Netflix is Growing-Up

With its revenue of over $29.600 billion in 2021, Netflix is one of the most iconic brands in history that changed the streaming industry forever, at least.. until now?

TUDUUM…
Over 220 Million people recognize the iconic sound.
(If you’re not one of them, let’s include you by listening to the sound below)

If you need a quick recap pic.twitter.com/afivzcex4H
— Spooky Hrithik Fan 👻 (@KrisLovesMovies) September 26, 2021

I, myself, watch Netflix quite a lot. The first series I ever watched was House of Cards, which I watched over and over again (I just love it!!), then I started watching Narcos (don’t do drugs, kids).

After living for almost 2 years in Argentina, I gave Narcos: Mexico another try to test my Spanish, and surprisingly… I could understand quite a lot without using subtitles! I guess my Spanish is really improving, señores.

So, here I was, again in one of the local coffee places in Córdoba, where I talked again with my friend, who made me start writing about the North Korean article (and also encouraged me to start this blog), talking about Netflix. He complained to me that he feels overwhelmed with all the available streaming services and that he gets annoyed by Netflix removing content; he asked me; “Why do you think they remove their content so often? They’re killing themselves with that move”.

Netflix’s License Agreements

Even though I watch Netflix quite often, I usually watch the Netflix original content, not so much the licensed content. See, Netflix works with license agreements. Once a license is about to expire, Netflix investigates if the rights to the title are still available, how popular the series/movie is in a region, and what the costs are of renewing its license.

To summarize;

Availability
Popularity
Costs

An example I gave to my friend is the series I started watching recently, “Rick & Morty,” which is not on Netflix anymore, or at least not in the US and Argentina. (It is still available in the United Kingdom and Japan). However, Rick & Morty is now available on HBO MAX (so I had to get yet another subscription…).

What I explained to my friend is that the following could have happened;
When Rick & Morty started, it wasn’t that popular, so Netflix could buy the license for a “good price” now that Rick & Morty is quite popular, the creators of Rick & Morty can ask for a good price, and the highest “bidder” wins. In this case, HBO MAX. It brings a powerful position to the creators of the show.

However, this affects us (the subscribers) a lot because we complain to Netflix about removing Rick & Morty, and start tweeting about it, which brings bad press to Netflix. So to avoid that, Netflix needs to outbid HBO Max… do you get it already? And all the creators of Rick & Morty have to do is just sit back and see how the streaming services are outbidding each other.

Am I saying this is bad? No. It is how business works. Just as simple as that.
Now, what I do dislike is that there are several streaming services, such as;

Netflix
HBO Max
Amazon Prime
AppleTV+
Disney+ / Star+
Paramount+
Hulu
And there are many more, including some for certain countries only (such as Videoland in the Netherlands)

Besides Netflix, I also use Disney+ for the Marvel Series (I love Marvel!!), Amazon Prime for “The Boys” series and now HBO Max for “Euphoria” and “Rick & Morty”. I used to have AppleTV+ for the “Invasion” series, but that’s about it.

We are not alone. Extraterrestrial beings have made their way to Earth from across the universe – AppleTV+ Original

See, all these streaming services together have a monthly subscription. Yes, I can save quite some money when I buy a Yearly subscription, but I don’t use the streaming services all year long.

For example, I recently canceled my Amazon Prime subscription because I finished “The Boys”, which I will reactivate again once the new season is released. Disney+ is great at adding new content, so with them it is a little harder to cancel, just like Netflix, who has a HUGE amount of content.

Password Sharing is all Cool, for now

For Netflix, I share my account with my family in The Netherlands, just like almost everyone else that uses Netflix does (suddenly, everyone is a family).

Now, this is something that Netflix also wants to end, kinda. Even though Netflix used to joke around about it and publicly talked about this “issue”, according to, this article Netflix loses $6 Billion a year in revenue over password sharing. They could invest a lot in improving their services, marketing, or other great things.

Do I think that limiting password-sharing is a bad thing? Not really. After Netflix announced they would limit password-sharing, Twitter went nuts, which is probably why Netflix is taking very, very small steps with this measure because they know it will make a lot of noise.

Some years ago, I actually questioned this password-sharing. I always thought that the day would come when Netflix would end supporting this, and that day has kind of arrived in a very limited way.

My Take on it

The bidding battle will also continue; it will never stop. Unless, just like when iTunes was introduced back in 2001, a “revolutionary” platform shows up that combines all the content of all streaming providers in one single platform for a single price… but if this will ever happen? I’m not quite sure about that.

Something I would like to see is to have an app that has an API (Oops, technical terms, I am still a developer / UIX Designer after all) to these services where you can simply enable/disable your subscriptions with a single toggle-switch for each service. But… if the streaming providers provided such an API, that would demolish their revenue. So… no. That won’t happen, either.

I am very curious, though, about which streaming services will survive this wilderness. Netflix has a very strong position, just like Disney+, who has a huge library of original content (especially after acquiring Marvel and Star Wars) and keeps on creating new series, such as “Secret Invasion” and “She-Hulk.” And, of course, Disney has all their content from the past.