The Hollywood Reporter birtir afar ítarlega og áhugaverða fréttaskýringu um Netflix og ótrúlega hraðan vöxt fyrirtækisins á allra síðustu árum. Vöxturinn hefur valdið miklum hræringum í bandarískum kvikmyndaiðnaði og margir óttast að Netflix nái yfirburðastöðu á sínu sviði líkt og gerst hefur með Google, Apple og Amazon.
Netflix eyðir nú um 6 milljörðum dollara (um 800 milljörðum króna) árlega í kaup á nýju og eldra efni frá rétthöfum fyrir hinar 83 milljónir áskrifenda sinna á heimsvísu (til samanburðar eyðir HBO um 2 milljörðum dollara). Það hefur vegið að hefðbundum viðskiptamódelum í efnisdreifingu og þannig skapað mikinn óróa, en um leið taka margir því fegins hendi vegna öruggs tekjustreymis og víðtækrar dreifingar.
Í fréttaskýringunni segir meðal annars:
Still, at a time when business is tough all over in the entertainment industry, there is a lot of gratitude for a deep-pocketed buyer that is snapping up an array of material, much of which might not find a home elsewhere. Netflix and its chief content officer Ted Sarandos are at once a savior, offering a giant gush of money to license shows that in some cases were past their prime or even out of production, and a terrifying competitor to studios.
„Out of the blue Netflix comes into the market and says, ‘We’re going to give you a number [to license a network show],’ “ says one television agent. „For the studios, it was, ‘Holy shit. Do we even need a cable sale?’ They all got addicted to crack. Nobody really thought they’d be a competitor on the originals market. They used stuff from the studios and became important. Now you see the backlash.“
The backlash is real but muted — mostly because few are willing to risk the wrath of a company that is spending $6 billion a year on programming and scored 54 Emmy nominations this year. But some executives, producers and agents who rely on deals with the streaming giant nonetheless increasingly view Netflix as an existential threat.
Studios and cable channels fret that the company, with its 83 million global subscribers, is sucking up so many eyeballs and bidding up prices for programming so high that they won’t be able to compete. And agents worry that as Netflix elbows out competing buyers, the company’s growing insistence on buying up all rights to its original programming around the world will do away with the profit participations that on breakout shows (such as Modern Family) provide steady income in an unsteady industry. „We love the money and we can still grow our clients [by getting them Netflix deals],“ says one agent. „But I’m worried about the long term. If backends go away, what’s the future? This is why CAA and WME have diversified.“
Og síðar:
Netflix generally declined to comment on THR‘s questions but asserts that it and other streaming services have sparked the creation of „huge numbers of programs,“ as one company insider puts it, generating more opportunity and money for the industry.
That’s one point of view. Another was offered by John Landgraf at the July gathering of the Television Critics Association in Beverly Hills, where the FX Networks chief warned that Netflix could be bucking for a Silicon Valley-style near-monopoly in entertainment, such as that enjoyed by Google in search or Amazon in shopping. „I think it would be bad for storytellers in general if one company was able to seize a 40, 50, 60 percent share in storytelling,“ said Landgraf. The clear implication: If Netflix amasses such clout, the generous deals will start to evaporate and creative freedoms could be curtailed.
Sjá fréttaskýringuna í heild sinni hér: The Netflix Backlash: Why Hollywood Fears a Content Monopoly
