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Comment by Y-bar | Hacker News Reader

And of these 31 remaining almost half are missing in the Swedish Netflix:

    5. Back to the Future
    6. Gladiator
    7. Sunset Boulevard
    8. Cinema Paradiso
    9. Django Unchained
    12. Reservoir Dogs
    13. Braveheart
    17. Amadeus
    21. Trainspotting
    24. There Will Be Blood
    25. Spotlight
    26. The Princess Bride
    27. Zootopia
    29. Jaws
    31. Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl

And yet Netflix want the same monthly cost for less of a service. Why?

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I keep subscribing to Netflix, then cancel, then resubscribe.

Thing is I'm not subscribing to Netflix for those movies. Because I've already seen those. And yeah, once every blue moon I can get in the mood for some specific title. But that's rare.

Why I keep subscribing to Netflix and why I tried HBO Go as well is because of the TV series. And I'm in Romania, you can imagine how limited the content is down here, but so far they've had a couple of decent TV series that I wanted to watch. If they keep delivering those, then I keep my subscription. You also have the ability to subscribe/unsubscribe at any point, it's not like with HBO GO or other services where you have to commit to an annual plan.

Yes, also in Sweden and when I once tricked Netflix into showing the US library I kind of wanted to cry.

Now I'm tempted to make a pretty graph of "Movies and TV shows per dollar" for the countries they're established in. Should be pretty interesting. I expect major differences.

Even with all the faults IMDb ratings have, id also be interested in a similar graph, but weighted with IMDb scores

Not a "per dollar" graph but still a graph just how big the different catalogs are: http://cordcutting.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/netflix-ca...

hummm.... i wonder why jersey and gurnsey have 1 different in their numbers... considering they're both channel islands... thats a fairly odd chart

Well, it's most likely some sort of licensing issue. If Netflix could show you all the same content that it does in the U.S. for the same price they absolutely would.

I agree that it most likely is some sort of licensing issue which prevents the same content. But Netflix isn't paying for Cinema Paradiso, or Braveheart, or Zootopia, or … in Sweden. In fact the Swedish library is less than half the size of the US library[1]. Yet Swedish consumers pay just as much as US consumers. There is a large discrepancy in the value given for customers' money here which Netflix does not address.

    [1] http://cordcutting.com/how-many-titles-are-available-on-netflix-in-your-country/

And, no doubt, there is a fixed overhead of dealing with with Swedish customers that is spread out over far fewer consumers than in the US.

What kind of overhead, specifically, would that be?

Swedes speak to the same english-only customer service representatives as US customers do. And CDN cost should scale mostly linearly with the size of the customer base.

License dealings are often per-country, and there are different exclusive deals in different countries which prevent anyone else from offering some film or show on their streaming platform. There's a lot of legal overhead per country, unfortunately.

>"There's a lot of legal overhead per country, unfortunately." //

Which it's worth remembering is entirely self-imposed by the industry.

Why, if Netflix comes along and says "we want to give you more money by showing this media to Swedes too" do the media conglomerates not fallover themselves to make it happen. It needs a couple of checkboxes on a form somewhere.

I'm not arguing in favour of the status quo, but merely trying to explain it. I completely agree that the current situation isn't very good---neither for consumers nor (probably) content right holders.

>> do the media conglomerates not fallover themselves to make it happen

Apparently they are not willing to do so for their own reasons or their licensing demands are too high for Netflix to sustain their service. I somehow doubt Netflix is turning away licensed content because they don't want to make money from that content.

I doubt it, they'd sell it at higher cost because in other countries there are often few alternatives.

Shows established in the USA become part of the global culture, USA is very good at exporting its culture. Once established, in order for people in other countries to buy in to that culture then exported media can be sold at higher value.

This is one of the reasons for regional encoding. You don't want to let outsiders buy in to something that's established as cool

Consider yourself lucky. There are 6 of those 31 available in Hong Kong and the subscription cost is 10% higher than the US, despite median household income being around a third lower.

I really don't understand the logic in charging a higher price for 10% of the content in a poorer country, but perhaps that's why I don't work for Netflix.

   Number of TV shows/movies on US netflix: 1147/4593
   Number of TV shows/movies on HK netflix:  134/ 392

   US Netflix standard price: $ 8.99
   HK Netflix standard price: $10.00

Because Netflix is focusing on their own content. They are spending money on developing their own shows instead of licensing shows and movies. They are trying to be more like HBO.

The Netflix catalogue in India is even worse. The surprising thing is they end up charging the same amount as US when disposable income in India is lower and you don't pay the same cost for entertainment services. For example, Apple Music streaming subscription is around $2.5. Also, you can subscribe to every cable channel(including HBO, sports channels etc.) for $8

Try the South Africa Netflix, I am not even going to bother checking how many of those are available.

To be fair, you can find the vast majority of the 250 movies on the first or second page of Google if you type in "MovieName streaming". uBlock and Privacy Badger extensions recommended of course. Also torrenting is available if nothing else.

Different licensing structure and cost in Sweden, and probably also different offerings based on the country and viewers. I'm sure the Swedish would like to see more Swedish content, which the US doesn't have any interest in.

> And yet Netflix want the same monthly cost for less of a service. Why?

You lucky bastard. In Norway, the same applies but we probably have to pay double of what they do in the US (100 nok).

Pretty much the same ones are missing on Norwegian Netflix as well.

Wish I could see how bad the Australian one is.

Cost is determined by demand, not supply.

Are you sure?

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