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from the and-I-thought-a-night-out-at-the-movies-was-expensive dept.
Netflix burns cash at a record pace, but investors love it
In its third quarter earnings statement on Tuesday, the company reported negative free cash flow of $859 million, the biggest figure in its history. Netflix continues to increase spending on original content as it seeks to compete with other players like Hulu, HBO and planned streaming services like Disney's, scheduled for next year. Netflix will reportedly spend at least $8 billion on content in 2018.
It would be a shame if someone were to pirate or illicitly stream that content.
Netflix has criticized the EU's local content quotas:
Netflix used its third quarter earnings report to criticize the European Union over a new content quota for streaming services. The EU, writes Netflix CEO Reed Hastings in the report, is "currently rewriting its audio visual rules" that will demand streaming services like Netflix "devote a minimum of 30 percent of their catalog to European works." Netflix's report acknowledged that catering to a specific audience encouraged more regional original programming for international audiences, but suggested that enforcing quotas on a streaming service could have unwanted negative effects.
Netflix is already set to spend $1 billion on European content this year.
Also at MarketWatch.
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(Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday October 18 2018, @11:31AM (1 child)
YouTube is said to be profitable, although it wasn't for a very long time. Correct me if I'm wrong, but they weren't running ads at all for a long time. That is obviously no longer the case, although they have yet to restrict adblock users for some strange reason.
Google parent Alphabet rakes in profit, and YouTube is one of its rising stars [latimes.com]
They did have a major existential crisis in the form of the "Adpocalypse" but they have been laser focused on addressing that, to the detriment of content creators.
About the Netflix spending, given the intense competition that Netflix faces now and what is looming around the corner, I think they need to spend a lot of money to survive. Although there are plenty of old films and TV shows on their catalog, their content-owning competitors, particularly Disney and other Hulu participants, can and do pull stuff out. So they've had to respond by making tons of original content. Edgier award-winning shows, the kind of stuff you might put on as background noise (like cooking shows), kid's programming, it's all being made by Netflix.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 4, Interesting) by bob_super on Thursday October 18 2018, @05:23PM
> given the intense competition that Netflix faces now and what is looming around the corner, I think they need to spend a lot of money to survive.
Won't change the end result. They are facing competitors who are now allowed to block them from reaching their customers. The Big ISPs, having achieved the repeal of Net Neutrality, will ransom Netflix until they have to raise their prices higher than Cable TV and/or the ISP's own offerings, while depriving them of the attractive content they control.
They'll eventually buy the US infrastructure at a nice discount, and Netflix might keep existing in NN countries.