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Originally Posted by jfman
Companies say things to attract customers - that's a natural thing to do. That doesn't mean there aren't long term plans to do something in a slightly different way once people are 'in'.
It's easy for Netflix to say they won't now - indeed it could be a selling point in a market of company A through to company Z. Once the market consolidates into company A, B, C, D, E or F it'll be a quick way to fetch a large and substantial dividend.
As I've pointed out before - these companies don't just know what you watch - they can ascertain information about your lifestyle, wider household and others than present commercial broadcasters cannot. That's far more valuable on a localised level and personal level that how many ABC1s watch Love Island.
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In terms of info on people, Netflix pulled off a blinder here and became the daddy of them all never to be repeated by anyone else.
It is highly unlikely that any other streamer will ever have the kind of access to the full spectrum of content from multiple companies that Netflix has enjoyed up to now. And by having all that content, Netflix has built up a mountain of info on user's viewing habits. That in itself is priceless.
On ads, like you, lets wait and see. Netflix is gradually turning the corner now from being a pure growth company into actually becoming a proper company that must make a profit.
We've already had phase one of this with the recent price rises, phase two is the brakes being put on content spend which some speculators are saying is just about to happen and the third phase may well be ads.
Netflix is on the top of the perch and it will take a awful lot for even someone like Disney to knock them off now, but they do need to start making money in the next few years and bringing that debt down.
On consolidation, as I'm sure you'll know, CBS and Viacom are about to recombine in the next few weeks and we'll see what streaming plans they come up with. Like Disney and all the traditional media cos, so far their plans are still based on having multiple streamers each, which I think is the wrong way to go about it. We may then see Discovery gobbled up by this company too, or get taken over by Comcast which again, will all effect what and how many streamers there will be in the future and how expensive it will be for us!
---------- Post added at 18:33 ---------- Previous post was at 18:27 ----------
Quote:
Originally Posted by jfman
Indeed - it's not going to be 18 minutes of random ads per hour. It could even be just one advert at the start of a programme. However it'll be so targeted it's talking to you.
It could be for a Mercedes, a beach holiday in Tenerife, a trip to Disneyworld, it could be Just Eat. The last of which could tell you popular local places, live estimated delivery times etc. Just Eat can then take that to their vendors and charge higher commission. If you've got kids they'll know the rough age (based on viewing habits) and could sell you all kinds of local 'days out' and even factor in the local weather forecast for the weekend into it (indoor or outdoor events).
The capability is genuinely immense.
The largest and most popular providers will be able to harvest the most data, and therefore attract the highest fees. Netflix, or someone else, could take the higher ground. However the evidence base from the vast majority of cable and satellite providers all over the world is that the added value of going 'no ads' doesn't outweigh not actually showing adverts.
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But Netflix won't have too much of this wider info, as they're a pure streamer. If you're talking Amazon, Google etc, then yes. Oh yes. Far too big brother for my liking.
My main investments at the moment, beyond companies like Netflix and Disney, are ones involved in all things cloud, especially digital ads and there is a lot more coming down the "wires" in regards to ads and other stuff - 5G.