zlacker

Is it actually worse than the status quo though? I'm not so sure.

I hate this era of consolidation but Warner and HBO have already degraded, so this may be the least bad outcome here.

>>Jeremy+(OP)
Warner Bros has had their best summer in years (Sinners, Superman, etc). HBO still makes highly regarded prestige TV series (The Last Of Us, Task, etc). This is just false.

>>Jeremy+(OP)
Yeah, HBO has moved decidedly down market.

Apple is at least trying to fill their old niche. It seems quite telling that the only company truing to do the whole “prestige TV” thing is a kind of side-project for a hardware company. At least nobody can buy them, though.

>>Jeremy+(OP)
I don't want you to think I'm picking on you; but, I've been thinking about the MBA-bullshittism "consolidation" for a while. It's really a euphemism for "trust formation", right? It seems like we fought tooth-and-nail just 100 years ago to set up real antitrust laws, with real teeth... and now every industry is "consolidated". What's going on in health and seed and cars makes me seethe.

>>thecha+Z8
The laws only exist if people are willing to apply them.

>>bee_ri+m7
> Apple

do we really want big tech to also control our media?

>>thecha+Z8
If you want some considered thoughts on consolidation and antitrust implications, Cory Doctorow's writings are interesting. Some relevant examples:

"Hate the player AND the game (10 Sep 2025)" https://pluralistic.net/2025/09/10/say-their-names/#object-p...

"The one weird monopoly trick that gave us Walmart and Amazon and killed Main Street (14 Aug 2024)" https://pluralistic.net/2024/08/14/the-price-is-wright/#enfo...

"End of the line for Reaganomics (13 Aug 2021)" https://pluralistic.net/2021/08/13/post-bork-era/#manne-down

"10 Oct 2022 Antitrust is – and always has been – about fairness" https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/10/play-fair/#bedoya

And his archives for more:

https://pluralistic.net/tag/monopoly/

https://pluralistic.net/tag/antitrust/

>>andsoi+Ui
> want

I described what is happening, not what I want to have happen.

Anyway it is entertainment media, not news media, so less of a big deal. But yeah it would be nice if somebody else tried.

>>snarky+G
That video game/superhero IP adaptations are considered "prestige TV" says more about diminished creative expectations than HBO continuing to uphold it's traditional high standards.

Nothing against people who like them, to each his own. But the throughput of quality programming out of HBO has dropped off a cliff through it's multiple changes in ownership.

>>bee_ri+m7
Apple has a family friendly bent that HBO had been degraded by sadly. Disnified. Adult oriented HBO quality shows don't exist anymore do they?

>>throwa+nC1
Apple seems to have a no-nudity policy more or less (or at least, minimal nudity).

I dunno. Sex is part of human existence so it shouldn’t be off-limits for media IMO. But the sort of perfunctory thing where every show on Netflix or HBO has to have some nudity in the first couple episodes was a bit annoying. I don’t mind the lack of nudity in Apple’s stuff. There’s a balance that Apple falls on the “overly conservative” side of, though.

What’s adult mean to you? Nudity, violence, I dunno. Severance considers things like self-identity and the fake personalities, and fake social constructs of our workplaces… it seems more adult to me than a gangster or cowboy story.

I also quite like Pluribus, it feels like actual sci-fi (in the same way 3 Body Problem from Netflix does, actually—legit sci-fi, not action heroes in space).