I can't believe it.
Netflix
is not like reigning Supreme anymore in terms of the streaming options.
It just reported that last quarter it lost 200,000 subscribers.
Part of that, I think it was because of the Russia situation.
And then they lost a lot of, you know, big Hollywood releases
probably to streaming platforms like Disney Plus and Hulu, all those.
Yeah. 150 employees are just laid off.
It has been rough over there.
I think the thing
keeping them afloat, one of the things keeping them afloat is neutral.
What's yeah?
New girl? Well, they lost the office, right?
That was a huge hit.
They lost the office to it's a peacock.
Yeah. And ABC. Towers of being. Reversal took back its show.
Yeah.
Isn't it crazy how one show has that much influence?
Well, the office is.
He's a big. Perfect. He's a big fan.
I'm a big fan.
You are the face of the fans.
I'm also lucky enough to work
with one of the producers on the show I've been working on. I
don't know what to think exactly.
I think Netflix was riding high and for a while.
It was also like the first of its kind.
Yes, man, that sucks, right?
Like, it's bad,
but it makes sense because
there's always gonna be competition in the marketplace.
Like, they were the streaming giant.
And all these other companies are smart enough to come on and say,
I think we're going to take back our own IP,
especially when the theaters started getting hit real hard.
And they're like, Look, we can't survive this.
You know, Blockbuster have a streaming app.
I feel like just out of the nostalgia of it, people would love it
if Blockbuster started streaming stuff.
Maybe. I mean, it'd be fun.
Netflix is what took Blockbuster out.
I know, because remember when Netflix started,
you used to have to order it like a library,
but it was such a novel idea to get the DVD in the mail.
It was so cool. Yeah, I did that, too.
Yeah, I. You started doing that.
Before they died.
And Blockbuster was like, streaming was going to do that.
Yeah. Yeah. There you go. Yeah.
Because people didn't think
that people's experience of the of the cinematic, you know, stuff.
But then what
we all know what happened
with streaming, basically, big stars started doing series
and then that cinematic experience was offered to people with budgets
running through you know, shows like even Google.
So it was a big, you know, film at the time.
At the time, she was she was pretty big in the film space.
And so it's still doing well on Netflix.
Yeah. People love New Girl. Interesting.
Liz Meriwether.
All Yeah. Liz Meriwether, I.
I don't know if I'm going to rewatch it a million times, but.
A little anecdote about New Girl When I first got to L.A.
to start chipping away at working as a writer,
I met with the Fox team about a show that I had created,
and they said, Hey, we're looking to do shows like this new show
that's about to release. Check it out.
And it was a pilot by Liz Meriwether called Chicks and
that I read and Chicks and became New Girl.
And Boy, did they have a hit on their hands.
Yeah. Did you and you read that? You read it?
Yeah, I've. Read it before.
You see, for and you knew you knew it was big because I remember
you mentioning it to me after your meeting. Yeah.
And I didn't think that that was a good title.
Well, neither did they.
We have kids that love
Netflix, but every single time you launch it, there's so many.
Not just one, but like ten new shows.
My kids like, yes, they have very different tastes, and
they always like to see something new.
But the problem is, is that there's too many things
happening, too much is out there.
And honestly, you get exhausted by using the platform because
it's like any place.
It's like you want to feel like you've actually utilized the show.
Sometimes having too much stuff, too many options is not a good thing.
This is why The Office and New Girl
and these things do so well is because people get it for food.
It's comfort food.
And people get like, you know, I like to fall asleep
to the office, Parks and Rec, Seinfeld, things like this,
because I know them, I'm familiar with them. It's comfort food.
I don't have to think too much.
So when there were less shows on the air,
it was not as stressful and people
imprinted upon those characters, they said, Oh, I'm, I'm like a gym.
I'm like, a Pam.
I think when you lose
those pieces of intellectual property, you hurt your, your platform.
And look, there's nothing really Netflix could do, right?
I mean, NBC was coming from what was theirs and their contract had expired.
Disney Plus needs to be mindful of this,
I think, because what I've seen on Disney
Plus is that they are trying to cater to their base.
And their Disney base is very different than their Marvel fans.
And like there's so many splintered versions
but I don't think that Disney is going to make that mistake.
But I will say, though, that there comes a point
where people just get inundated by the database and they're like,
This isn't fun for me to process because it's just so much sensorial
for you to launch the app and get pummeled with content
that you now have to find the time to like use and watch and enjoy.
So yeah, rollouts, people like anticipation, people like that.
They thrive on that.
Not to mention that really does help stoke the fires of people
wanting to like anticipate something coming out like that.
Is that to me is human nature.
It's, it's that pleasure delaying thing that people.
Like these streamers are going to need to adapt to
do things the way they were done.
About 15 years ago, we were in this golden age of TV
with like Breaking Bad Mad Men pretty much like LOL, a movie
that was segmented right into one hour long episodes,
and that became the way that we started making television.
And I think it's great.
But when you have little bits
that you can consume that are easy to watch, right?
That are more sitcom esque, they might be single cameras, OK,
but I don't know.
They give you breathing room, they give you time.
You don't feel like I have to binge, binge, binge, binge.
Binge bingeing has become this like funny thing,
but when you think about it
on a larger scale, binge is really unhealthy.
You know, there is no such thing as a free lunch.
You know, they are there is a market
for them to keep making more and more and more money.
So like any business, they want to keep making more
and more and more money.
And what they're making money on is our time and our our brains
so essentially to have to to binge every single little square
that they've got that feeds into your algorithm.
When you think about it, you have to put you first.
The media really is serving itself as as a function.
As are most businesses.
But there's no regulations for these things
that are mindful of people's mental health.
What they're doing is they're quote unquote optimizing everything
to feed you this quote unquote best content, the splashiest content
the content with the biggest stars. Right.
That's what they always say.
The biggest names
brought to you in your home and life experiences have the biggest budgets.
And like, it's big, big, big.
And it's like but then why would want to just watch the office?
It's just a simple thing or even reality, really.
Certain reality shows are really simple.
So, you know, and yet people are still trying to make those
the splashiest biggest cooking show, the biggest splashiest reality show.
It's a cooking show.
It's on the side of a plane while moving place like.
Rock is with children.
It's like I think I.
Think people are going to get tired and if if that's anything
that we are learning about this Netflix situation
is that people are inundated by too much content.
And now Netflix is actually launching an advertised model.
That's supposedly cheaper.
Or will be cheaper.
Yeah. Yeah.
Like Hulu had that already, right?
Where it's like, OK, you can get you.
Started like that.
You get it.
You can have you
advertised model version for like six, seven bucks, whatever it is.
How are you going to have premium where you don't have to pay
for ads for 14, 15 bucks, whatever it is, right?
So Netflix for you, right?
Netflix, in order to keep up, they're going to launch this, this model.
And I'm curious to see how that works.
I'm sure that's always been an option.
Yeah. You know.
They prided themselves on not having that as an option. Before.
I think that that's, that's a telltale that there's a lot more
wrong over at Netflix than we even know that says a lot.
Well try
to think of the original series that we watch on Netflix.
I mean, we watch Ozark.
What else do we watch? That's an original Netflix series we.
Watch a lot of cartoons that are original. Netflix is.
Oh, kids content. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
We watch a lot.
That's true.
That's true. And that's what I was saying.
Well, it's not like, you know, like we watch you know,
I mean, like you and I on our free time, we don't watch
you don't watch the free time. We watch because we have to. Right.
But like, you know, the I don't know,
a lot of series that are doing it over there for me.
So it was was it one of those cartoon shows?
It was either South Park where they were like
they would go to Netflix and they would get.
Greenlit they.
Yeah, it was in the South.
So South Park had this episode where basically like,
I don't know, one of the kids people were coming to Netflix
and they were like greenlighting everything.
And it was like a joke
because at one point, Netflix was just going into production,
just like giving so much money out and like greenlighting everything.
And then they even got into the whole, like, Lifetime, like Hallmark movie
space to around the Christmas time, which I'm sure they'll still do.
Right. But they are in the they are in the volume.
It seems like business and they must be slowing down.
Oh, yeah.
I don't know if that's the case anymore.
It's better to curate good content, write shows
that are buzzy that people will watch that can talk about.
Because again, you want to create these moments
of what used to happen back in the day,
like when friends friends was a thing and now there were less options
but you want your friends like HBO. Max has it with you.
For you, you need a show that is like your thing.
Netflix.
You come here to watch boom, you know,
and that means you have to be choosier, right?
It means you have to have a good development process.
What do you guys think?
Like, do you think Netflix is going to make it?
What are the shows you watch on there?
And do you think that there is too much content right now
and is it sustainable? I'm curious to know what everybody thinks.