This is rather brilliant in it simplicity.
Thank you! Iāve been trying to convince them to bring back the British comedies from the 70s and 80sā¦ Now, I just have toā¦
How very un-Hollywood
Yeah, that wasā¦ smart!
Welcome to the 21st century, Hollywood!
Now if only they could figure out how to make a deal that would put Game of Thrones on Netflix streamingā¦
So thatās how supply and demand works.
What they need is an exceptionally large air conditioner. That way, they could freeze hell over. However, even that probably wouldnāt work because HBO would point out that an AC, just being a heat pump, created hell on the other side of the air conditioner, and so hell really just moved and didnāt freeze over. HBO then would take more fat wads of cable company cash.
Iām an adult with a job. I can afford to pay for content, and I want to support the stuff I like, so I am generally happy to do it. I just follow a simple rule. If I can buy something within 5 minutes, I will. If I canāt I am an unabashed pirate. Thankfully, companies are slowly waking up to the fact that people like me are pretty normal consumers. In the US, I almost never pirate except for Game of Thrones. I wonder how many more years it will take before entertainment companies pull their head out of their asses and realize that things work much the same across the pond. Europeās piracy rates are so high because that is oftentimes the only way to get digital content on demand.
This is an outrage! Just how much do you suppose these so-called āpiratesā are being paid for their sweatshop labor? Would this be tolerated in any advanced nation if these workers were, for example, college students working in the field of their major?
Wait, so a corporation with a goal of content delivery just admitted that piracy helps them do their job? Hell DID freeze over! GoT on Netflix very soon!
Nice rant, but it might help if you tried to discuss the economics from HBOās point of view. There is a reason that they are doing what they are doing and I donāt see it as stupidity.
Here is an article that discusses some of the economic considerations.
I never implied that they had no reason. HBO obviously they has a reason; they get hot sweaty wads of cash from cable companies to specifically not sell their stuff. That is perfectly acceptable, but Iāll happily pirate the shit out of their stuff with no remorse as a result.
Like I said, I have a very simple rule. Can I buy your shit in 5 minutes of looking around the internet? If I can, Iāll buy it. I like to support stuff that I like. If I canāt find your stuff, or your stuff is locked behind some bundled pay subscription service, it tells me that either through consumer hurting exclusivity deals or blatant stupidity you have decided to write off a portion of your viewers, in which case I assume you realize that piracy is the only viable option left and you are apparently okay with that.
The point is that even with piracy, HBO makes more money with the current business model. And if they wanted to reduce piracy by making their products easier to buy, they would make less money. Logically, they chose the latter and have learned to live with piracy.
hbo content has a 99.9% chance of being licensed to netflix. you do realize that?
Can you support that statement?
No it doesnāt. HBO is owned by Time Warner. Netflix is a competitor. The only way that HBO would be licensed to Netflix is if Netflix convinced Time Warner to sell them HBO. And once that happened, all of the other cable companies would probably block HBO or significantly raise the fees. And cable companies that bundle cable with internet services would fuck with Netflix more than they already are. Right now the cable companies are happy with the current system and everybody is making good money. While it is obvious that at some point in the future that TV will be provided solely by the Internet and that streaming services like Netflix will win, that time is not right now. Honestly, I donāt see any motivation for Time Warner to sell, license, or a la carte price HBO unless there are other viable high end content providers that significantly reduce the value of HBO. Netflix appears to be going down this road, so there is some hope in the future.
Oh man. Reminds me of a conversation I had with the head of operations with Regal Cinemas back in the 1990s. Iād gotten to talking with him about all the work they must put into planning where to build their next movie house. Pouring over stats and reading census data and the like. As he lifted his beer he said, shit no. We build right behind where Wal-Mart puts up a new store. Let those fuckers do the work.
Uh yes, as has already been said like for or five times, everyone agrees that HBO gets big fat wads of cash to maintain exclusivity agreements. The point was that as a result, you should merrily and without any remorse, pirate the shit out of their stuff.
Good! Thank you Netflix for giving me a legal way to view content I want to see in the way I wan to see it. Also thank you for all the TED talks that I am enjoying right now as I write this.
