by dzink 15 hours ago
In 2009 a Turner Broadcasting executive stood in front of employees and said they are not worried about Online streaming because it only covered 15 minutes of watching time among consumers. TBS, TNT, Cartoon Network, HBO, Time Inc were all under the same ownership umbrella along with the entire MGM catalog Ted Turner had acquired at the cost of losing control of his company. There were executives who knew what they were doing but some were performative - using buzz words and bravado to hide that they had no idea. Many were trying to extract as much as possible from both ends - 50% of revenue from consumers and 50% from advertisers. Even when those two were in direct conflict with each-other’s interests. They believed content was king and so they invested in content, instead of distribution. They hoarded their back catalog for years.
In the mean time Netflix started with 3 CDs per month plans and when they began streaming on 2007 we didn’t use it at start because we assumed that it would cut out of the 3 movies allotment. So we were scared to use it for a while. Yet we used it regularly - because unlike the cable service, streaming didn’t have ads. And ads were massive massive abuse and waste of time for consumers. You can benchmark the level of abuse by the types of ads in the super bowl: Alcohol, crypto, gambling, cars…
The reality is that cable was a paid premium service, unlike broadcast TV, which was free and littered with ads. Mix the two and you lose the golden goose.
That said, the bravado of that executive stuck with me since then.
Everything is now re-consolidated under different media companies now. Instead of Ted Turner we have Larry Ellison, and Netflix, and Disney.
So I think the biggest question is, what form of entertainment will eventually supplant streaming services? Whatever it is (or will be) will almost certainly be disregarded by most people.
AI generated by demand, most likely. Or AI generated by indie creators who have a vision but not a budget, and are provided with a platform to create content easily.
Yeah, I dunno. There's a guy on Instagram right now making techno-futuristic stories I equate to micro-episodes and...it gets old. Economies of scale would say that finding the good content in the sea of dogshit would be impossible if everyone was doing that. Premium is premium because it's scarce; not everyone is doing it.
Don't worry, there will be algorithms to help you find what you like. And content will still go viral within subcultures.
As always, anticipated (at least in some sense) by Neal Stephenson:
Except the algorithms don’t help me find new things I like. They never have, and I’m starting to suspect that they never will.
What they find - what they’re designed to find - is more of the same. Which is only “more things I like” in à very, very shortsighted sense.
Maybe this is because of scarcity.. if existing algos are applied on top of infinitely generated entertainment then perhaps we'll see something even more addictive than YouTube.
Reminds me of Red Vs Blue series of 2003 that were only using the Halo game. They were quite fun to watch. Imagine what can be done with AI nowadays!
Yeah, currently generated content made with some interconnected ideas, vision, script and talent is kinda better than I thought it will be. I expected it will be extremely sloppy at first.
Youtube, TikTok, Sora...
YouTube.
Unfortunately, I think the best competition to streaming already exists. And it's already owned by a concentrated player.
For example, if indie AI generated content is the next big thing, it probably shows up on YouTube.
The branding debacle around HBO streaming service was malpractice
HBO Go and HBO Now - simultaneously, for some reason
Then HBO Max
Then Max
Now back to HBO Max
How many committee meetings did it take to get this strategy?
It's frankly amazing WB Studio and HBO quality has survived this insanity.
Time-Warner and its incarnations is whatever the opposite of synergy is (the parts are worse because of the whole)
IIRC the Go / Now switch was due to Go being the app if you already paid for cable and wanted to watch HBO by logging into your cable provider account. Now was the pure streaming option those without cable could purchase. Took a bit to consolidate I think.
That was the given reason, and I'm sure they knew it was ridiculous and fixed it as soon as they could get all their ducks in a row, but it sure was comically bad from the outside perspective of ordinary users. Even if there had to be 2 apps for some contractual reasons I think most people would have been more tolerant if they had identical functionality and appearance after login, and were just titled "HBO Go for Cable" and "HBO Go Streaming."
And netflix has ads now.
> The reality is that cable was a paid premium service, unlike broadcast TV, which was free and littered with ads.
The reality is, most cable channels had ads from day one. Less ads than most broadcast stations (which made up most of the channels you had on cable at the start anyways) but still a lot of the first cable-only channels had ads from the start. WTBS had ads on cable in 1976. MSG/USA had ads on cable starting in 1977. CNN had ads on day one in 1980. MTV had ads on day one in 1981.
Yeah the allure of cable was always that you got more (boutique) options. Like an entire channel dedicated to cartoons, e.g
I dont think I have ever seen a completely ad free cable channel?
Disney Channel in the 90s didn't have any ads. And they would show whole Disney movies uninterrupted by anything. For this reason it was a paid add-on to your cable package though, like HBO -- never included in the basic cable package.
In the '00s they still had no real ads, only promo spots for mostly other Disney shows on the channel, and the occasional tie-in with some other Disney property. I think today they have some normal ads but I'm not sure.
C-SPAN
They do (did?) exist. Nickelodeon was originally a completely ad-free channel. HBO and Cinemax also didn't have ads.
Tales as old as time, especially in tech: rich monopolistic incumbents not seeing the writing on the wall of a new paradigm shift; seemingly invincible execs brazenly displaying their (incorrect) hot-takes; and the inevitable enshittification of the new paradigm as it turns from revolutionary movement to ruling-class incentives.