Netflix layoffs have started | Hacker News Reader

Netflix layoffs have started

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Interesting that they're laying off writers seeing as the American public has been pretty unhappy with Netflix quality (whether the actual content or the idealogical pushes). I know a lot of people personally that cancelled their Netflix accounts after Cuties and even more for similar reasons as time continued on. I wonder how much of their subscriber-ship was impacted due to things like this and if it's a non-minor amount, what will be the affects on their content?

Source on "know a lot of people canceled after Cuties"? Or just anecdotal stuff? I never saw data on that...?

> I know a lot of people personally

Yes, anecdotal.

I cancelled my account directly because of Cuties. I dont live alone and do not want anyone in my household watching CP disguised as an art house film. I know of at least 1 other person who have done the same.

Have you watched the movie? At its core it’s a story about how vulnerable children are and how society sexualizes children.

That they showed by sexually exploiting children in the filming. There is no excusing this - forget about the 'message' - one is watching children in sexually explicit situations and trying to say 'the artistic direction excuses it.'

I think I'm going to sit far far far on the other side of the overton window.

This is a pretty standard film criticism- you can't make a movie about something bad without glorifying it. Scorcese comes in for that a lot, Fight Club, people reading or watching Liar's Poker and feeling inspired, the list goes on.

This is not the same. Nobody actually gets their face broken in fight club, and there are no actual murders filmed in Goodfellas.

Cuties exploits children on camera in an attempt to tell a story about child exploitation.

I'm curious by what standard the film's production sexually exploited the actors, and it's a serious accusation. On first approximation, having watched the film and due to the fact nobody has been prosecuted by and government for the film, I'm inclined to disagree.

Anorher commenter in the thread called it 'child pornography', which is an even wilder claim, from a legal or moral perspective.

The exploitation is on and off camera.

How many audition tapes did they go through in order to choose those 5 girls? 50? 100? Someone sat there and watched dozens of half-nude 11 year old girls twerking on camera. This is disturbing to me. If it isn’t to you then i don’t know what to say.

You're making an assumption that the actresses are chosen on whether or not they can twerk, and then an assumption that the producers of the show (or the audience) see it with a pedophilic gaze. Are parents who read shop catalogues showing children in underwear pedophiles, or looking at the image in that way? How about the people who take the photos?

I really can't see why it would be disturbing, unless the person watching is doing so in service of a pedophilic desire - and you still have to prove that.

I feel uncomfortable watching the trailer, much less the movie. I’m not sure I know anyone who wouldn’t.

Also, I don’t understand that reasoning. You could make a film about the horrors of prison rape. That does allow or require you to film the actual rape.

Anecdotally I think it's the long tail of ideological content rather than the extreme examples that make people leave. But I suppose it could be specific things that push people over the edge.

I'm a strong free speech supporter - I'd rather there be lots of things that people find offensive on offer (as long as they wouldn't have been illegal in the year 2000). But having all new content revolve around some aspect of identity politics means there's nothing actually interesting to watch, which is why I've abandoned netflix now that I've seen all the foreign police procedurals.

Netflix can have free speech. They can make and do whatever they want.

No one should be expected or required to keep paying a subscription when they start disagreeing substantially.

Yes I agree, maybe I wasnt clear. What I mean is that I don't generally hold it against a platform (or whatever) for allowing views or content that I find offensive. If somebody does, that's their right. But what I can't abide is (obviously) not having anything that interests me, because in that case why would I pay them.

That's nothing. I cancelled when they added Full House (https://fullhouse.fandom.com/wiki/Back_to_School_Blues). When it comes to virtue signaling, you're an amateur.

I shared a password with my parents at the time. My wife and I stopped using Netflix entirely because of Cuties, and I think my parents also canceled.

I don’t know anyone who even knows that the show Cuties existed.

I do (me). Your anecdote is hereby nullified! ;)

These seem to be blog post writers for this blog: https://www.netflix.com/tudum. They're closer to the marketing team than to being writers on shows.

> Interesting that they're laying off writers seeing as the American public has been pretty unhappy with Netflix quality

I'm not sure if I'm phrasing this right. But I've felt for the past three years Netflix's US' content has become like the Hallmark Channel for U.S. progressivism. Too sterile, too formulaic, too forced. (Or could it be the algorithm that is recommending me the same content over and over?)

I'm sure someone could come up with a "Generic Netflix TV Show" video like this one:

* Dissolve - This a Generic Millennial ad https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KG_i7oWzTyU

* Dissolve - Generic Brand Video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2YBtspm8j8M

I still keep the subscription for some Asian and European content though.

I am virtually certain you have not watched Mignonnes. It is really quite good, and treats its subject matter with care. You have fallen for propaganda. Just watch it. It isn't long and I promise you won't wind up scarred for life. If you hate it, at least you will have come to that decision yourself.

Until you watch the film, I couldn't possibly care what you have to say about it.

GP doesn’t have anything to say about the movie, they just said they know people who cancelled their account because of it.

Why are you so defensive about something that wasn’t even sort of attacked?

For anyone confused by the comment, Mignonnes is the original name of Cuties [1] in French. I haven't watched it, so I don't have an opinion, but the trailer [2] seems pretty okay-ish. I you don't like the move, hit dislike and move on. Not sure why the whole "#cancelnetflix" drama.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M0O7lLe4SmA

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuties

I canceled and encouraged people to cancel[1] after The Closer was released. I will continue to encourage people to cancel when they mention Netflix content as a way to demonstrate allyship. It is a small act of protest anyone can do in just five minutes.

1. https://www.netflix.com/cancelplan

What is that URL? Does that lead to an account cancellation flow? I'm bemused that Netflix would make that so straightforward, and go-viral-able. (Also, come on - nothing says 'allyship' like trying to ruin a black guy's career to teach him a lesson for expressing unhappiness about the relative pace of change in trans vs black rights. I don't agree with everything he said, as a gay guy, but I find this response extremely distasteful.)

This overreaction of transactivists to Chappelle cracking a few jokes at their expense really just supports the point he was making.

The most perplexing thing about Netflix is that even though they have a reputation for hiring the best, I can’t think of a single way that the experience is better than Disney, HBO or Apple TV.

And this is after 25 years of investing in technology.

Don't forget that Netflix was early to the streaming game. The others likely hired a few key Netflix people on the tech side to avoid having to relearn their lessons. The others (except for Apple) were also earlier to the content space, so their back catalogs are better.

That is true. But you would expect that they would have found something really substantive to show after 25 years of investing in technology.

I am not sure what the lesson is. But something seems to have gone really wrong for Netflix. Not just on the content side, but also with their technology investments.

I disagree, their tech put them into the spotlight, they never had content. In the streaming industry content can't be copied or replicated as easy as years-old technology.

My point is they could never get this far without their tech edge but it won't keep them afloat in the copyright-laden world we inhabit.

For me, Netflix's UI works pretty well while the Disney+ UI is an exercise in frustration. With Disney+, watching the credits required clicking on just the right bit and there's no obvious way to go from the episode itself to the episode list.

Same with HBO. Their UX needs a bunch of work and it just makes me miss Netflix. But you gotta go where the content is.

Disney+ is seriously confused about credits - at times it instantly minimizes and threatens you with the next episode/movie (often when there is still “stuff” happening) and other times it makes you sit through literally ten minutes of credits in every language known to man and some unknown before advancing to the next.

Disney+ UI is bad but for me Amazon prime is the worst: the super invasive and spoilery Amazon X-Ray display that keeps popping up will make me just stop the TV. But Netflix is also there with the worst, having for example on Better Call Saul season six a complete spoiler content advisory warning top-left, prominent full time on screen always: "this is how this character's arc from episode 1,2,3 will end, you can stop watching now. Completely destroyed the work of the actors an writers for me, and I don't want to watch the remaining 9 episodes thank you...

Hulu is the worst of all IMO. Then you pay to remove ads to discover oh that’s not all ads. It’s some particular subset of ads.

They hired writers from jezebel and are now wondering why people are sick of their trash?

I wonder if they can sell their video distribution tech as a service? But yes seems like double down on good original context is the best bet.

They could have done that… 10 years ago.

Now lots of other companies are in the marketplace to provide this and Netflix would be a late entrance.

Not surprising, since Netflix is to known to quickly "right size" their work force. They are quick to do it and they aren't afraid to over do it. They know that they can quickly replenish their ranks if they over do it since they have some of the best salaries in the industry. Sentimentality is never an issue with them.

Here's one of their famous quotes,

“We’re a team, not a family. We’re like a pro sports team, not a kid’s recreational team. Netflix leaders hire, develop and cut smartly, so we have stars in every position.”

This sort of tech-related crash had to come someday, and out of this earthquake in terms of these FAANG companies, Netflix (NFLX) stock has cratered 40% in one week and 75% from its all time high.

The most obvious name one could come up with this is The Big Tech Crash which has now spread into the private start-up markets. [0][1]

As for Netflix itself, they are essentially a side-project for Disney, Apple and Amazon which after this disastrous earnings they respond by raising prices; which is a bad idea. If they don't think of something clever soon, they will be at risk of themselves being taken over.

Probably won't happen, but we'll see.

[0] https://www.ft.com/content/298baba3-83c7-45d3-8932-d811d248e...

EDIT: Non-paywalled link.

[1] https://archive.ph/sXcBQ

paywall

Steve Jobs told the Dropbox CEO his company was a "feature". You're saying Netflix is the same? I'm not saying Netflix is going to be Disney, but if they did their programming right they could approach that, eventually. At least an HBO.

They have every opportunity to be an HBO. But they’ve got great tech combined with a collection of content missteps and excessive price hikes. When was the last time HBO’s price went up?

I don’t think Steve Jobs was wrong in hindsight. How many people still use Dropbox compared to Google Drive. They even shifted focus to B2B. But storage is so cheap nowadays, their moat has completely evaporated.

Given the state content licensing, I actually think that is the case. Netflix cant compete financially with Apple or Amazon, or on content against Disney, Paramount or WB. HBO is an absolute best case scenario, but HBO was owned by Warner and ATT, so they had (IMO) better resources.

Netflix is a zombie unless they can either produce some very popular series or the government starts taking antitrust seriously and either divorces producers and distributors or forces FRAND licensing for all content.

I don’t think Netflix is a zombie. It simply might not be a $100B+ company for the time being, like Disney. Which some investors may have hoped it would become by now (although I do not why they would have thought that).

It may still be a viable business (remains to be seen), but under the current rules they will be outcompeted.

I wonder if Netflix should leverage same day delivery and start doing more physical copies again.

Now that digital is ‘refragmenting’ it would be funny if the red disks came back to get around all these silos.

But what would regular people use to play these DVDs?

> Now that digital is ‘refragmenting’ it would be funny if the red disks came back to get around all these silos.

I'm not an IP law expert, but does anyone know why fragmentation isn't such a problem with music? You never hear someone complaining that they have to subscribe to eight different music streaming services to hear all the popular songs. It seems the big music streaming services all have pretty much all the popular artists.

Why isn't it this way for video content?

Video is much more expensive to produce than music. That leads rightsholders to want to exercise more control over distribution, even though doing so paradoxically decreases their market share.

You also get a lot of productions that are financed in-house. Few HBO properties are going to be available on Netflix and vice-versa. The filmmakers had no choice but sign with someone, giving them access to a particular subscriber base at the expense of the broader market.

> Now that digital is ‘refragmenting’ it would be funny if the red disks came back to get around all these silos.

Why isn't it this way for video content?

There are only three companies that control distribution of almost all popular music. (Universal, Sony and Warner) Once you get outside of artists and genres published by these four (e.g. smaller foreign artists, very small niche genres, small indie artists) streaming options decrease.

I suspect Apple snapped up some very long rights early on which means they’re not going to bother trying to compete directly as they’d only have their own songs.

Same way that a bunch of studios waited for their Netflix/Prime contracts to wind down before opening their own streaming service.

In the US, the music subscription services get blanket licenses (from the MLC for mechanical rights and from the PRO’s for performing rights).

It’s different but similar around the world, but there is no long term rights securitization going on.

Music streaming could have gone the fragmented route. The major services were doing all sorts of exclusives. Two things stopped it (the first being it was bad business, the second being the mail in the coffin):

1. Exclusives were very expensive and not linked to growing subscribers. This is true within the other services but can be seen publicly by the failure of Tidal.

2. Frank Ocean screwed Universal Music (well played), resulting in the CEO declaring an end to exclusives [0].

[0]: https://www.billboard.com/music/music-news/frank-ocean-endle...

I've heard people complaining on this site about streaming sites having or not having particular indie and obscure artists. They usually complain about YouTube making videos in playlists disappear as well.

With what DVD player?

For you kiddos and newbs to startups/corporations out there, nothing anyone says is worth anything unless it's in a legally binding contract.

When your boss says, "your department is super important to our company," that is effectively meaningless. I take it back; it has meaning: it means you should wonder why the boss has raised the issue at all.

This is true, and the what the former employee tweeted was somewhat unprofessional, despite the fact that it feels like the rug was pulled out from under you.

Hey this is just the new progressive playbook, it's OK to hate on big corps and "billionaires". Check out what this game producer tweeted about her own CEO RE her own unreleased game: https://i.redd.it/yu9im5p38ld81.jpg Unprofessionalism for miles.

I do hear that hate a lot. People will sneak in "billionaire" and "big business" like it's an inherently bad thing, and the audience is supposed to just agree, without any further explanation. Not that those groups can't be bad, but there are absolutely small businesses with poor ethics and large companies that are good corporate citizens.

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