<story><title>Netflix&apos;s New Chapter</title><url>https://stratechery.com/2023/netflixs-new-chapter/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>tootie</author><text>Yeah, D+ is churning out an enormous volume of what would be considered prestige content at other services. All the Star Wars and Marvel shows are star-studded and larded with top-tier visual effects. And some of them aren&amp;#x27;t really getting a lot of viewers from what the rumors say.</text></item><item><author>phphphphp</author><text>Content is expensive to produce. Disney+ is not just a streaming platform for existing Disney content, rather, Disney produce content for it. Likewise, Netflix spends most of its money on content, operating the actual platform is comparatively cheap.</text></item><item><author>zamadatix</author><text>What I don&amp;#x27;t understand is how e.g. Disney+ is losing so much money. It&amp;#x27;s Disney&amp;#x27;s content, has an enormous userbase, and somehow is bleeding billions?</text></item><item><author>no_wizard</author><text>I&amp;#x27;m gonna attempt to break this down:&lt;p&gt;- Netflix has 5-6 Billion USD free cash flow, and because they got what debt they do have under favorable terms, they are positioned to retain most of that free cash flow&lt;p&gt;- Disney, Comcast (Peacock), CBS&amp;#x2F;Viacom and other media corporations are saddled with debt, and are all losing money on their own independent streaming businesses. Likely untenable in their shareholder model&lt;p&gt;- Therefore, Netflix needs to do what it can to retain &amp;#x2F; attract subscribers, but essentially can wait until the other services have to give up due to cost&lt;p&gt;In a nutshell, Netflix is poised to play more long game, due to cost structures of their competitors.&lt;p&gt;so fair, sounds good, but it assumes the boards &amp;#x2F; leadership of these companies won&amp;#x27;t also play a long game, seeing some sort of profitability horizon is they cannibalize their existing businesses for sticky services (like streaming). I could see Disney doing this, to some extent, with their cable TV channels and movies. I&amp;#x27;m less bullish on Comcast&amp;#x2F;NBC, CBS&amp;#x2F;Viacom or really any other media company being able to do this, simply because they don&amp;#x27;t have the &amp;quot;staying power&amp;quot; Disney does.&lt;p&gt;This also fails to account for the strength of HBO Max (very strong sub numbers)</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>Volundr</author><text>TBH this more or less describes the problem at least for me. I&amp;#x27;m like 3 Star Wars series behind. Catching up at this point feels more like a chore than entertainment. Forget Marvel.</text></comment>
<story><title>Netflix&apos;s New Chapter</title><url>https://stratechery.com/2023/netflixs-new-chapter/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>tootie</author><text>Yeah, D+ is churning out an enormous volume of what would be considered prestige content at other services. All the Star Wars and Marvel shows are star-studded and larded with top-tier visual effects. And some of them aren&amp;#x27;t really getting a lot of viewers from what the rumors say.</text></item><item><author>phphphphp</author><text>Content is expensive to produce. Disney+ is not just a streaming platform for existing Disney content, rather, Disney produce content for it. Likewise, Netflix spends most of its money on content, operating the actual platform is comparatively cheap.</text></item><item><author>zamadatix</author><text>What I don&amp;#x27;t understand is how e.g. Disney+ is losing so much money. It&amp;#x27;s Disney&amp;#x27;s content, has an enormous userbase, and somehow is bleeding billions?</text></item><item><author>no_wizard</author><text>I&amp;#x27;m gonna attempt to break this down:&lt;p&gt;- Netflix has 5-6 Billion USD free cash flow, and because they got what debt they do have under favorable terms, they are positioned to retain most of that free cash flow&lt;p&gt;- Disney, Comcast (Peacock), CBS&amp;#x2F;Viacom and other media corporations are saddled with debt, and are all losing money on their own independent streaming businesses. Likely untenable in their shareholder model&lt;p&gt;- Therefore, Netflix needs to do what it can to retain &amp;#x2F; attract subscribers, but essentially can wait until the other services have to give up due to cost&lt;p&gt;In a nutshell, Netflix is poised to play more long game, due to cost structures of their competitors.&lt;p&gt;so fair, sounds good, but it assumes the boards &amp;#x2F; leadership of these companies won&amp;#x27;t also play a long game, seeing some sort of profitability horizon is they cannibalize their existing businesses for sticky services (like streaming). I could see Disney doing this, to some extent, with their cable TV channels and movies. I&amp;#x27;m less bullish on Comcast&amp;#x2F;NBC, CBS&amp;#x2F;Viacom or really any other media company being able to do this, simply because they don&amp;#x27;t have the &amp;quot;staying power&amp;quot; Disney does.&lt;p&gt;This also fails to account for the strength of HBO Max (very strong sub numbers)</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>thedrbrian</author><text>&amp;gt;All the Star Wars and Marvel shows are star-studded and larded with top-tier visual effects.&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;m just going to throw this out there. What if these shows just aren&amp;#x27;t that good?</text></comment>