start charging sign up fees to keep people from doing that though.
I love Business Talk with Vera ❤
I agree, something, something, Captialism bad. Also, You are valid and beautiful, too!
My suspicion is that the highly specific and targeted streaming services may survive, if they're canny and clever, and may continue to stand alone (e.g. Crunchyroll), because they're offering content that most of the other streaming services may not be interested in hosting. But I do think the services that are all fundamentally providing the same content as everyone else are likely to shutter operations.
Not at all a surprise. This is how capitalism works. The driving force behind capitalism is competition, and competition ALWAYS ends with a winner and losers. And the winner is usually the one that gets there first. In many industries, you can carve out a niche being in the middle of the pack. But that's because most industries don't have such massive costs to entry.
One thing that's important too is that from a consumer's perspective, Netflix is still by far the best streaming service, if you want one but don't want anything too specific like MCU or Star Trek or anything like that, Netflix is the best option, besides, Netflix is the only streaming with a good UI, the rest have some bad to horrendous UI that I'm sure turn a lot of people off from them. This is quite a big problem with the others, they try to pull people by their content, but forget that there are other things that are just as important to get costumers, like, what's the point of having good content if the UI is so bad that you can't really find it? Until some other streaming service start investing in their platform, not only in their content, Netflix will reign supreme.
The difference between a liar and an idiot would be a great concept for a Doctor Who episode
The most frustrating thing is that people who had no creative output since that one family-under-a-rainbow-picture in kindergarten trash stuff artists bled their hearts out for. And for what? Tax refunds? disgusting.
It’s not a coincidence that Netflix and Hulu are the ones making a profit when they’re also the ones that conglomerated multiple shows and movies from multiple sources.
26:15 You forgot to mention the best Star Trek series Enterprise! Jessie Gender will be hearing about this!
We're not stuck with anything. I have never used a streaming service, and I never will. I'm not paying for digital media without a DRM free download. I either buy stuff on DVD, or sail the high seas if I want to watch something.
The fact of the matter is that storage is extremely expensive. Pre covid, a lot of places were starting to go back on site storage because server farms were charging so much. it takes a lot of server space to store the digital libraries and that is expensive.
You'd think these companies, especially warner, would understand the cost of internet infrastructure. They literally owned several ISPs (AOL, AT&T) so of anyone, they should've been best equipped to handle that.
Amazon also has the benefit of web hosting infrastructure already being a massive part of their business. With everything else they do, they can afford to just be host for jeffy bezos LOTR fanfics all they want
If Netflix does get "everything" again, my streaming manager app idea (dream, no tech xp) won't be as needed. The app idea in question was meant to compile your streaming services and make playlists or do shuffles that can mix shows/movies in an effort to get that cable feel of not having to choose or to run multiple series of the same franchise for chronological viewing if overlapping timeline.
The biggest source of tension in this video, was me expecting Nebula advertisement at every turn.
Cheers for getting the reference right with FlavorAde. And yeah, all of this stuff you describe is why when I'm making investing decisions, I do the research and actually look at business fundamentals. I don't care what the execs are promising (except, perhaps, as a bullshitometer (ie: bigger promises=less likely to invest), I just look at the numbers and see if they're profitable, and look at what they do and consider if I'm willing to have my name attached to that business. (Yes, my 50 shares in a company is a tiny fraction of a percentage, but if I own shares in a business, I am one of the owners of that business. So I check for relatively ethical business practices (particularly in the matter of certain red lines, like fossil fuel extraction/processing and allegations about the use of sweatshops) and invest in the ones that don't make me sick.)
Glad somebody got the Flavorade reference.
18:24 it's also short-termism. If they didn't do that, the expense of producing the movie would be spread out over multiple years, this is also known as capitalization. The difference between what they are doing and what a normal person would do, is that they take the deduction all at once in one year. But what about future years? Well that's next period. That's it next year problem.
I suspect that they're gambling on the notion that the movie wasn't going to make very much money and that the money is spent on it is computed as a sunk cost which means that it doesn't factor into their decision but the deduction does factor into the decision because it's in the future. The deduction for this period is bigger than the amount that they would make from that movie in this period.
I suspect that they might want to amend the tax code such that if you don't release a movie that's completed, you lose the deduction entirely as a permanent difference. That will discourage the tax avoidance.