Chris Lynch's slanted view on sports, politics and entertainment. Please send thoughts or comments to chris.lynch@gmail.com
More stuff I found interesting or amusing and thought I'd share.
- Taking the jobs Americans want to work?
- The more Covid 19 shots you get - the sooner you're likely to die.
- A look at the Senate revision to the One Big Beautiful Bill.
- Streaming viewership surpassed cable and broadcast combined for first time ever in May.
More stuff I found interesting or amusing and thought I'd share.
- Disney not even trying to hide their racism.
- Tucker Carlson on why he's interviewing Vladimir Putin
- Ronna McDaniel is reportedly stepping down as RNC chair after South Carolina primary. Would anyone be surprised if this turned out to be a false flag operation?
Stuff I found interesting or amusing and thought I'd share.
- Morgan Housel with a Few Stories about Big Decisions
- Cool: America's most valuable companies 1995-2023
- Interesting: the average American home now streams 4 services and spends about $30 per month.
Stuff I found interesting or amusing and thought I'd share.
- What it was like to eat with Anthony Bourdain (from the archives).
- Gambling revenue in Macau - was this drop due to Covid (Las Vegas recovered) or due to economic changes in China?
- Morgan Housel: The luckier you are - the nicer you should be.
- Is the collapse of RSN's a problem or opportunity for MLB? Article misses one of the biggest issues - for years teams like the Yankees and Red Sox squeezed the cable companies to get top dollar for their games. When streaming became the norm the cable companies turned around and said you can't offer a streaming service at a price below what we pay per sub. That's in part how you wind up with NESN streaming (Red Sox and Bruins) at a monthly cost of $29.99. Who wants to pay that?
Interesting look at the battle between Netflix and Disney for stream superiority. Right now Disney's family of streaming platforms (Disney+, Hulu, and ESPN+) have barely passed Netflix (221.1 million subs for Disney's family of platforms vs 220.7 million for Netflix).
Both platforms have their own flaws. Think ad supported tiers will actually turn off subscribers for Netflix while Disney's platforms relies upon extensive libraries of content that are being played out. How many times can you watch the "classic" Star Wars or MCU films and the new offerings in those genres are mostly dreck.
Wouldn't be surprised if this turns out to be the apex for subscribers for both.
Are investors worried the streaming wars are about to get ugly?
"Netflix Inc. shares dropped as much as 25% Friday after the company reported its slowest growth since 2015, and forecasted its worst start to the year in at least a decade. Netflix shares have now dropped 43% over the last few months, wiping out almost $130 billion in market value."
It's a variation of the old "200 channels and nothings on" issue cable faced just before cord cutting became a real problem for the cable companies. Except now subscribers can do their own version of a la carte. Netflix was the darling of cord cutters at first but now people have many options - Amazon Prime, Disney+, Hulu, YouTubeTV, Paramount+, and HBO Max to name a few.
The problem was summed up in one sentence in the article, "They [Netflix] need to give customers a new reason to pay every month, and that is both hard and expensive." Netflix's competition faces the same problem but to a much lesser degree. I have Amazon Prime because I signed up for the free shipping - the video service is a bonus. Disney+ can release a new Marvel or Star Wars series on a regular basis and add in the newest Marvel or Pixar movie while they're at it.
People don't need all of the services - they don't have time to watch them. So they can drop a service and MAYBE come back if there's a compelling reason. Netflix may be number one right now but their foundations may also be built on sand.
Stuff I found interesting or amusing and thought I'd share.
- Watch out for streaming service price hikes in 2021
- I for one welcome our robot overlords
- Dan Wetzel on how to fix college football
- COVID-19 bill starts a 180-day countdown for UFO disclosures. Just when you thought 2020 couldn't get any weirder.
- How Will You Measure Your Life? Excellent life advice.