7 ms·

Yikes. A little more than half the estimate. I’m pretty sure that is the worst miss the company has ever had. With recent news that reruns like the Office and

Yikes. A little more than half the estimate. I’m pretty sure that is the worst miss the company has ever had. With recent news that reruns like the Office and Friends are leaving next year, it would be really funny if a large chunk of Netflix subscribers are literally subscribing just to watch decades old reruns. It could be a bit of an Emperor Has No Clothes situation for them.

apocalyptic0n3 7y ago
That is definitely what their concern has been the last 7 or 8 years and why they've made such a massive push with original content. With so many content producers starting their own streaming services, they have to lure and keep customers the same way the other content producers will be: with original content not sourced from elsewhere. It's the only way forward for them and fortunately for them, they were aware enough to realize it almost a decade ahead of time.
- lanrh1836 7y ago
  Personally I haven’t found the quality of Netflix originals to be anywhere close to the same level as HBO. Their approach is more “consistently release a ton of average quality shows” and hope a few stick. Will be interesting to see if that actually work long term.
  - apocalyptic0n3 7y ago
    I agree for the most part. They definitely have their great content (Dark, Stranger Things, first few seasons of House of Cards, OITNB, I Am Mother, etc.) but it is incredibly inconsistent overall. I think they were more focused on beefing up their library so they had _something_ when the third-party content left the service, and hopefully get a few hits like Stranger Things in the process. With reports that they intend to slow down their investment in original content, I'm hoping they start focusing more on quality than quantity now.
wvenable 7y ago
Netflix is a heavily data-oriented company; if a large chunk of Netflix subscribers just watch decades old reruns then they know it. What Netflix needs to do is build content specifically for these people and I don't believe they're doing that. My anecdote on this: My collage age daughter watches Friends on Netflix basically continuously -- she's probably watched every season a dozen times now -- when she gets to last episode it just cycles around again. This is because she keeps on it in the background when she's studying or doing school work.
- dangrossman 7y ago
  What can you build for those people except reboots of those old shows, which they're doing (e.g. Sabrina, Fuller House)? They can't force NBC to license them the old reruns forever if NBC doesn't want to. There's no amount of money they can offer that will work once a studio decides it's going to reserve the content for its own streaming service.
  - wvenable 7y ago
    Make new shows that appeal to that market. Netflix content is a reflection of it's desire to compete with HBO, not NBC.
    - ceejayoz 7y ago
      It's hard to make shows that appeal to the "leave 10-20 seasons of a show on infinite loop" demographic in a short period of time. You need 10-20 years to do it.
    - jbob2000 7y ago
      You can’t make a new Office or Friends. Those were created by really special groups of people and I’m not confident today’s society allows groups like this to form. This decade of outrage that we’re coming out of (hopefully) has crushed an entire generation of comedians and actors. Look at late night talk shows for example; they’re totally stale. Nobody has the balls to say anything, fearing the tweet storm will be turned against their production company. It’ll take another generation before we’ll be in a place to create good shit again. Or maybe it will never happen again and the golden age is over?

apocalyptic0n3 7y ago

That is definitely what their concern has been the last 7 or 8 years and why they've made such a massive push with original content. With so many content producers starting their own streaming services, they have to lure and keep customers the same way the other content producers will be: with original content not sourced from elsewhere. It's the only way forward for them and fortunately for them, they were aware enough to realize it almost a decade ahead of time.

lanrh1836 7y ago
Personally I haven’t found the quality of Netflix originals to be anywhere close to the same level as HBO. Their approach is more “consistently release a ton of average quality shows” and hope a few stick. Will be interesting to see if that actually work long term.
- apocalyptic0n3 7y ago
  I agree for the most part. They definitely have their great content (Dark, Stranger Things, first few seasons of House of Cards, OITNB, I Am Mother, etc.) but it is incredibly inconsistent overall. I think they were more focused on beefing up their library so they had _something_ when the third-party content left the service, and hopefully get a few hits like Stranger Things in the process. With reports that they intend to slow down their investment in original content, I'm hoping they start focusing more on quality than quantity now.

wvenable 7y ago

Netflix is a heavily data-oriented company; if a large chunk of Netflix subscribers just watch decades old reruns then they know it. What Netflix needs to do is build content specifically for these people and I don't believe they're doing that. My anecdote on this: My collage age daughter watches Friends on Netflix basically continuously -- she's probably watched every season a dozen times now -- when she gets to last episode it just cycles around again. This is because she keeps on it in the background when she's studying or doing school work.

dangrossman 7y ago
What can you build for those people except reboots of those old shows, which they're doing (e.g. Sabrina, Fuller House)? They can't force NBC to license them the old reruns forever if NBC doesn't want to. There's no amount of money they can offer that will work once a studio decides it's going to reserve the content for its own streaming service.
- wvenable 7y ago
  Make new shows that appeal to that market. Netflix content is a reflection of it's desire to compete with HBO, not NBC.
  - ceejayoz 7y ago
    It's hard to make shows that appeal to the "leave 10-20 seasons of a show on infinite loop" demographic in a short period of time. You need 10-20 years to do it.
  - jbob2000 7y ago
    You can’t make a new Office or Friends. Those were created by really special groups of people and I’m not confident today’s society allows groups like this to form. This decade of outrage that we’re coming out of (hopefully) has crushed an entire generation of comedians and actors. Look at late night talk shows for example; they’re totally stale. Nobody has the balls to say anything, fearing the tweet storm will be turned against their production company. It’ll take another generation before we’ll be in a place to create good shit again. Or maybe it will never happen again and the golden age is over?