The Golden Age of the Streaming Wars is Over

[Blackhawk]

I wouldn't be surprised to see metrics come back. Things like the Nielsen ratings and viewership numbers disappearing have been a big problem (now the services keep that info secret.) It was how advertisers chose where to invest, and it was a big part of how residuals were calculated.

Come back?! They have been amped up beyond recognition from the old school Nielsen ratings days. It's Nielsen on crack, speed and gamma rays combined, with the metrics and the tracking going on with streaming services. They have more data and metrics and your behavior patterns than ever before. They probably can predict when you are going to pause for a bathroom break well before you do.

The context was in an earlier post. It isn't that the viewership data doesn't exist, it's that they made it all proprietary and hid it from everyone except marketing and the execs. Viewership numbers used to be public, and more detailed info was given to creators (as it was part of their income calculation) and to advertisers (because everyone wanted to advertise during ER and Friends, and the studios could charge an arm and a leg for it, while smaller advertisers had to make due with Love Boat: The Next Wave.

Without ads, there's no ongoing profit, especially for older shows. The services were all relying on subscriptions and growth to (eventually) drive profit, and it just didn't work. And even if there were suddenly ads again, without viewership numbers, there's nothing for advertisers to use to choose what's most worth their investment.

And that goes back to the writers and actors, who relied on the post-launch revenue and viewership numbers for their residuals. Without it, they're reliant on the generosity (and honesty) of the services when it comes to them getting paid for their work. For them, it's like having your entire income based on a diverse stock portfolio (stocks being writing/acting credit.) The more you have in your portfolio, the more trickles of steady income you have throughout your life, and if you made a really good investment (worked on a hit), you got big money. When streaming hit, it was like Wall Street quit publishing stock performance. "Oh, gosh guys - I'm afraid all of your stocks were flat again this quarter. Sorry!" Oh, and the 'good investment' stocks that could their jackpot? You only get paid for those if they do well four quarters in a row (and, hey - how about that - they keep crashing after three. Trust us on that.)

But the services really, really don't want those numbers to be visible outside of their bunkers. To bring back the metaphor, all of their stocks are dropping, and if anyone finds out, they're sunk. The actual streaming metrics are so bad (from what I've heard) that it would cause every investor out there to jump ship and bring the streaming companies down in the process.

[gilraen]

+1. Netflix’s is worse, though. Netflix does not tolerate silence or inactivity.

You can configure your profile to not auto-play trailers or go to next episode of a show. It's really not as bad as dealing with Amazon's mess of a UI.

[Kraken]

+1. Netflix’s is worse, though. Netflix does not tolerate silence or inactivity.

You can configure your profile to not auto-play trailers or go to next episode of a show. It's really not as bad as dealing with Amazon's mess of a UI.

I can do that on my PC, but the option isn't there for my TV. Netflix has a bad case of ADD on my television.

[Blackhawk]

I was going to bitch about the godawful rewind function that keeps screwing up shows, but I'm too tired, and can't remember if it was Parmount+ or Disney+.

[Anonymous Bosch]

+1. Netflix’s is worse, though. Netflix does not tolerate silence or inactivity.

You can configure your profile to not auto-play trailers or go to next episode of a show. It's really not as bad as dealing with Amazon's mess of a UI.

I can do that on my PC, but the option isn't there for my TV. Netflix has a bad case of ADD on my television.

Therein lies the rub.

If you wish to disable autoplay previews on ALL of your devices (e.g. the Netflix app on your phone, tablet, and/or TV, that seemingly provide no options to do so), you need to do this by signing into your Netflix account through the web with your PC.

Click your Netflix profile photo in the upper right, and choose "Manage Profiles." Now select the profile you want to disable autoplay for. Beneath the options for your profile name, language, and maturity settings, you will see a section with check boxes for autoplay controls. Now simply uncheck "Autoplay previews while browsing on all devices" to stop clips from playing when you’re navigating around the Netflix home screen and other sections of the service.

[Kraken]

That’s grand; thank you. Netflix is downright painful with its default hyperkinetic need for constant noise and motion, and I couldn't figure out how to fix it through my TV.

[Isgrimnur]

I guess this is a thing now:

Hasbro’s Entertainment One (eOne) is rolling the D&D dice — betting that Dungeons & Dragons fans will flock to a new free, ad-supported streaming television (FAST) channel dedicated to the fantasy franchise it’s prepping for a summer launch.

Hasbro Confirms Sale Of eOne To Lionsgate For $500M

Hasbro bought eOne for $4B in 2019 but will sell for just $500M, consisting of $375M in cash, subject to certain purchase price adjustments, and the assumption by Lionsgate of production financing loans.
...
[Hasbro CEO Chris Cocks] said Hasbro “looks forward to partnering” with Lionsgate in the future, especially on the upcoming movie adaptation of Monopoly.
...
Lionsgate has bought eOne’s scripted and unscripted TV production, all film production and related global distribution, a 6,500-plus title content library and Hasbro’s interest in eOne’s Canadian film and TV business. Hasbro holds on to the Family Brands division, which houses staples such as Peppa Pig and PJ Masks.
...
Lionsgate, whose vice chair Michael Burns sits on the Hasbro board, is meanwhile in the process of separating its film and TV studio from Starz.
...
Hasbro bought eOne in 2019 for $4 billion when the company was divided into three divisions: Music, which has been sold; Family Brands, which Hasbro has rolled into its brands licensing and merchandising operation; and Film and TV. Hasbro previously sold eOne’s music business to private equity firm Blackstone in 2021 for $385 million.

[Rumpy]

So, dedicated streaming services for specific franchises, ie Warhammer and now D&D? Why do I get the feeling that they won't last very long when other more broad streaming services are struggling?

[Carpet_pissr]

Yeah, worst possible time to be launching something like this. Doubling down on an already crumbling model? Crazy.

[Isgrimnur]

Oh, I imagine it will quietly die under the new ownership.

[Blackhawk]

So, dedicated streaming services for specific franchises, ie Warhammer and now D&D? Why do I get the feeling that they won't last very long when other more broad streaming services are struggling?

Seriously. Some niche streaming services may still make it if they have a considerable amount of existing material to draw from (like Crunchyroll or Curiosity Stream), but I can't see single-property services going anywhere.

[Rumpy]

So, dedicated streaming services for specific franchises, ie Warhammer and now D&D? Why do I get the feeling that they won't last very long when other more broad streaming services are struggling?

Seriously. Some niche streaming services may still make it if they have a considerable amount of existing material to draw from (like Crunchyroll or Curiosity Stream), but I can't see single-property services going anywhere.

Yeah, it sounds wild to try something like this in the current environment. Maybe if this had been done in streaming's peak days, there'd be something, but I can't imagine trying to run a streaming service based on niche properties and having enough content. And there aren't many scenarios with any IP where that would really be viable. Seems a stretch, and I'd love to have been a fly on the wall for the discussions surrounding them, ie who thought it was a good idea and why. There can't be that many takers can there?

[gilraen]

Someone looking for a tax writeoff? Or a money-laundering scheme?

[Blackhawk]

So, dedicated streaming services for specific franchises, ie Warhammer and now D&D? Why do I get the feeling that they won't last very long when other more broad streaming services are struggling?

Seriously. Some niche streaming services may still make it if they have a considerable amount of existing material to draw from (like Crunchyroll or Curiosity Stream), but I can't see single-property services going anywhere.

Yeah, it sounds wild to try something like this in the current environment. Maybe if this had been done in streaming's peak days, there'd be something, but I can't imagine trying to run a streaming service based on niche properties and having enough content. And there aren't many scenarios with any IP where that would really be viable. Seems a stretch, and I'd love to have been a fly on the wall for the discussions surrounding them, ie who thought it was a good idea and why. There can't be that many takers can there?

And the thing is, Hasbro actually has a hell o f a lot more to draw on than D&D, some of which could use modern reimaginings, others of which already have successful film franchises. Magic the Gathering, GI Joe, Power Rangers, My Little Pony, Transformers, Gamma World, Ravenloft (admittedly D&D adjacent), and literally hundreds of board games (they own Milton Bradley, Avalon Hill, and Parker Bros, too), they could make a full-featured channel.

Well, they could have - I doubt any variant gets past the drawing board these days. Nobody who isn't already neck-deep is going to want to stick their toes in the streaming pool right now.

[Rumpy]

That idea's not half bad. Certainly much better than limiting the scope to some very niche IPs. I'd take Clue. In fact, I think I heard that they were making a new movie. That's something that happens to have a lot of potential since murder mysteries seem to be making a comeback lately, ie the Poirot movies, the Knives Out movies, etc.

I have local friends who are gamers and they have no idea what Warhammer is. I only know of it based on what I've heard, and never played anything from that IP. And they are into some obscure stuff.

[Jaymon]

As for a new streaming service. If you make it Ad supported, stay within budget provided by your Ads, and allow your sreaming service onto any platform. Roku, Apple, Fire, etc, then it may be possible. Obviously you would need to have something that people want to watch, but as long as you don't go crazy with hundred million dollar liscencing deals it seems possible.

I watch freevee and pluto, as well as several paid for streaming services like disney+ and netflix. I know there used to be a hasbro channel with all the old cartoons, and I would not mind if that came back.

I do not mind at all to have on demand streaming with ads for older shows and movies. For me personally its far better than paying for them.

For example. I wonder if Northern Exposure held up? I really liked that show. $20 to subscribe to a service? Nope, not that interested.
But, able to watch it free with ads, that is something I can handle.

[Zarathud]

Someone is hoping to make another Barbie movie blockbuster and willing to pay Hasbro for the lottery ticket.

[Rumpy]

The problem is that what Hasbro is proposing is literally all licensing, and it doesn't seem financially viable.

And I would be into more classic shows, but the problem with streaming services is that when it comes to that, their back-catalogues are often not available. For example, the longest-running drama in Canada ran for 19 seasons, with over 350 episodes, from 1972 to 1990, and I'd love to dig into it even just to get a historical perspective on it and see its evolution over the years, but the home network's streaming platform only has a small selection of handpicked episodes at most, and it's ad-supported.

[Blackhawk]

I do not mind at all to have on demand streaming with ads for older shows and movies. For me personally its far better than paying for them.

For example. I wonder if Northern Exposure held up? I really liked that show. $20 to subscribe to a service? Nope, not that interested.
But, able to watch it free with ads, that is something I can handle.

If we want the kind of shows we've gotten used to, I think we're going to end up having to get used to paid-with-ads in the future. I still like the idea of new shows being ad-free for the first six months, and everything older being ad supported. But we've got to remember that in The Olden Days, networks got paid by both the subscribers (via cable) and via the ads. Doing one or the other may not cut it anymore.

They gave us more than we paid for. We got used to it. And it's going to be a hard pill for the public to swallow. If that's the way they do it, they're going to need to create a unified front and have everyone implement an ad + fee system at the same time. Otherwise whoever steps forward first is going to get skewered.

[Sudy]

Disney raising prices on Disney Plus and Hulu ahead of account-sharing crackdown

Disney Plus and Hulu subscription prices are going up, but only for subscribers who opt for the ad-free versions of those streaming services, Disney announced Wednesday. Viewers who bundle those two streaming services may not feel the pinch of a price increase, thanks to a new option that will combine Disney Plus and Hulu, without ESPN Plus.

...

Disney will also reportedly take a page from the competition in 2024 by cracking down on password sharing. According to a report from The Wrap, Disney CEO Bob Iger said Wednesday during an investor call that the company is “actively exploring ways to address account sharing and the best options for paying subscribers to share their accounts with friends and family. Later this year, we will begin to update our subscriber agreements with additional terms and our sharing policies, and we will roll out tactics to drive monetization sometime in 2024.”

[Rumpy]

If we want the kind of shows we've gotten used to, I think we're going to end up having to get used to paid-with-ads in the future. I still like the idea of new shows being ad-free for the first six months, and everything older being ad supported. But we've got to remember that in The Olden Days, networks got paid by both the subscribers (via cable) and via the ads. Doing one or the other may not cut it anymore.

I agree, and I think it would be ideal to have shows that are 'premium' as part of the regular service, with older shows or seasons that could be viewed with a free ad-supported account. It'd be a win/win. If people want the latest seasons, pay up. This also allows for a more leisurely pace of not feeling like you're missing out.

[Blackhawk]

I've never understood the furor over Netflix cracking down on password sharing. I can't think of many subscription services that let you pass your credentials out to other people living elsewhere so they can get free service. Obviously lots of people do, but I always figured that when they eventually got caught at it, they wouldn't see the company as being in the wrong.

[Rumpy]

I think it's more the fact that Netflix once encouraged it, then turned around years later and said they couldn't. I think that's what made people angry over the policy change, moreso than the actual policy change itself.

[Blackhawk]

I wasn't aware that they'd ever encouraged it. That gives some context.

[Isgrimnur]

Netflix CEO Says Account Sharing Is OK - January 11, 2016

[Blackhawk]

Sort of. I'm looking for the original quote in the original context (I poked around the CES keynote. I don't have an hour to actually spend listening to a 7-year-old advertising spiel, though, so I might have missed it.) Still, that story isn't quite so black and white if that's what people are drawing on.

“We love people sharing Netflix whether they’re two people on a couch or 10 people on a couch,,” Hastings said. “That’s a positive thing, not a negative thing.”

To illustrate this example, he spoke of how a parent may share their login with their child. And when that child grows up, they will usually subscribe to Netflix, too.

Given that Netflix already supports family accounts where each member can have their own profile, it’s interesting to hear that the CEO is still okay with account-sharing as an alternative to upgraded accounts where more users can sign in on multiple devices at the same time.

It seems that subscribing to your own Netflix account is just another coming-of-age milestone for today’s young adults, in the CEO’s mind.

“As kids move on in their life, they like to have control of their life, and as they have an income, we see them separately subscribe,” Hastings told reporters at CES. “It really hasn’t been a problem.”

It really sounds like he's talking about people within a single household.

While Hastings didn’t directly address how he feels about non-family members sharing their credentials – such as in the case where friends or roommates may split an account – it’s clear that the company’s consumer-friendly position is more focused on getting people addicted to its content in the hopes they’ll later becoming paying customers – just like HBO wanted, too.

It almost looks like he made a comment about people sharing within a limited scope and people took it as permission to give neighbors, friends, and grandma their credentials. Instead of, "And when that child grows up, they will usually subscribe to Netflix, too", when the child grew up he was just getting a copy of the password. Maybe they did backtrack on it, but it sounds like people took their position to extremes, too. It still sounds less like an extreme betrayal and more like a course correction (that even in that article people were expecting: "Of course, Hastings may not see the need for an immediate crackdown on password-sharing today.")

Good lord, I'm being a corporate apologist here, and toward a streaming company at that. Ick. I need to clean off my fingers after typing that.

[ImLawBoy]

Spoiler:

Netflix
@netflix
Love is sharing a password.
1:00 PM · Mar 10, 2017

[YellowKing]

I hate big business as much as the next guy, but I think it's completely unreasonable to feel entitled to free service while everyone else (even if it's your best friend) is paying for it. I mean surely a reasonable person should be able to draw the conclusion that a company's not making money if everyone is allowed to give their product away to friends for free.

Did Netflix make a mistake encouraging it? Absolutely. But again, I don't know how you can reasonably expect a company to give their product away for free and stay in business.

[Blackhawk]

That's kind of where I stand. Even with them supporting some interpretation of sharing being OK, people had to know that the buy-one-get-one deal wouldn't last forever. I can see people being disappointed when they were told that people in different houses would need separate accounts, but I can't see the reactions of shock, betrayal, and boycott.

[Rumpy]

They never clarified it at the time, though. And I don't think they cared to as long as they were getting people hooked. Fact is, they were very public about it and used it as a marketing tactic. They made a famous tweet along the lines of "Love is sharing a password!" in 2017 which resurfaced last year in the wake of the crackdown.

https://www.nme.com/news/tv/netflix-rid ... et-3392067

So, you can't exactly blame people for feeling like their backs were against the wall on this one. And at the same time, I agree with you and can't say I'm surprised. But people surely feel like they were betrayed.

[YellowKing]

I will say that I'm a bit of a prude when it comes to sharing accounts though - maybe working in IT for 25 years has just made me squeamish about any kind of password sharing.

I've had friends voluntarily share their Vudu accounts with me so I can watch whatever they purchase, and I won't do it even if it would save me a few bucks. It's not so much that I care about Vudu losing a few bucks, but more of a guilty conscience thing.

When I was younger and had no money, I pirated a LOT of movies and music (not distribution, just personal use). I never felt good about it. Once I had enough money to buy/rent my own stuff (and the infrastructure was there to actually legally obtain stuff), I stopped doing it. That's not to cast judgment on anyone, it's just my personal code.

[Rumpy]

Oh yeah, the thought itself makes me a little bewildered, in fact. Like you, I don't think I would ever do that. It would be a little different if Netflix built-in a special one-time code that could be generated for sharing. But sharing the password itself not something I'd ever do, simply because of the fact that it's been so ingrained into me that it's not a thing you should ever do.

[ImLawBoy]

They never clarified it at the time, though. And I don't think they cared to as long as they were getting people hooked. Fact is, they were very public about it and used it as a marketing tactic. They made a famous tweet along the lines of "Love is sharing a password!" in 2017 which resurfaced last year in the wake of the crackdown.

https://www.nme.com/news/tv/netflix-rid ... et-3392067

So, you can't exactly blame people for feeling like their backs were against the wall on this one. And at the same time, I agree with you and can't say I'm surprised. But people surely feel like they were betrayed.

BAM!

FWIW, I'm on the side that I don't care about this one way or the other. I have never shared streaming passwords and I don't plan to, so it didn't affect me one way or the other.

[Blackhawk]

But people surely feel like they were betrayed.

I get that they do, but it still doesn't seem reasonable to me. Even the original article posted when the comment about sharing was first made stated that he wouldn't comment on sharing outside of the household and that it was just a matter of time until they cracked down on it. They shouldn't have been surprised, let alone 'betrayed' when that stopped. I'm going to use a word that I hate because of how it's so badly misused, but I see that as a serious sense of entitlement.

Lately, many reactions that we see just seem to be built off of the idea that people are more stressed than ever, and we're living in an era where the correct outlet for stress is to find an excuse to be mad at someone, and then hate that someone with as much bile as possible (until the next excuse comes along, after which the old one cycles out.)

[Rumpy]

Well, sure. It would be different though if they had said you can't share from the get-go and people still did it and cracked down on it then. But there was no sense that what they were doing was wrong since they themselves were encouraging it, and so people did. Sure, maybe 'betrayal' was a bit too strong a word, but I also wouldn't really call it 'entitlement' seeing as Netflix was once enabling it. But times change, and Netflix cracked down because it affected their bottom-line.

Not like it affects me though. The only place I've ever viewed Netflix was at home, and it hasn't even bothered me to set a home location as a result.

[Blackhawk]

I also wouldn't really call it 'entitlement' seeing as Netflix was once enabling it. But times change, and Netflix cracked down because it affected their bottom-line.

Netflix let them have something extra for free that was never part of their agreement, with their blessing. When they stopped, they got mad because they weren't getting something for free anymore, and felt that since they'd been allowed to bend the rules for a little while, they should get to continue to do so forever. That's a sense of entitlement, as in "feeling you're owed something in exchange for nothing." I get disappointed. But anything more than, "It was good while it lasted" is too much.

[dbt1949]

I'm thinking about going with the Britbox. I do love my Poirot.

[Blackhawk]

Keep watching - we could use a new Brit, given that Simon hasn't been around in ~16 years, and membership has been dropping ever since.

(And yes, I know we have British people. I wasn't talking about British people, I was talking about A Brit.)

[Rumpy]

I also wouldn't really call it 'entitlement' seeing as Netflix was once enabling it. But times change, and Netflix cracked down because it affected their bottom-line.

Netflix let them have something extra for free that was never part of their agreement, with their blessing. When they stopped, they got mad because they weren't getting something for free anymore, and felt that since they'd been allowed to bend the rules for a little while, they should get to continue to do so forever. That's a sense of entitlement, as in "feeling you're owed something in exchange for nothing." I get disappointed. But anything more than, "It was good while it lasted" is too much.

I'd say it definitely was good while it lasted, and leave it at that. I honestly don't get the uproar from those people. I find it perplexing. Maybe it's an example of marketing being a little too effective. I mean, in marketing one of the strategies is to make the customer feel good about using your product in order to get them hooked on it. But maybe it's a case where it worked a little too well (which would be an interesting case study), hence the anger from some people when it was reversed.

[Smoove_B]

Amazon will be airing commercials with streaming content:

Amazon Prime Video, one of the last mainstream streaming services to eschew the injection of regular commercial breaks into its movies and shows, plans to start letting them run early next year. Amazon follows a host of other streaming hubs — including Disney+, Netflix, and Warner Bros. Discovery’s Max– that also offer ad-supported tiers, a move that suggests the world of streaming may just eventually mirror the world of traditional television in the not-too-distant future.

...

The company says it plans to run fewer ads on Amazon Prime Video than traditional broadcasters or broadband rivals. Four minutes per hour seems to be a benchmark for the lowest amount of ad time on a streaming platform. Commercials will first appear the U.S., U.K., Germany, and Canada in early 2024, followed by France, Italy, Spain, Mexico, and Australia later in the year. Those who want to keep Amazon Prime Video ad-free can still do so — for an additional $2.99 per month in the U.S. on top of the annual subscription to Amazon’s overall Prime service.