Comment by fny | Hacker News Reader

Comment by fny | Hacker News Reader

Some feedback:

1. What is your cost per episode? Can your subscription fee sustain realistically sustain that?

2. Your design needs improvement, at least on desktop. Haven't looked at the apps yet. If you expect "product" do be your differentiator, there's a LOT of work. Also, I'm not sure this is a sufficient competitive advantage. (a) its replicable (b) I've never seen this as a reason for people to pick one content provider over another: content is king.

3. Do you plan to incorporate content from existing content providers or remain purely indie?

4. A lot of the shows are short and production quality varies. Do you have any concern that people might consume all the "good" content of interest and now have anything else to watch?

5. You all have some filters that aren't meaningful like "Author". These authors are so niche, I have never heard of them, making the filter useless. There's also a draft filter showing up!

6. You need to make it easier for people to sample content before going through the friction of installing an app or registering. Maybe a trailer plus the first 5 minutes of an episode? Right now I don't feel compelled to watch anything else or sign up because the page is a little janky and I can't really tell what some of the shows are about from the trailers.

7. Netflix had the initial advantage of not focusing on content creation, and instead leveraged existing content. Why not solely focus on distribution instead of cutting checks to creators for original content?

These are tremendous questions! Ones we need to continue to think through, but I can share our early thoughts...

1. Content cost: Generally speaking, and assuming capital raises, we will only buy content that our subscription revenues can sustain. And over time, we do intend to raise our price as the service gets better.

2. Product: Yes, the product is far from perfect. We wanted to get in market with content, and iterate on product as we learn. We're largely leveraging third-parties to hold this thing up, but we will make improvements just as any product does. In terms of it being a differentiator, it's just that different, not necessarily defensible. But the way the market sits, we're the only ones interested in doing that. But I get your point, it's not like Netflix has a game-changing technology advantage over all the companies chasing them.

3. Content diversification: We hope to have the most, and best, black content on the planet.

4. Lack of content: Yes, we're very early, and I'm worried about not having enough content. But we will continue to add to it as we grow. We definitely do not plan to stay where we're at, but where we're at does work for our super-niche demo w/in the greater black community at this point.

5. UX/filtering/etc.: Thank you for calling those site issues out. We aim to fix those this weekend!

6. Content sampling: Agreed. We should, and will, make it easier to do that. However, the 7-day free trial mitigates that to some degree. Additionally, people generally don't just land on our site/homepage randomly. They usually have seen a trailer or come through a landing page that features (and describes) a specific show.

7. Just be a curator: Netflix also had the advantage of doing this 10+ years ago, so we can't change that. The truth is that with today's number of options, you have to have content that people can't get elsewhere. Plus, as I've alluded to in the comments, working directly with creators has been a big part of acquiring subscribers for us, and will likely continue to be so.

> it's not like Netflix has a game-changing technology advantage over all the companies chasing them.

You're kidding right? They have huge technological advantages in the areas of content production. Comments like this are why people are doubting this pitches ability to deliver. It doesn't really sound like you know your competitions strengths.

There is a reason it's the N in FAANG. They are a technology company first.

Just a thought on point number 2.

I fully agree with you that a good "product" and design is a reason for people to pick one content provider over another. It's almost exclusively about what content a provider has access to.

One particular example that I would call out is funimation. They offer a streaming service that has a very large library of english dubbed anime. Their platform sucks - missing features, constantly receive errors about needing a subscription (even when you're a pro member), sometimes specific episodes just won't player. Yet, they are still a huge player in the market because they offer content that people want.

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