Netflix seemed to be a threat to all of TV, but with the current quarterly earnings report, it sure doesn't look as if that's true now. Netflix really proves that even Internet viewing of video isn't immune to profit and other business issues. This is a lesson we need to learn if we want a viable online video model.
I think you're right that their near-term future depends on out-of-US markets like Brazil, but I wonder if the expansion there is anything more than a way of gaining time. Whatever issues with content rights and subscriber growth there might be within the US market over time, I think other markets would at least share them. That would mean that Netflix still has to figure out a way of addressing new revenue opportunities within each of their target markets. It's like cellular in the US; at first you chase new customers but eventually you have to chase ARPU (average revenue per user) growth.
Apparently the future well being of Netflix might depend on their move to streaming in various countries in Central and South America with Brazil being the gold ring.
I am happy to pay for content that matches my interest, especially if I don't need to wade through 30% of the content time in commercials. 18 seconds for every minute I really want? Pretty high price to pay when I can eliminate this for 8 bucks a month!!!
I agree with your point, Susan; I think that in general direct payment is always the best because it doesn't disguise the value of the exchange for either party. Advertising, particularly commercials, focuses production of mass-consume material, meaning not so much what people like but what they're willing to tolerate. I guess as I age my tolerance reduces, because I've taken to using Roku to view Amazon Prime Instant Videos when I can't find something I really want to watch. Since I got it, I find that to be true for somewhere between a third and two-thirds of the time I spend viewing!
I think that all of the olden-day hopes of getting a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow or being kissed and turning into a prince/princess have mutated into the view that everything on the Internet can ge free! It's hard to be rational when people don't want to hear it and when there are plenty who will indulge their fantasies. Sadly, commercial reality always wins.
I think that the sad thing about all of this is that as it is in many aspects of modern life, simply addressing reality would likely suggest better solutions to problems than we'll come up with through avoidance strategies. In content, for example, we need a really good picture of the total food chain involved from production to consumption and we need settlement among the parties for the role we want them to play. In a system like that people would gravitate to places in the process where their investment could earn a better return by making a more dramatic improvement. Content shortage begats content production, etc.
About content and advertising, I prefer good content with no advertising. Two of the several reasons why I don't watch television are bad advertising, and not very good content. I am happier choosing content that matches my interests -which are not the popular interests-, is free of advertising, and is available anytime I want.
Paying for content for the value of content is better than paying for content through advertising.
This issue with content keeps coming back. Rarely good content is free, even though some times you can come across some. Some time ago I was wondering why some people think other people should offere their content without receiving any compensation for their work. How serious do we take content that is not compensated? And do we tend to put all content that is not compensated in the same basket, even though some of it may be quality content?
The whole Amazon.reader debate is a double-stupid. It's stupid to think that there's any e-book buyer who doesn't know Amazon's URL, and it was stupider to let ICANN launch the whole free-form TLD initiative to start with.
Subsidized handsets, rather than locked handsets, should be the focus of regulators. We're not getting good deals, not fostering innovation, and weakening our power as buyers.
50 billion household devices will be on the Internet by 2020, according to Cisco. And we're hearing foreign governments are hacking our infrastructure. Surely our refrigerators are next!
YouTube's move to a partial pay-for-view model could help relieve a dearth of good new content but it could also complicate debates in many parts of the world over payment by content providers for delivery of their material to customers.
That's what Larry Page said on Google's earnings call, referring to the conjunction of mobile and the cloud. Well, let's chart it then! We need to be thinking about an Internet where 90% of our traffic goes to 70 destinations within 40 miles of us.
Facebook's Graph Search may face some profound challenges and risks, first, because Facebook users haven't been thinking of their posts as product reviews; and second, because Facebook will now have to contend with the social-network equivalent of SEO "gaming" of results.
EU operators are considering joining up to create a pan-European network to reduce competitive overbuild and cost. This might lower costs and focus operators on higher-level, more interesting services.
Mobile TV is everywhere, and yet, nowhere. Nobody uses it – because the handsets aren't good, the pricing is too high, and the coverage is not good enough. But Qualcomm's FloTV Personal TV aims to change all of that.
What do Apple TV, Google TV, Netflix, and Apple's tossing YouTube from iOS have in common? They prove that streaming video success is dependent on two things, a solid linkage to TV and an ecosystem surrounding the video to mine margins and profits for the provider.
Free online video was supposed to kill cable. But research shows most people are getting less interested in replacing cable with online video – not more. There are three reasons why, says Tom Nolle.
New York's Metropolitan Transit Authority is conducting a pilot test of digital kiosks to guide subway users to where they want to go more efficiently and at lower cost.
The IBM Smarter Commerce Global Summit in Monaco kicked into high gear today, and we've already begun to see news emerging from that lovely city-state by the sea.
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