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Comment by DrBazza | Hacker News Reader

Streaming services may be 'in control' but they're still as bad as, or controlled by, the studios they're replacing.

In the UK, suppose I want to watch Forbidden Planet, or Gone With The Wind, or Carry on Screaming. Show me a streaming service that has those films. I either wait 6 months and hope the TV shows them or.... hello bittorrent. Even more recent films.

Suppose I want to listen to Louis Armstrong, or Ella Fitzgerald? Spotify, Apple Music, and Amazon Music all have those songs.

It's just a shame we didn't have higher bandwidth in the Napster era to do to the studios what it did to record labels.

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The other thing going on is that Netflix' DVD service drove Blockbuster et al out of business and now the Netflix back catalog is pretty terrible. So you increasingly can't rent a disc if something isn't available streaming--even a la carte. (In fairness, many films are available for Amazon pay-per-view that aren't on all you can eat subscriptions, including 2 of the films you mention.)

But it's a mess generally. I don't know if it's Napster/bandwidth given that mechanical licensing for music is much older. In any case though, we've largely moved to a new medium but a lot of content hasn't moved over.

Blockbuster drove itself out of business Possibly more so than Netflix because of billionaire investor Carl Icahn.

> The other thing going on is that Netflix' DVD service drove Blockbuster et al out of business and now the Netflix back catalog is pretty terrible.

I subscribe to both Netflix DVD and streaming.

I don’t much like serialized shows and maintain streaming mainly for my partner and the occasional one off.

Netflix’s DVD back catalog is thinning and I’m sort of at a crossroads about what to do.

I wish Netflix would spin off the DVD service and give it a chance to thrive.

> I wish Netflix would spin off the DVD service and give it a chance to thrive.

They were going to do that back in 2011, but then cancelled the plans

https://www.cnet.com/news/netflix-cancels-qwikster-spinoff/

I canceled my DVD service a year or two ago because I was doing a lot of work travel and I'd end up with discs sitting by my TV for a month. I've renewed it for now during the pandemic. It's fine for recent movies but the back catalog has gotten pretty bad. I've mostly resigned myself to paying for streaming rentals plus buying a Blu-Ray every now and then if I think it's something I might want to rewatch.

I suspect there isn't a critical mass for a robust DVD service any longer. RedBox skims some demand for current blockbusters and a lot of people want content right now.

> RedBox skims some demand for current blockbusters and a lot of people want content right now.

I really can't emphasize the right now enough. I'm never planning things I want to watch days in advance, so a by-mail service just doesn't work (plus there's the physical hassle of having to mail stuff all the time and dealing with the inevitable hassle of things going missing in the mail).

I just can't imagine waiting for something to come in the mail when I could instead fire up BitTorrent and be watching it 30 minutes later. The music industry learned their lesson from piracy but the movie industry still hasn't. Things will hopefully change now given that theaters are a much-reduced experience; they did always have the benefit over music in that whether you buy the music CD on launch day or pirate it digitally, the listening experience itself is identical, whereas seeing a film in theaters on launch day is definitely still quite different than watching some shitty pirated cam version, assuming the shitty cam version is even out by launch day (it isn't always).

As long as I'm around to watch them, I actually find getting DVDs by mail is a low effort way to catch up on the previous year's award winners; there's always a film I want to see sitting there. And I usually don't need to watch something in particular right now. It's just increasingly not a great way to watch older films.

Libraries. Your local library probably has a large selection of DVDs, and most libraries are part of networks that can request everything you can't find locally. The only downside I've found is for kids' movies, as those are invariably scratched beyond any usability.

I live in a small town so my library doesn't have great selection. I have gotten DVDs out of the library when I've been down there for some other reason anyway. But, for the most part, I find it's more effort than it's worth.

You can rent all of these for sub £5 on amazon (probably itunes as well).

There isn't a world where you can pay $20 a month and get everything, every movie, every tv show, ever, the finances just don't work.

Why don't the finances work?

As an example: I'm paying for Netflix and Amazon prime. I'm not going to pay for more services because I don't value watching TV more than that.

We buy or rent a specific movie maybe once a quarter at most.

So total expenditure on TV services is around $20/mo.

Almost everyone I know is in a similar situation. Some swap one of those services for something else, many are sharing subscriptions with other households.

So right now most people are paying a fairly fixed amount for access to a portion of TV and film. The total money flowing in seems to be enough to support the entire industry.

If a service that cost $20/month for access to everything came out, I'd definitely switch. I imagine most of my friends would as well.

Then the total money flowing into the industry would be the same, but everyone would have access to all the media.

It's not enough to support the entire industry, that's the point of the article. $20 a month has never been enough, bearing in mind it's effectively replacing (in north America) cable which used to cost much more than that and those channels used to run ads as well!

I suspect a lot of people buy or rent more than you and your friends.

For example, many people have either a cable TV or online streaming subscription that's another $50-100/month. HBO would be another $15 or so. And so forth.

There is an argument that, at some point, there are only so many hours in the day and a Spotify for video (i.e. most content for one monthly fee) makes sense but that's probably a $100-200/month fee in the US (assuming you could get most players to cooperate). YouTube TV alone is $65/month these days.

Are normal working people really willing to pay hundreds of dollars a month for some TV? Nobody watches that much TV surely? And how many have that kind of spare cash?

I feel like outside of the rich, $10-15 is about all you can reasonably ask people to afford for a pure luxury like this.

lol

"According to a Nielsen report, United States adults are watching five hours and four minutes of television per day on average (35.5 h/week, slightly more than 77 days per year)."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Television_consumption

I.e. a good chunk of people has the TV running in the background all the time. Another chunk is just watching whatever during the day. How much do you think those demographics value that financially?

My intuition is that the 90s provided a good high-water mark for pre-internet entertainment spend. The average price of a cable subscription which in 1995 was $22.35/month [1] (inflation adjusted to $38 [2])

So $40/month. I'd add to that whatever the average blockbuster price was $5 * 4-weeks (quick googling didn't give me a great answer, but I found 2.18 GPB for 1995, so probably $3-5 with conversion and inflation).

That makes roughly $60/month for the average American at-home tv/movie spend in the 90s. I suspect that still is the rough tolerance.

[1] https://www.businessinsider.com/cable-tv-prices-inflation-ch... [2] https://www.usinflationcalculator.com/

I would guess that the distribution today is at least somewhat bimodal based on whether someone pays for a live TV package whether cable, satellite, or streaming. Any of those probably cost at least $60/month (in no small part because of sports).

I expect that typical other streaming spend (Netflix, a la carte rentals, maybe a premium Print add-on or HBO, etc.) probably don't add up to more than $30-40 a month or so.

Many people did and do pay $100 for a satellite or cable TV subscription and add on premium channels (movies/sports) to that. And many of those same people go out the movies (during normal times) a couple times a month and possibly rent/buy DVDs as well (though less than in the past). And while most of those people are presumably not poor, I'm sure many of them are not rich.

And, as I said in another comment with respect to streaming, YouTube TV alone is $65/month.

So, yes, many normal working people do pay on the order of a couple hundred dollars a month for video entertainment.

That’s why Disney’s Crown Jewels are not its studios but ESPN

That may be true in the US, but I doubt many Europeans would be able and willing to pay that much.

Sky TV UK charge £59/mo ($77) for the package with sports and movies. The "everything" package with UHD and a second set top box costs £97/mo ($127). Nearly half of UK households have satellite or cable TV.

Normal working people watch ridiculous amounts of tv.

I suppose for developers you flip it right.

"Normal SV developers spend 4 to 5 hours a night coding on personal projects"

The normal people watching their TV would think those devs spend a ridiculous amount of time coding.

If you spend 4-5 hours a night coding on personal projects you probably have both a pretty strong self image of yourself as a developer and probably people who know you see you that way as well. Same goes for if you read for 4-5 hours a night, gamed, worked out, cooked, swam, whatever. Reader, gamer, bodybuilder, amateur chef, swimmer, etc. If you consistently do something for 4-5 hours a night it's generally a big part of who you are.

TV stands alone where people do it 4-5 hours a night and its not considered being super in to that thing. People in the tv watching category don't see it as choosing to do a thing. It's just part of what you do. Sleep, work, then tv. Repeat. They don't identify as a tv watcher any more than they do as a sleeper.

What'd the people who just turn their mind off _do_ before TV.

Form mobs and look for people to hang.

Sit around and shoot the shit with friends and family.

You'd be surprised. In our household we pay for a sports streaming service and watch the occasional movie over Xbox video, but otherwise we don't use any other streaming service.

Our friends have recommended over 200 hours worth of TV since the pandemic hit, and everyone is quite horrified of how big our things to watch list has grown. It's months worth of spare time where we simply wouldn't do anything else.

> There isn't a world where you can pay $20 a month and get everything, every movie, every tv show, ever, the finances just don't work.

It is the promise we were sold on when Netflix first started online streaming: without the costs of distribution and physical media creation, it would actually be possible.

I'm happy to be corrected, but I don't think costs of distribution or physical media creation actually add up to that much in comparison to the cost of actually producing the content which pretty much only ever gets more expensive.

People think physical media has much higher costs than it does. Don't know about movies, but about $2 of a hardcover book costs are associated with printing and distribution--and that has far less infrastructure associated with the digital version.

Netflix has never had a great streaming movie catalog. As a senior Netflix exec told me, "people come for the movies and they stay for the TV." So, to the degree Netflix streaming ever claimed to be about having all the films, it was always something of a bait and switch.

Theoretically, a fairly good subscription video catalog plus live TV is probably possible. But as I said elsewhere, it would probably be more like > $200/month than $20. Recreating the cable bundle streaming is already pushing north of $100.

>without the costs of distribution and physical media creation, it would actually be possible.

Did anyone seriously think just because you don't need to make blu-rays any more a 50 million dollar TV show or movie can just be sold for next to nothing? It's probably not even 1% of the production costs.

Even weirder because I've never seen anyone think that Red Dead Redemption would coast 5 bucks if they only sold it on steam

The lack of unified interface is my biggest gripe. I pay £12/month for Netflix, £8/month for Amazon Prime, £6/month for Disney+. Used to have to pay £8/month for NowTV to watch GoT in 720p. My Android TV has a Google Play store embedded in it for me to rent/buy in one tap. I often find myself jumping ebtween 4 different apps on my TV to figure out what content is where to watch, and occasionally end up finding out it's an iTunes exclusive. That's assuming the content is available in the UK at the time - many TV shows just aren't available on any of the UK equivalent streaming services until months later than the US (Mandolorian for example)

I don't want the content for free/bargain prices. I want the content in a reasonable format, that I can play legally on my TV, phone or laptop, and that I can discover easily.

Compare that experience with something like popcorntime, where a user can type in a movie name, and have it streaming in 1080p/4k/highest available quality in under 30 seconds.

I want that, but paid.

Yeah, I find myself spending 10 minutes searching for something on Netflix only to realize it's on Amazon.

People didn't like cable bundles. Now it's a la carte in various ways and people are realizing that it's not only not cheaper if you want "everything" but it's a fragmented mess.

There’s many sites you can use to see where something is. Inconvenience still but only one step first.

Have you tried the app that is called Just Watch? I use this to find what is available where. Saves a lot of time.

No, I'd never heard of it but it looks like _exactly_ what I want. Thank you!

The search on my Roku is across services. I'd like to have a cross-service discovery app too, but the in my roku (and even better, on my roku phone app where typing is easier) I can type a movie name and see if it is on one of the services I use, or if not in Amazon to rent/buy).

That's really helpful. My Android TV will let me do voice commands to "Play X on <Service>" but if it's not on the play store, it won't respond to "Find <X>". Unfortunately, I'm not in the roku ecosystem right now, but this would be something that would make me change!

Kodi plugins are available for netflix, amazon prime and disney+ so you can use these 3 from kodi interface not sur about google play or apple.

Fire TV also has cross-service search which I find good. Roku has a more streamlined clickthrough interface but Fire TV generally shows me where something is available even if it takes a few more clicks to get there.

From some googling, It seems like the median movie costs about $18M to make, while the average is about $70-100M and something like the avengers is around $200M. Oscar winners seem closer to median or average cost than avengers cost.

For shows, it seems to be in the $0.5-10M per hour range. I'll wave my hands lazily and call a season $5-100M.

If about half of US households spend $20/mo on these services, that's $16B per year. If half of that went to making movies and shows, it could make something like 500 median movies per year, 100ish average movies, or 40 avengers-caliber movies. For shows, it'd be 80-1600 seasons per year.

Apparently something around about 500movies and 500 shows come out each year.

I'm sure these numbers are way off, but the orders of magnitude are probably reasonable and suggest to me that $20ish/mo for everything ever is likely a little low, but not insane.

If you include China which is nearly as big as the US, and the EU which isn't far behind and it looks credible.

> $20 a month and get everything, every movie, every tv show, ever

I'm surprised, thought, that there's no service that offers a lot of old movies. I get it - the Avengers movie that was just released cost a few hundred million to make, so it would make sense that it would be harder to find on a streaming service than something that came out in the 80's. What I find is the opposite, though - it's easy to find recent big hits online than it is to find, say, Bladerunner or Bill & Ted.

Studios aren’t being replaced.

This isn’t an article about streaming services replacing studios, it’s an article about streaming executive culture replacing studio executive culture.

> In the UK, suppose I want to watch Forbidden Planet, or Gone With The Wind, or Carry on Screaming. Show me a streaming service that has those films

They're on Amazon UK. You can stream them right now. What are you talking about?

That's a "controlled by" problem, not an "as bad as" problem. Region restrictions are primarily imposed by studios, so that they can make different exclusive licensing deals in different regions.

Napster pitched a $10/month all-you-can-eat subscription, and the Music industry said NO WAY!

Then they were crushed by reality and we got multiple suppliers of Napster's $10/month-for-all-music offer.

Imagine if Napster had got what it wanted and became the only supplier of music? I doubt they'd still be seen as the good guy.

The monopolies are always seen good in their infancy. You always forgive them for mistakes as they are new and fresh. Then they begin making significant mistakes as they age. And finally become too powerful and you realize they are truly a monopoly. See Google. Everyone ‘welcomed their new google overlords’. Now we see how awful they are for the world.

"in the case of Apple, the company’s strategy was doomed right up until it was illegal, or so it seems with the App Store."

Ben Thompson (https://stratechery.com/2020/apple-epic-and-the-app-store/)

LOL

I feel like you are purposefully ignoring the fact that you can easily get all of those movies (and tons of others not on streaming services) on DVD or Blu-ray for relatively cheap. As another commenter said, you can also rent them from any number of services for $2-$4.

While I don't love the current state of affairs, I dropped cable TV recently (which I hardly ever watched) and I sort of take the attitude that it makes sense to keep my monthly subscriptions down and periodically buy, whether disc or streaming, or rent a la carte things I want to watch--especially given that I don't really watch all that much.

That is no longer always possible, some movies just don't release on DVD or Blu-Ray anymore or it takes a very long time after release before they appear as Blu-Ray (as to not take profit from streaming services)

I don't see how that justifies torrenting it but most new movies are available within a few months on DVD/Blu-ray.

(Obviously there are exceptions for things made by streaming companies but even those get physical releases eventually.

There is plenty of movies that are not available to me. They're not available for streaming or as bluray, and in some cases cannot be imported legally either.

What am I going to play a DVD on?

Black box above the betamax and below the 8-track player - you may need to move all the floppy disk boxes on the floor first. ;)

An external USB DVD player is about $15.

I feel like you're purposefully making this hypothetical difficult and throwing up as many roadblocks as possible.

The obvious answer is that either you own a DVD player or you can get one for next to nothing. Amazon has region free ones for $25.

ewaste ftw

Eighth generation consoles (except the Switch) have a drive that can play DVDs and Blu-Rays.

Even record labels came out unscathed, relatively.

It's not like we live in a world where artists record songs, and get paid by streaming services. Record labels get paid, and they pay artists with hollywood accounting. All the control is still with them.

They have much less control of what becomes popular. Recording has no need for upfront, risky capital anymore... Once upon a time, you needed a lot of money to cut & press a commercial album. A warehouse full of records, physical distribution, the advertising to make that work.

The "record deal" was essential because someone had to fund an album. The record industry was built around this, with the portfolio of "signed artists" being their primary asset. Napster, Youtube & Spotify haven't really changed this... They've affected it, but the system survived irrelevance.

The reality of content industries (and many other ones) is that centralisation is everything. The big hollywood studios, record labels & such will take the lions share. If they don't, it will be netflix, youtube, spotify & such. Someone will be in position to dictate terms, and it's not the artists.

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