This comment from Reddit user SmegmataTheFirst really nails it:
"tl;dr: Advertising ruins everything, which is why netflix originals are better than cable TV shows."
https://np.reddit.com/r/technology/comments/5ou7px/netflixs_...
"tl;dr: Advertising ruins everything, which is why netflix originals are better than cable TV shows."
https://np.reddit.com/r/technology/comments/5ou7px/netflixs_...
Personally I'm not too bothered by it as long as it's subtle, and so far it has been.
But generally I find I notice the product placement spots because they seem out of the flow of the program, I guess they work best when the brand is more hands-off and lets the creator do it subtly.
I can see why you'd consider it heavy handed. Had I watched that in the episode proper, it would have set off the 'placement ad!' bell in my head.
However, as stated elsewhere, that's orders of magnitude less invasive than a real ad., and it would not break the flow of the show, for me, at all.
It's really the same kind of exchange I have actually been involved with many times in real life.
No, he likes playing video games on his PLAYSTATION(TM) to relax, and it feels like this bit of character detail was kludged in purely to satisfy the product placement requirement.
It's obvious that with a different sponsor the character would have had different behaviours.
Every time I use Hulu, I say "I wish this UI was half as good as Amazon's."
For players: Amazon's interface is much better than it used to be when Prime TV firt began but it has a lot of gimmicks too that take time to understand. Hulu's still buffers or gets stuck on an ad or does something dumb.
Finding stuff: Hulu isn't great for that and I hate my queue/watchlist. I think it was following in the footsteps of Netflix, switching to the big pictures, which I'm assuming is meant for swipe-y screens/tvs more so than the computer browser these days. The findability of items on Amazon is appalling, despite having a generally good selection.
To actually browse, on Prime and Netflix at least, I use instantwatcher.com.
Slow, ugly, poor UX.
Netflix on the same device is excellent.
However, that works surprisingly well. And it has a bonus feature: While the episode is playing, you get annotations on the phone about what actors are on the screen and what music is playing, with the ability to click on them to get bios etc.
(I'm sure this isn't offered on every show streaming on Prime; the last example I remember was Goliath.)
Also why I don't bother streaming from UK's other commercial channels e.g. ITV and Channel 4 as they are riddled with ads. And you have to log into them which is annoying, not helped by rubbish players especially on Linux. May also be that their programming is mostly irrelevant, e.g. reality show and singing contests etc.
I do endure some ads when streaming sports channels. (Sky sports, BT Sports, Eurosport). But at least then they are limited to before and after the events.
Viewers/subscribers are a zero sum game, as they're not growing as a total in places like the US.
Traditional content was designed in a content-scarce environment (from the few broadcast channels, to a few more cable channels, to VHS, to DVD).
That's not the world we live in anymore: now it's a time-scarce environment.
There's more content (both legacy and new) than I could hope to consume, so I'm only interested in the best content for me. Traditional content providers aren't optimized for micro-targeting.
For some odd reason they cut out the ads although you have to create an account and give them a Scottish address and postcode.
Caveat/ the app sucks btw so you have to use the web version.
There are occasional gems worth the effort, but not many.
No third-party ads. Prime pre-roll advertises its shows in its own show.
The secret is that there's no "whole amount", because that would imply the concept of "enough money". There's no such thing as "enough money".
I mean that entirely non-sarcastically; to the extent it doesn't go to cover their costs, it goes to increase their profit, which has no upper bound. If they've found a way to extract more money, they'll do it. They question then becomes "to what extent have they found a larger revenue stream, and to what extent have they obtained more money now by alienating customers and driving them to other services".
I've never been so upset about a product like this. I think I paid ~70GBP for the Fire TV and 20 each for two Fire TV sticks and then they sneak advertising in with a software update after the fact. It's particularly egregious because they've recognised the equivalence of ads and charging you money on their tablet range which I think you can buy at a discount if you agree to have ads shown to you on the home screen.
Cable was originally advert-free. It was slipped in gradually over time. They got away with it because people put up with it and didn't call foul and stop subscribing. Expect Amazon, Netflix, everyone to do it. Precedent was set with cable subscriptions. The bar is set very low, and our resistance is known to be pitiful.
I don't think that's true, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13460306
> Bin them. Bin Amazon Prime too.
That would be altruistic but I don't think that enough people will do it with me (and I have no interest in organising them to do so). I'm tempted to return the device since they've changed the fundamental functionality, IMO.
But why would I ever be interested in watching a season in progress when I can watch backlog until it finishes, then watch the entire season on my own schedule?
The first problem goes away after the initial transition, and the second goes away when everyone you know also uses Netflix and/or Amazon Prime. But don't underestimate the value in getting people to switch.
If you keep up to date you can discuss the EP on various forums right after it airs. Then it's something to talk about with your co-workers who are also fans.
Losing subscribers is fine if they don't go anywhere else (because they can't), but losing subscribers to a competitor is a risky move.
Really? So why don't they show more commercials, or charge more for the service?
The reason there are commercials is it allows them to offer the service for less money and most people don't care.
Because there's a balance where doing more would lead to much more immediate revenue loss. Few people would watch a channel with 20 minutes of commercials for every 10 minutes of show, but network TV has already demonstrated that people will watch shows with 8 minutes of commercials for every 22 minutes of show, especially if they don't have a good alternative. The loss of customers from such a move takes longer to show up in the bottom line, and it started before alternatives like Netflix existed.
> The reason there are commercials is it allows them to offer the service for less money and most people don't care.
They're not in the business of offering a specific fixed service for as little money as it takes to cover their costs; that logic would apply to a non-profit or co-op, not a for-profit company. For a for-profit company, lowering prices isn't an end, it's a means.
Of course. There's nothing nefarious going on here. They're constrained by competition, the amount of advertising people will tolerate, and what their customers are willing to pay, but within those constraints they'll set up the business so that between commercials and the monthly fee they make the most money.
> Why can't they just charge tv subscribers the whole amount and get rid of ads on tv?
It's because doing that would mean artificially constraining their own business when they don't have to do that. So why would they?
As the article itself notes, few people buy a subscription service for one or two shows.
If Netflix can continue to bid high enough to starve its competitors of high-quality content (because it can amortize its costs over a larger subscriber base), then no competitor can grow large enough to compete without running substantial initial deficits (which Netflix can make temporarily worse if they choose to, by overpaying for content and driving prices up).
So essentially, lack of competition.
Somewhere is the optimal balance, where they have lots of subscribers, and show just the right amount of commercials to prevent people from leaving, and thus maximize the value of the ad slots.
Personally, I don't pay for anything with commercials. I just don't want to pay to be fed ads. Instead I pay for streaming services and movies. But if they want to sell me premium channels without commercials, I'll consider it.
As for "native advertisements": it really depends on genuineness, and disclosure.
Which amazingly we don't do.
Oh you don't like google and facebook eventually abusing what they know about you? Don't use their services.
However it turned out that by paying for TV they were signaling to advertisers that they were better off (and willing to spend money for things) than regular free-to-air TV watching people, and therefore their eyeballs were worth more. So now pay/cable TV in Australia has more ads per hour than free to air TV.
To pay the bills.
> Why can't they just charge tv subscribers the whole amount and get rid of ads on tv?
That's what premium channels (HBO, Cinemax, etc.) do, and they appeal to a different audience than non-premium cable, because most people are more willing to accept the cost of advertising than the cost of paying for premium channels.
Look at the bottom line. Netflix lost 126 million dollars in 3 months. Revenue per user is negative and going down. Needless to say, this can't last. Either price more than doubles, or ads come.
And how could revenue per user be negative? Even if Netflix were burning cash they wouldn't have negative revenue.
[1 (xlsx)] http://files.shareholder.com/downloads/NFLX/3717249512x0x924...
Think about what your local cable company charges for HBO. They have no advertising and programming is pretty good. Back in the day it was $20/month, now it's something close to $10/mo, right?
What would your cable bill look like if every single channel was $10/month?
Of course, Netflix is well worth the subscription and if you don't watch a lot of TV, it has enough content to keep you entertained for a while. But I've noticed that I discuss HBO shows more with my friends/family than Netflix ones.
HBO was doing that long before Netflix had original programming and Netflix, fairly overtly -- as in, I'm pretty sure I remember Netflix execs saying this -- was following HBO's arc rather than vice versa.
It happened.
Sopranos, The Wire, Deadwood, Sex and the City, Entourage, etc., all well before Netflix did originals.
Netflix has obviously run with the idea though. I'd love to see Netflix and HBO merge actually.
A former Netflix tech guy once told me that "People get Netflix for the movies and stay for the TV shows." Though that's probably less true than it used to be given Netflix Originals and a pretty wide recognition that their streaming movie catalog is limited. Today it's probably the Originals that drive the purchasing (as with HBO).
Lately I'd agree, but a few years ago that didn't have much and it was mostly high quality. So many of netflixs originals seem to fall into the super hero category that I'm not interested in.
Which ones were those? Are you sure they were Netflix originals?
It is true that, if you start slicing out ESPN, A&E, etc. it would theoretically be possible to subscribe to an overall lower cable bill but the cable cos would almost certainly raise per-channel (or mini-bundle) pricing to compensate.
Everyone passed on Mad Men except this little movie-rerun channel called AMC. Would Walking Dead have happened without it?
I tried to watch Friends on comedy central, which is 20 minutes per episode... each episode had 3 ad slots... 3!!! ad!!! slots... and I was paying £70 a month for that thing, they were trying to milk me out... I've quit sky and I don't miss it at all, and am very glad I quit it.
Still, while some of their original content is good I am not subscribing to their service just for that, let alone I don't need six semi super hero shows. If they keep pairing down their catalog I am going to lose interest real fast