Why "Streamageddon" Is Stupid But Par for the Course
What does this mean? Well, right now it means that a bunch of James Bond films, Barney collections, the film Barb Wire, etc, are unavailable to you. Instant Watcher has a list of all the expiring films, but I'm not even going to link you to it, because as of this writing server traffic is making it nearly impossible to see it.
In theory, we (as Netflix customers) have no right to be upset. None of the titles Netflix carries are set in stone to exist forever. I was dismayed the other week when I couldn't find an old MST3K episode I was hankering for, but them's the breaks. Titles going away and (maybe) coming back is nothing new. But what makes this scenario different is Warner Bros banking on a scheme that angles to get a cut of the streaming pie.
It's a ridiculous notion for a couple of reasons, both of them being false assumptions about the nature and means of the viewing public. I know a couple of film professors who might plonk down some cash for access to our mustache-twirling Bros' vault, but the idea that Joe Schlub is gonna pay ten bucks a month to stream a few thousand movies when they can pay less than that and have access to hundreds of thousands of titles on Netflix is bananacakes. And looking at their FAQ, it sure seems like they're only going to have a couple of hundred titles available at one one time. That's just preposterous, my good Bros.
"Ah, yes," says one of the Bros, peering over his wire-rimmed spectacles, hidden behind piles of cash, "but what of the specific titles we have that those Redflicks people haven't?" And yeah, okay, looking at their site, there's some pretty sweet old titles in their lineup of 220 available films and shows. That's nice. I know The Bros have been digitizing films that haven't gotten a wide home video release and making them available via Warner Archive print-on-demand, so that's probably what these things are. But again, does the average person care? I doubt it.
Here's how I use Netflix: I set up my instant queue. Occasionally I watch something from it. Most of the time I just sort of jump around and see what looks good to me. I'll go to Instant Watcher and see what new crap has gone up that looks like it'll be entertaining. I know a lot of people who operate the same way. The idea that someone is going to spend an extra ten bucks a month because Warner Bros might decide to have up one of the Bond films is pretty poopy, and I say this as someone who generally doesn't like poop. Disney's the only company who could really pull something like this off, because their fans are obsessed.
Will the the scheme work in the short-term? Sure. There's a segment of the population, probably a lot of film buffs, that will check out the service to see what it has to offer. And there will be some people with disposable income who will just love the idea of sitting down with a nice glass of Cabernet Sobbymom and watching some old noir film from the Bros' sweet vault. But overall it's just another example of Hollywood studio backwards thinking. In the short-term you're gonna make some bank; congrats. In the long-term, the Bros are putting up a massive barrier between themselves and the majority of the viewing public. Without the support of the general public, a studio's reputation withers and dies. If you separate your catalog of film and television from a massive, installed subscriber base, you gain a share of the streaming pie but risk losing public awareness of your legacy and power, diminishing the reputation of some once great Bros.
