zlacker

>>meetpa+(OP)
Any consolidation like this seems like a negative for consumers. But at least it wasn’t bought by Larry Ellison, as was considered very likely (assuming this merger gets approved, in the current administration you never know).

From a Hacker News perspective, I wonder what this means for engineers working on HBO Max. Netflix says they’re keeping the company separate but surely you’d be looking to move them to Netflix backend infrastructure at the very least.

>>afavou+Jd
> Any consolidation like this seems like a negative for consumers

This is a very common narrative to this news. But coming into this news, I think the most common narrative against streaming was essentially "There is not enough consolidation." People were happy when Netflix was the streaming service, but then everyone pulled their content and have their own (Disney, Paramount, etc.)

>>noneth+Rp
I want a separation between the streaming platform companies and the content making companies, so that the streaming companies can compete on making a better platform/service and the content companies compete on making better content.

I don't want one company that owns everything, I want several companies that are able to license whatever content they want. And ideally the customer can choose between a subscription that includes everything, and paying for content a la carte, or maybe subscriptions that focus on specific kinds of content (scifi/fantasy, stuff for kids, old movies, international, sports, etc.) regardless of what company made it.

>>thayne+BO
> I want a separation between the streaming platform companies and the content making companies, so that the streaming companies can compete on making a better platform/service and the content companies compete on making better content.

Exactly the correct solution.

We did something similar with movie theaters and film studios for decades, up until a couple years ago. Same sort of problem, same solution should work.

>>phanta+h61
Not only movie theaters, but also movie rental and selling of VHS tapes/DVDs etc.

One could go to the favorite department store and get movies from all studios right next to each other, sorted by genre or title or similar.

>>johann+Db1
Like vertical integration isn't always bad 100% of the time, but this particular case of marrying distribution and production seems to serve minimal beneficial purpose and inevitably the main outcome is high levels of rents-collection and squeezing the people doing the actual creative work. There's pretty much nothing but up-side to forcing the two roles to remain separate.

It's probably got something to do with copyright. Like the way it interacts with markets makes this sort of arrangement net-harmful pretty much any time you see it.

>>phanta+pf1
> It's probably got something to do with copyright. Like the way it interacts with markets makes this sort of arrangement net-harmful pretty much any time you see it.

I would say it is monopoly.

If you are a luxury brand you may sell your pen in a brand store only and limit access and will have some business.

But other companies will produce comparable pens and then your only moat is the brand identity but in all objective criteria the other pens are equal.

With intellectual work you got the monopoly. If I want the Taylor Swift song I don't want Lady Gaga, even though both may be good. If I want a Batman movie, I don't want Iron Man. These products aren't comparable in the same way. And another vendor (studio) can't produce an equal product in the same way as with the pen example.

>>johann+kV1
I don't understand your point, though. Yes, you want stuff.

Do Porsche dealerships have a monopoly on Porsches because only they sell Porsches, and you want a Porsche from somewhere else?

>>philip+ac3
The physical world equivalent would be if Porsche didn't sell their cars, they only leased and rented them, and the lease terms didn't allow subleasing or renting it out, or even letting someone else drive it. And there were no wholesale or reseller agreements to allow other dealerships or rental companies to lease or rent them out.

If Porsche were to do that, a lot of customers would probably switch to BMW or Audi instead. But with Movies and TV, competing products are less fungible.