Netflix - Not bad! Qwikster - uh, never mind...

u find? the interface on stuff like ps3 sucks, and i dont find the website that great either. the recommendation algorithms are shit hot tho

how is netflix losing the exclusivity and muscle? i mean starz and criterion arent on netflix anymore but... who* gives a shit about starz and criterion

*real people, not ppl who watch black orpheus for pleasure

the redesign of the website isnt amazing--but their recommendation algorithm is fantastic--and its still much much better than amazon or hulu

i guess they need to fix the ps3 thing but i never watch it on ps3 so

starz has a lot of studio stuff, pixar etc

yeah oh well. theyre getting dreamworks!

http://pardon-my-french.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/06/pixar-dreamworks-tm.gif

By muscle I mean its pull/esteem/power. It's a matter of perception, and the appearance of weakness - say, massive overnight stock drops after months of bad business decisions - does not put Netflix in a position of power when it comes to negotiating content. Though yeah, it does have a big head start on the competition.

But see, that's sort of it: streaming is something that doesn't take much know-how, right?

― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, October 26, 2011 11:53 AM (43 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

no not at all, god, every popular internet thing in the result of an incredible amount of know how, institutional agility, area business expertise - its no coincidence that like every really big internet thing google amazon twitter netflix etc were created by technology companies not like disney or time warner or w/e

i guess they need to fix the ps3 thing but i never watch it on ps3 so

They don't need to fix the PS3 interface since it loads everything you set up via the website; tbh, the PS3 is kind of a terrible unit to use for browsing anything so they're sort of handcuffed by the platform.

i still dont think anyone really has figured out how to present a gigantic library of content for browsing on any digital platform

Also yeah, reliably streaming something like mp3s, which are bandwidth-light, is a different ball of wax from reliably streaming high-definition movies, particularly on a heterogeneous network owned by several competing business entities.

By muscle I mean its pull/esteem/power. It's a matter of perception, and the appearance of weakness - say, massive overnight stock drops after months of bad business decisions - does not put Netflix in a position of power when it comes to negotiating content. Though yeah, it does have a big head start on the competition.

― Josh in Chicago, Wednesday, October 26, 2011 11:58 AM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

yeah this is fair--this is what i worry about most

besides world hunger, war, disease, etc.

worst case scenario, we're gonna end up with like 5 services with different shit on it with no way to figure out what's gonna be on what (cuz no one goes 'i wanna watch a warner brothers movie tonight!')

then again, paying $50 a month for unlimited movies/tv is actually NOT A BAD DEAL

i still dont think anyone really has figured out how to present a gigantic library of content for browsing on any digital platform

Sure, but the website is always going to be a step ahead due to the expected keyboard input interface; it's always going to be less cumbersome to type than to point-and-click letters.

Now, if Netflix on PS3 integrated with, say, Dragon Naturally Speaking and developed a reliable voice interface, they could really go somewhere.

well the other part of the "worst case scenario" is if cable companies get involved and start throttling bandwidth, charging an extra $15/mo for the "streaming videos package" etc., and that the 5 services have horrible shitty UIs

Blockbuster already has a streaming service. Was this mentioned upthread? The problem, as ever, is that studios want more money per view.

Sure, but the website is always going to be a step ahead due to the expected keyboard input interface; it's always going to be less cumbersome to type than to point-and-click letters.

Now, if Netflix on PS3 integrated with, say, Dragon Naturally Speaking and developed a reliable voice interface, they could really go somewhere.

― he carried yellow flowers (DJP), Wednesday, October 26, 2011 12:03 PM (3 minutes ago) Bookmark

appletv netflix is actually a better interface for a bunch of reasons - one of which is you can use your iphone as a controller/keyboard.

another is that it's just better laid-out, with more stuff on the screen. you can see a whole big grid of your queue instead of like 5 at a time. seems more designed for the "HD" in HDTVs

One thing that the Netflix web interface lacks is any kind of editorial/curatorial voice. Contrasting with eMusic, another service I subscribe to, the difference is striking. eMusic has a staff of editors who write regular features providing introductions to bands/periods/labels/genres, compile lists of picks, recommend new releases, etc. While I don't always agree with them, it's interesting to read the perspective of an informed curator, and it helps you to learn about stuff you might be interested in. I personally find this a lot more interesting and helpful than some technological black-box recommendation system that gives me a random list with no hint of any connecting logic or theme.

ya that would require hiring like a billion people tho

(not that i would complain if all of the sudden there were a billion new jobs for film writers)

I'm curious how they got the numbers for this "$1 billion contract with the CW" deal

I love the current cable gambit of "watch movies currently in the theater in the comfort of your living room! (ps thx for the $60 lol)"; it seems like such a blatant preying on our current short-attention-span culture that I can really only just sit back and applaud.

appletv netflix is actually a better interface for a bunch of reasons - one of which is you can use your iphone as a controller/keyboard.

Yeah, layout concerns aside I can't help but think this is a HUGE improvement over the PS3, which basically works like searching for stuff in Comcast's OnDemand menu without the detailed parametric hierarchical menus.

One thing that the Netflix web interface lacks is any kind of editorial/curatorial voice

This is a bonus IMO.

I love the current cable gambit of "watch movies currently in the theater in the comfort of your living room! (ps thx for the $60 lol)"; it seems like such a blatant preying on our current short-attention-span culture that I can really only just sit back and applaud.

they ended up not doing this iirc

got to think its the wave of the future tho, maybe not $60 but you know

that'll only happen, imo, when the studios just give up on theatrical releases, which i think are still pretty profitable

Comcast was doing it for a while (with some terrible movies I can't remember now) although I think maybe they were only charging $30?

imho in the future theatrical release will be p much for promo purposes as a lot of people wont have movie theaters anywhere near them

will we live in the sky or the ground

important question

I would just like to announce that on behalf of ILX, I bought all of netflix's stocks

who wants some netflix stocks, I got 'em

imho in the future theatrical release will be p much for promo purposes

Thought that said "porno purposes" and got pretty jazzed tbh

who wants some netflix stocks, I got 'em

I will trade you some guess papers

hmmm intriguing offer but I feel like I am in a really good 'market position' right now, I can really 'capitalize' on these netflix stocks

imho in the future theatrical release will be p much for promo purposes as a lot of people wont have movie theaters anywhere near them

― ice cr?m, Wednesday, October 26, 2011 12:18 PM (53 minutes ago) Bookmark

and bands will make all their revenue from touring!

if that happens to be true, and it might be, the movie industry is fucked. $7.99 a month per household (which people are still whining about) versus whatever it costs for everyone to go see a bunch of movies every year is not gonna cut it.

theyre just gonna need to learn how to make movies more efficiently

I know this guy from china who does a great brad pitt impression

a reverse mickey rooney, if you will

a reverse mickey rooney

^^highlight of the Screech sex tape

if that happens to be true, and it might be, the movie industry is fucked. $7.99 a month per household (which people are still whining about) versus whatever it costs for everyone to go see a bunch of movies every year is not gonna cut it.

― the jazz zinger (s1ocki), Wednesday, October 26, 2011 1:14 PM (26 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

well i could see the actual cost of the thing being higher but yeah the movie industry is in for a hard landing - its not just box office but dvd sales etc - theater attendance has been shrinking since the advent of television and its only accelerating w/fancier home theater setups/competition from video games internet etc - the industry wants to keep the dvd money faucet on as long as they can but thing is if they dont eventually offer people a good inexpensive way to get movies over the internet theyre gonna get napsterized just like the record industry did

i mean i think there will still be theaters, just not that many of them

But if there are not many of them, how could they open the same movie on 3000 screens at the same time?

dvd is a weird historical anomaly that will be seen to have briefly saved the industry, i fear

Kind of like the CD in music-land.

totes

man i dont really care that the music industry collapsed cause people still be making music, but not sure how im gonna live w/o more billion dollar cgi adventurescapes

youtube man... youtube

500 more episodes of epic eating contest have been ordered

i am just coming to terms with the fact that pretty much every cultural product except for like in situ installation art has been rendered monetarily valueless by the last 10 years