The $55M saga of a Netflix series nobody will ever see

According to this site[0], their revenue for 2022 was $31.6B, so $55M would be approximately 0.17%. Stated otherwise, on average, they make $55M every 15 hours or so. So yeah, it kind of seems like a rounding error.

[0] https://www.statista.com/statistics/272545/annual-revenue-of...

onlyrealcuzzo• 3 years ago

Operating income is ~$6B - so it's closer to 1% of what really matters.

IshKebab• 3 years ago

Revenue is the wrong number. Their net income is only $1.7b so $55m is not completely insignificant.

notimetorelax• 3 years ago

It's still around 180k of premium subscribers at 25$ per month for a year, not taking into account traffic costs. It's not nothing, it's lost cash and lost opportunity.

jl6• 3 years ago

Just because large companies publish large round numbers in their reports, doesn’t mean they don’t care about the underlying figures.

ssnistfajen• 3 years ago

Doesn't mean they can just forget about losing that money for an evidently frivolous reason.

WalterBright20• 3 years ago

If somebody stole $55M from them, I'm sure Netflix would go after them hammer and tong.

iudqnolq• 3 years ago

Well in this case Netflix is defending against a case in arbitration that they owe the guy an extra $14 million. Sure seems like they signed a very stupid contract.

quickthrower22• 3 years ago

Not necessarily because of the $55M per se though, but because they need to discourage further stealing.

It would be like someone shoplifting $100 of stuff from a corner store.

paxys• 3 years ago

Losing the money to a crazy director who gambled it away is at least better than actually finishing the series but never releasing it to get tax write-offs (looking at you Max).

nickelpro5• 3 years ago

This isn't how tax write-offs work. The expenditures in the production of a film or TV series are always deducted from taxable net income regardless of whether the final product is released or not.

There are a plethora of reasons not to release a creative work. For example, you don't want to spend any more money on music licensing, editing, marketing, etc, that is unlikely to be recouped.

"Tax write-offs" simply isn't one of them

bobsmooth2• 3 years ago

There have been multiple completed works that have been canceled for tax reasons.

https://deadline.com/2023/01/as-tv-turns-to-tax-write-offs-t...

aqme28• 3 years ago

I know this is derailing the main thread, but then why are studios choosing not to release finished movies on streaming? It seems like they could recoup at least some of the expenses compared to just shelving the thing forever.

akgoel• 3 years ago

Certain expenses will be capitalized while the film is available for release/streaming. Depreciation/amortization will be years for the life of the film. But if you scrap it right away, you can deduct those expenses immediately.

anonymouskimmer2• 3 years ago

For example, you don't want to spend any more money on music licensing, editing, marketing, etc, that is unlikely to be recouped.

I have no idea what "Max" is in the GP, but another big reason to not release a creative work is if audience feedback was negative enough that even releasing it for free would hit the value of your brand.

wouldbecouldbe• 3 years ago

It is though, I definitely had project not-launched which had expenses that accountants found much harder to justify then launched projects. Taxes isn't a hard science but a soft one, and when talking to a tax officer, as far as my limited knowledge goes, launching a product or movie does help to ease their fraud suspicions.

granzymes• 3 years ago

You also need to pay residuals to the writers / actors when people watch the show. If you never release it to audiences you don’t need to pay.

wslh• 3 years ago

Just opportunity cost? [1]

[1] https://www.investopedia.com/terms/o/opportunitycost.asp

xrd• 3 years ago

So many stories like this recently. Coyote vs Acme drama is so interesting as well. I bet the movie industry will become as crazy as the world of casinos

gkoberger3• 3 years ago

Very different situation. For Coyote vs Acme, the movie was finished properly and the only issue was WB projected it would make more money as a tax write-off. There was no malfeasance from the director/producer/etc.

For this one... well, read the article. The director/producer did some crazy stuff with the money.

nradov4• 3 years ago

It is not possible to make more money as a tax write-off. That's not how corporate income taxes work. The expense of making a movie can always be written off regardless of whether it is released or. If the studio decided not to release it then that was done for other reasons.

jedberg8• 3 years ago

The real crime in the whole Coyote vs Acme situation is that the tax code makes it more profitable to write off a completed movie than sell it.

RajT886• 3 years ago

I love these stories of sci-fi movie diasasters. There are just as many insane stories of "amazing this classic ever got made".

On the topic of disasters, I recommend reading about The Starlost:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Starlost

dylan6046• 3 years ago

Sounds like Jodorwsky's Dune[0] where it's famous for not getting made.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jodorowsky%27s_Dune

nihiven• 3 years ago

I would love to see how insane a 10-14 hour Dune movie would be. No intermission I'm sure.

no_wizard• 3 years ago

IMO Dune needs to be a tv show that likely runs several seasons so all the world and backstory can be explored properly so the audience can get a full experience.

Think The Wire in terms of plot discovery and forwarding (leaves out bogus exposition, means you have to pay attention to get things etc that moves along at a good pace and has forward development each episode.

It would be expensive, but it’s the only way I can imagine Dune being done to its fullest extent on screen

phatfish2• 3 years ago

The documentary is very good. Conjures a perfect film adaptation in your imagination.

rolph3• 3 years ago

the "can i be of assistance" interface always reminded me of al jafee

RajT886• 3 years ago

That guy seemed really annoyed the whole time. It was strange!

rolph3• 3 years ago

Re: "can i be of assistance"

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0069638/mediaviewer/rm194734796...

Occasionally, they are aided (or hindered) in their travels by the ship's frustrating and only partially-functioning computer system interface, known as Mu Lambda 165 (portrayed by William Osler, who also provided the opening narration for each episode).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Starlost

final paragraph of the premise

burningChrome• 3 years ago

Reminds me of the outrage over the $100M budget of Water World and how it barely got made. Today, a $100M budget is nothing. We've already had several $300M budget films this year.

Hollywood can be so crazy sometimes.

jiggawatts• 3 years ago

Adjust those for inflation, and also the larger market these days (more international viewers paying nearly full price).

atombender2• 3 years ago

$100m in 1995 would be $200m today, mind you. It was an expensive movie.

a_t48• 3 years ago

Is The Starlost worth watching? The episode summaries look neat, but the reception/reviews don’t look so good.

cpeterso• 3 years ago

Wikipedia says The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction described the show as "dire" and The Best of Science Fiction TV included the show on its list of "Worst Science Fiction Shows of All Time”. But the full episodes are available on YouTube, so as a fan of 70s sci-fi, I’ll decide for myself. :)

RajT886• 3 years ago

It had some talent behind the writing, Ursula K. Le Guin, Harlan Ellison. For the first few episodes it seemed legit and to be going somewhere, but lost its way at some point. Production values were always quite low, but not that much different from Dr. Who from the same period.

I rate it as worthwhile from a sci fi archeology perspective, but not good in any traditional sense.

boeingUH603• 3 years ago

Maybe they can create a new movie based on this funny story. Name it Doge King and chronicle the bizarre world of selling shitcoins.

gte525u• 3 years ago

Basically 'Ed Wood' reimagined?

duiker101• 3 years ago

Netflix just gave him the money? Isn't a producer the one with the money that hires people?

gkoberger3• 3 years ago

Well, he had his own production company, and they gave money to that.

pavlov• 3 years ago

In the same sense as a startup founder is the one with the money who hires people. Usually it’s somebody else’s money who is keeping a distance, and the producer/founder is making decisions on how to use it.

livinginfear2• 3 years ago

Since we're discussing the economics of film/TV studios, and their weird decisions. I'd like to understand why the studios are still making Star Trek shows. Each one seems to be more poorly received than the last. That's costing studios far more than $55M. Picard alone cost ~$9M per episode according to Wikipedia.

dylan6046• 3 years ago

Eventually, you get one right, right? Even a blind squirrel finds a nut once in a while. Plus, there are so many Trekkies that will watch anything regardless of how bad it is just so they can bitch about it after watching it. They still had to watch it though, and that's about all that matters to the analytics.

rightbyte2• 3 years ago

It is strange they can fail so bad, since Star Trek is essentially a setup to make any story at all each episode. I mean, McFarlains comedy-as-an-excuse Not-Star Trek Star Trek is so much more Star Trek than the new series ... at a way lower budget. Imagine if they gave him the job instead.

mavhc2• 3 years ago

Which new series?

alisonatwork• 3 years ago

I know, right? To me the essential Star Trek formula - at least of TOS, TNG and Voyager - is simply to have a team of competent professionals encounter all kinds of weird and wacky creatures and anomalies, and then to resolve those encounters in a peaceful way. It's a sci-fi anthology show that emphasizes the experience of scientists, engineers and diplomats over warriors, outlaws and extremists. One of the reasons I think new Trek fails is because even when they try to make it more episodic (SNW), the characters lack the idealism that makes the show different. The Orville, on the other hand, gets it exactly right.

That said, there is a case to be made that Star Trek is now more than just TOS/TNG/Voyager, and it already was that after DS9. So I don't begrudge fans of the dark, morally gray, against-a-backdrop-of-war stories getting to see more of that in new Trek. At least the animated shows (Lower Decks and Prodigy) keep the optimistic spirit of Starfleet alive, so there's something for everyone.

TMWNN• 3 years ago

It is strange they can fail so bad, since Star Trek is essentially a setup to make any story at all each episode.

The early slash fiction writers (almost all women) in the 1970s more or less viewed the science fiction elements like the Enterpise and the Federation as distractions, and got Kirk/Spock away from them as soon as the could to focus on their relationship. In other words, they were inspired by the close, John Ford-like camaderie between the two characters (or, if you choose to believe so, saw the clear sexual subtext below their heterosexual veneers) and used it as a springboard to tell the stories they really wanted to tell.

anonymouskimmer2• 3 years ago

Star Trek shows last for decades as revenue generators through syndication, streaming, merchandising, novels, movies, theme park events, and etcetera. A new series may draw people in, many of whom will stay to watch the older series.

Now that the series are basically only available on streaming through CBS/Paramount I don't know what syndication gains are being made, but I'd guess a huge percentage of the CBS/Paramount streaming subscribers are staying subscribers for the huge Star Trek library. It's an anecdote but the last time I quit Netflix was when they lost Star Trek and I realized I was basically only hanging on for Star Trek episodes (after about a year and a half I resubscribed for other content).

ralphc• 3 years ago

There's a cable channel, Heroes and Icons, that Sunday - Friday shows back to back TOS, TNG, DS9, Voyager and Enterprise, starting at 8:00 Eastern.

metabagel• 3 years ago

Paramount+ took a few swings at this, and eventually they hit paydirt with Strange New Worlds.

The intention isn’t to make mediocre shows. The intention is to make a show which draws an audience, and Star Trek shows start with a decent base audience to make it worth trying.

pests• 3 years ago

SNW works imo because it's a throw back to the episodic nature of the earlier shows.

Discovery did not work for me in the same way despite me usually liking those less episodic plotlines.

bobsmooth2• 3 years ago

SNW and Lower Decks are pretty good.

krapp• 3 years ago

Each one seems to be more poorly received than the last.

Only to a certain subset of "fans" who have made hating Star Trek a part of their identity politics, and a grift on Youtube. They've even started to hate Strange New Worlds, even though it should be everything they wanted.

In actual objective reality, each of the new Trek series has been highly successful.

livinginfear2• 3 years ago

made hating Star Trek a part of their identity politics...

...The only reason anyone could dislike modern Star Trek: Because they want to </s>. No, I actually want to like the new Star Trek. I just found that to be prohibitively difficult.

They've even started to hate Strange New Worlds, even though it should be everything they wanted.

Except that it wasn't. It feels like a modern Marvel film masquerading as Star Trek. With sassy Mary Sue characters that just quip back and forth sarcastically. The dialogue is honestly terrible.

In actual objective reality, each of the new Trek series has been highly successful.

On Rotten Tomatoes Picard has an audience score of 57%. Discovery has 37%. About what I expected. Strange New Worlds is doing well though. I'm not upset that other people like it. I'd consider giving SNW another go, but I won't waste any more time with Picard or Discovery.

_npe3• 3 years ago

this has got to be the least self-aware comment I've ever seen on this website

jandrese• 3 years ago

So I assume Netflix sued him for breach of contract? It doesn't seem like the world was deprived of any art except for whatever production wasn't greenlit because this guy was too busy making line go up to actually do his job.

gkoberger3• 3 years ago

Ironically, he sued them. But yes, it's currently in court as we speak.

(It's all in the article!)

usrusr2• 3 years ago

Heh, sounds like the next big Netflix white collar crime hit will be self-referential then. Will they reuse their Streamberry alter ego from Black Mirror or appear as Netflix proper?

function_seven• 3 years ago

From the Times article:

[Rinsch] transferred more than $4 million from his Schwab account to an account on the Kraken exchange and bought Dogecoin, a dog-themed cryptocurrency.

Guy sounds like a dummy

Unlike his stock market investments, this one paid off: When he liquidated his Dogecoin positions in May 2021, he had a balance of nearly $27 million.

Shit, maybe I'm the dummy?

starttoaster4• 3 years ago

Around 2021, Dogecoin was a very interesting short term investment, yeah. Everyone was high off of AMC and GME in the stock market, so people were actively investing and day trading. Elon Musk was talking up Dogecoin, keeping in mind this is when he was still very popular in a positive way, and crypto in general was doing really well around that time. I'm not sure that it's wise to throw money into it now though. Crypto has become a very polarizing topic with people, with a vocal group of people that absolutely hate it (some of whom have no idea what they're talking about, but there are absolutely genuine reasons to dislike it as it's implemented today), and it has a somewhat uncertain future with government agencies reigning in on it (which certainly needs to happen for it to have a future too, but governments today seem more content with pulverizing the tech into the mud than see it grow into itself while keeping it fairly regulated.)

sennight6• 3 years ago

Crypto has become a very polarizing topic with people...

Certain people. I was involved from the beginning, and most of the OGs just shrug at the present day noise - the convert zeal being long exhausted by all the complaints about how PoW makes Mother Gaia cry. The people who have a crazy level of investment are the tech journalists that took very public positions badmouthing bitcoin. That is probably also true of anyone else who can't resist calculating how much their mistake cost them when they compared bitcoin to beanie babies at $150.

...which certainly needs to happen for it to have a future too, but governments...

Firing first in a duel, global economy style - that is why the foot dragging has been so protracted.

quickthrower22• 3 years ago

He did effectively an SBF, leveraging someone else's money. By the way you could have put $4m on Frankie Dettori too, and be a smart dummy.

askonomm2• 3 years ago

I wish they'd make another Altered Carbon season. And bring back Joel Kinnaman. The first season was amazing.

guhcampos• 3 years ago

Indeed, that was a painful loss.

jauntywundrkind• 3 years ago

Or more Electric Dreams! Great production value Philip K Dick short stories.

I haven't actually watched Altered Carbon but I have a trail of Takeshi Kovacs characters in various mmos and games, and am in general a Richard K Morgan fan. I loved Altered Carbon series. His recent-er Thirteen was fun imaginative Mars stuff. Market Forces is old old old & has a lot of mediocre aspects, but I loved the Car Wars style setting & corporate mercenary treatment.

selimthegrim• 3 years ago

What were your thoughts on their take on Autofac?

atombender2• 3 years ago

That show butchered the original stories, though. And for some reason they picked some Dick's earliest and least interesting 1950s pulp-era stories, rather than the later, more mature. Autofac is the only classic that stands out, and the adaptation is both atrocious and unfaithful to the story.

Why not "We Can Remember It for You Wholesale", "A Little Something For Us Tempunauts", "Second Variety", "Impostor", "Faith of Our Fathers", "I Hope I Shall Arrive Soon", "Colony" or "Foster, You're Dead"? I wonder if it's because someone owns the rights? Some of these have already been adapted, though never faithfully.

In fact, a faithful adaptation of a PKD story or novel has never been made. Which is odd, for two reasons. One, PKD wrote quite filmable stories, with excellent dialogue and well-paced plots that should not pose a problem for anyone trying to adapt them to screen.

And secondly, why would you change anything? You adapt PKD because of the idea and how brilliantly it unfolds to its conclusion; if you replace that with your own spin, it's no longer PKD. Blade Runner very much lacks the feel of a PKD story, for example (no absurdist humour, no existential angst, no color; everything is just drab and dreary, which is a property that plagued some of his mainstream writings but very few of his SF works; if BR feels like anything it's Flow My Tears the Policeman Said, which is a sad and bleak book).

gretch• 3 years ago

I really liked S1 and went into S2 bright-eyed and bushy tailed. Woe, it wasn't the same at all...

Hope they bring back Joel and the S1 formula for success

ciberado• 3 years ago

The books where also very different from each other, but with much superior result. Give them a try, if you want part of the fun of the first season. But the first season of the Netflix show is still muy preferred approach to this universe.

rurp• 3 years ago

Same, I was pleasantly surprised by the first season and thought it was really good. Season 2 felt like a totally different show and was pretty much a generic bad action show.

kjuulh• 3 years ago

I rewatch it once a year or so. I haven't caved yet and read the books. But I still hope for a 3rd season even though it is probably never going to happen

askonomm2• 3 years ago

Yeah, Netflix said it was too expensive to make, and yet they shelve $55M worth of a show ...

WalterBright20• 3 years ago

So many great sci fi novels, and so many bad movie versions.

Heck, nobody even seems to be able to film a decent "War of the Worlds" that is like the book.

Jedd• 3 years ago

The first story in this class that I read was Empires of the Deep - really amazed me on two fronts.

First, the way the economics of these endeavours are so flawed that even the most passionate creatives / sponsors can't viably get the finished or near-finished product out to paying customers.

Second, that this stuff doesn't get leaked more often - especially recent examples. Wikipedia also has a running list of abandoned films, though it looks to be US / Euro-centric. [1]

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empires_of_the_Deep (there's plenty of more interesting write-ups around the backstory)

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_abandoned_and_unfinish...

gverrilla2• 3 years ago

Still waiting for Neuromancer movie.

Krasnol5• 3 years ago

I'm afraid it won't happen because there has been so many movies out there which were inspired by it. It could never live up to its visual and mood simulacra.

Also, after they've killed The Peripheral before it actually got interesting, I don't think there is even interest in the plot out there.

gverrilla2• 3 years ago

In a quick google search it seems that supposedly there's a ongoing project on Neuromancer, although not much info is divulged.

But I agree with you: it would be EXTREMELLY difficult to live up to the book anyhow. Nevertheless, I think it will happen eventually: the book is incredible.

neilv• 3 years ago

Netflix executives grew so concerned with Mr. Rinsch’s behavior that they consulted with the Los Angeles Police Department’s threat management unit, a person with knowledge of the matter said. A Police Department psychologist reviewed Mr. Rinsch’s texts and emails and concluded that he didn’t seem like a threat to himself or others.

Were executives concerned about possible risks to people, or were they trying to use (misuse?) the police to establish the conditions for a contract clause or insurance policy?

Rinsch sounded from other assertions in the article like he was having some kind of mental health and/or substance challenges. But I don't understand the uncritical acceptance of this bit by the journalist.

b112• 3 years ago

They could have been trying to establish proof, that they looked into odd behavior.

Then, if anything happens, they're less likely to be successfully sued.

ulizzle2• 3 years ago

Granted innocent until proven guilty, but I wouldn’t hedge my bets on anyone from Hollywood being a paragon of moral justice oppressed by the powers that be, unless you want a nasty cut from Occam’s razor later on that week

Especially given the rest of the behavior detailed in the article, which as always, no one ever reads

edgyquant2• 3 years ago

Especially given the rest of the behavior detailed in the article, which as always, no one ever read

Okay. So maybe don’t passive aggressively bring it up then

notatoad• 3 years ago

Were executives concerned about possible risks to people, or were they trying to use (misuse?) the police to establish the conditions for a contract clause or insurance policy?

this kind of just seems like the system work as intended. if you are thinking you need to call the police to perform a wellness check on somebody just for the purposes of covering your own ass, you're probably justified in calling for a wellness check.

colechristensen• 3 years ago

The threshold for someone to be unwillingly forced to undergo a psych evaluation is rightfully rather high. Not being carted away certainly doesn’t mean that doing that kind of check isn’t justified.

MichaelMoser123• 3 years ago

There is more:

A correction was made on Nov. 22, 2023 : An earlier version of this article misstated the status of Carl Erik Rinsch’s series when Netflix bought the rights to it. There was a script, but it was not complete."

'is not complete' can mean many things.

Also Netflix initially planned more than one season, but then they backtracked when the script was extending beyond the first season - there seems to be a gap in the narrative of the article.

Netflix gave Mr. Rinsch final cut, a privilege it had previously bestowed on only a few directors. And it assured Mr. Rinsch and Ms. Rosés that they would remain “locked for life” to all subsequent seasons and spinoffs

Mr. Rinsch had missed several production milestones and was toggling between two versions of the script, a shorter one that matched the original 13-episode plan and one twice as long that would have required greenlighting a second season.

Also 'missed several production milestones' is a bit vague. That year we had Corona, which would naturally lead to some sort of delays.

calgarymicro• 3 years ago

Also Netflix initially planned more than one season

No they didn't. The article is pretty clear that they only greenlit one season. That 'locked for life' quote is saying that if Netflix decided to buy more seasons and/or spinoffs, Rinsch was guaranteed involvement, aka Netflix couldn't just fire and replace him (like NBC did to Dan Harmon on Community for example).

lmm• 3 years ago

Rinsch sounded from other assertions in the article like he was having some kind of mental health and/or substance challenges. But I don't understand the uncritical acceptance of this bit by the journalist.

Presumably that was one of the "detailed questions" that he "declined to respond" to.

duxup• 3 years ago

As I read the article I thought there was reason to be legitimately concerned about him.

w10-1• 3 years ago

Sorry, but what's the actual corporate structure here?

For software companies, investments are nominal in the sense that they come with responsible CFO's, budgeting and reporting structures that would prevent the money from being vacuumed into personal accounts for investment gambling.

Is it really the case that a Netflix would just wire $11M based on a promise? Or that they would tolerate the kind of hostaging that insists on building v2 before delivering v1?

I assumed that anyone in any field disbursing $1M+ contracts has provisions for monitoring, bad faith, etc. (and clawing back misappropriated fund). But not here?

sethammons• 3 years ago

Famously, the movie Human Centipede was made "behind financier's backs" and were presented a movie that they did not expect nor want.

actionfromafar• 3 years ago

"They" are hardly alone in not wanting or expecting that movie. :-)

Jochim• 3 years ago

Competency is a myth put in place to explain why they pay themselves more than most of us.

logicchains• 3 years ago

Competency is a myth put in place to explain why they pay themselves more than most of us.

If it was a myth then everybody would be in a place to pay themselves as much as they're paying themselves.

motohagiography• 3 years ago

They foucus on the dollar amount, but the startup graveyard of software companies who raised $50M or more by their series A or B that nobody will have heard of seems much larger. Movies and series seem pretty low risk by comparison.

A movie studio and a venture fund seem to have similar economics.

advisedwang• 3 years ago

A single Netflix show does not have the potential to end up with multi-billion dollar per-year recurring revenues. The potential upside on a startup is far far large.

In addition, there are no low-risk startups. There are, however, relatively low risk films and TV shows to be made.

jowea• 3 years ago

Do they calculate the possibility that the show will start a decades long franchise?

jjice• 3 years ago

This was directly blown without making the project. At least a VC funded startup would try (hopefully).

wmf• 3 years ago

Most of the money was spent on production. The embezzled money is a small part of the story.

ur-whale• 3 years ago

https://archive.is/W282A

jmyeet• 3 years ago

This is a long story that can be summarized as "Carl Rinsch is going to jail". The feds will charge and convict him of wire fraud and possibly other offences. But wire fraud is so broad it easily applies in this situation.

Failing to deliver on a project because of cost overruns, reshoots, whatever is one thing. Buying cars, "investing" in crypto and otherwise using the funds for purposes not reasonably defined within the contract is fraud, plain and simple.

synthos• 3 years ago

Sounds like highly functional personality disorder or manic depression

VHRanger• 3 years ago

Looks like amphetamine abuse to me.

The delusions, gambling addiction, reckless impulsive behavior.

Second story we see where amphetamine abuse played a part (SBF being another one)

metadat• 3 years ago

Extra backup: https://archive.today/W282A

Edit: Thank you!

theoldlove• 3 years ago

Great piece by John Carreyrou, who broke the Theranos story and wrote the unbelievably entertaining Bad Blood. I wouldn’t be surprised if this story is his next book.

steveBK123• 3 years ago

Streaming content wars were a ZIRP phenomenon.

magedqwani• 3 years ago

will i want to see it now

namuol• 3 years ago

If the media giants were bidding on his work based on the shorts he produced to promote the show, they must have been pretty good. I find stories of destroyed talent like this one profoundly sad.

iradik• 3 years ago

Isn't this fraud? Why isn't he in jail?

supermatt• 3 years ago

They (all major streaming services) throw away millions on series they never release, they reduce spending on new series, and yet they still manage to increase the cost of the service - and some are even adding pre-roll advertising?

I was a huge advocate for these streaming services, but with the unjustified pricing hikes, ongoing georestriction of content, and the addition of advertising into a paid service, it has now come full circle and I feel the return to torrents is inevitable.

BiteCode_dev2• 3 years ago

Honestly despite paying for netflix, I never stopped using torrents, even for netflix shows.

Their UI is terrible and the geographic limitations are annoying, your watch list is unusable and the suggestions keep getting in your way. It's like their are not using their own product, and netflix is the least bad of the streaming services.

Much easier to use the stremio app for most things.

beAbU• 3 years ago

I use Netflix to discover things I might be interested in, and if I want to keep watching I go to the high seas.

I have all the other mainline streaming apps installed, sans a login. I use it purely for discovery.

I have to say that the frequency of finding something worthwhile on netflix is decreasing...

evulhotdog3• 3 years ago

Streamio in conjunction with real debrid and there’s little risk, with the library of the world at your fingertips.

It’s the one stop shop that you would hope that all the streaming services could be, if they teamed up and split profits based upon views.

rapind• 3 years ago

It's funny how disrupters eventually fit right in with the disrupted.

Meet the new boss, same as the old boss. - Pete Townshend

ekianjo3• 3 years ago

I was a huge advocate for these streaming services,

It was always going to go this way. Once you have a captive audience the next strategy is to milk it to death

augustulus8• 3 years ago

as usual the stock market is to blame. in the 100 years or so it’s existed, the BBC has never really had a sustained drop in content quality, and yet its model is somehow taboo

selcuka3• 3 years ago

Once you have a captive audience the next strategy is to milk it to death

Netflix (or any streaming service) users are not captive audience. The network effect for such services is next to nil.

If I don't like what Netflix offers, I will simply cancel my subscription. There is nothing that would keep me paying other than quality content.

danjc• 3 years ago

Every successful disruptor becomes what it set out to disrupt.

scyzoryk_xyz• 3 years ago

I agree with the sentiment, but the entertainment industry is largely built on a spread of various more or less risky bets. Usually from a single giant budget of a studio, and focused on ensuring a constant release timeline.

And this isn’t a Netflix or streaming thing - the big 5 studios and tv industry have always had cases just like this one. We would have to take a look at the rest of that spread to figure out whether this is more or less business as usual.

matheusmoreira• 3 years ago

some are even adding pre-roll advertising

Never fails.

anfogoat• 3 years ago

... the return to torrents is inevitable.

The only reason I ever paid for Netflix, HBO and Prime was because I felt less bad about never leaving in the first place.

The UIs are atrocious, yes, but the absolute worst part of them all is that you have zero control. Content is there one day, gone the next.

bhpm2• 3 years ago

I just wait until I can buy it on the Apple TV store or I don’t watch it. Torrenting and maintaining the software to play movie files on my TV takes time and it just isn’t a priority for me.

rgblambda• 3 years ago

Torrenting and maintaining the software to play movie files on my TV takes time

I've never thought either of those things took much time or effort. Though admittedly I've never timed myself doing it.

ewweezdsd• 3 years ago

To be honest all you need is a torrent client, HDMI cable and a laptop. Not much time required. With slightly more effort you can even intall Plex or Jellyfin on your laptop, and stream directly to your smart tv.

davely• 3 years ago

This is where services like Rdio (sigh), Spotify and Apple Music have done really well, in my opinion.

If I want to listen to some music, it’s practically guaranteed to be right there in the one music service I’m paying for.

If I want to watch a show or movie, there’s now a bunch of cognitive overhead going going on.

- Which app is it in?

- Do we have that one?

- Do we have a subscription?

- Wait, how do we navigate the UI in this app again?

- Why is there an ad? I thought we pay for this service!

- Oh, we don’t pay enough.

- Oh, this service is raising it’s monthly fee, again

For me, the creation of streaming music services completely stopped me from pirating music.

The current state of streaming video makes me want to pull out the old eye patch and take to the high seas again.

rvba• 3 years ago

It is very easy to be a monopoly, especially one that was first in a certain market, or which can use various tactics to make you use their service. You dont remember how Apple would upload some album into your device without your consent?

I find it fascinating how many people allow monopolies for just laziness: "Steam is so great because I have all games in one place - I dont need 20 shortcuts on my desktop". Then Steam (for years - I think they fixed it now and it opens in few seconds, without asking you to login every day), takes 2 minutes to start because it was written by cheapest bidder + it can close your account so you lose all your games.

Multiple services are a way for actual market competition. Otherwise everything becomes Disney, who churns multiple crappy Marvel movies every year (current blockbuster cinema is mostly rubbish), or everything becomes Neflix where quality is trash, but hey actors were chosen by an algorithm (Ozark - or what was the show name, basically took popular actors and a popular theme and made a show with no interesting plot, no interesting dialogue).

So scary to see that people agree with that, because they are lazy. This is some Idiocracy level.

By the way, since we are on hacker news: nearly all, if not all shows are on the pirate websites.

1000100_1000101• 3 years ago

I like JustWatch. Search for a show, it will show you where it's available for free, where it's available with subscription, and where you can buy it... and not just the major services, but TV channel sites, too. (Note, I'm Canadian, and it's showing Canadian TV, like CTV. No idea if they just happen to be Canadian, or they show what's available elsewhere.)

Shows what's trending across services.

Also has a "new" tab. Select which services you subscribe to, and it will show what's added to each service. It seems to remember my service selections via a cookie, so I don't even have to bother making an account.

n3dm• 3 years ago

Funny because I'm using Spotify paid and I'm getting closer and closer to cancelling that with all the bugs and advertising. Using a web player the music just mites itself for 10 seconds at a time, skips tracks on its own. Pauses. The mobile app hits you with full screen ads and big banner ads at the top that you can't disable. It's the most annoying service I use for streaming.

vinyl7• 3 years ago

A lot of, if not most of, our modern tech economy over the last 10-15 years is all very economically nonviable. It only worked because of ZIRP and free money. It's all unsustainable and fake. It would be nice to get back to an economy based in reality, but that would undo all the "progress" we made since the dotcom bust and 2008 crash. Can't let that happen, so we'll probably keep the coke fueled party going so the crash will happen when it's somebody else's responsibility.

eslaught• 3 years ago

The early, cheap phase of streaming was funded on the back of overpriced, bundle cable subscriptions. I think it's underappreciated how much streaming gutted this business model. Not that it was justified per se, but streaming went from a nice bonus on top to an "oh shit, we killed the golden goose" for the content industry.

Therefore, I think what we're seeing is inevitable. Higher prices, more silos, and a possible return to bundling or similar. And probably with less content to go around. That will push some into piracy, but we all know that never made up a substantial fraction of users in the first place.

1B05H1N• 3 years ago

My netflix subscription went up because Rinsch embezzled money to pump and dump dogecoin?

ChicagoDave• 3 years ago

It’s all good. Got a code request from one of my college kids to sign in or buy an add-on subscription. I immediately cancelled Netflix.

santiagobasulto• 3 years ago

Soon after he signed the contract, Mr. Rinsch’s behavior grew erratic, according to members of the show’s cast and crew, texts and emails reviewed by The New York Times, and court filings in a divorce case brought by his wife. He claimed to have discovered Covid-19’s secret transmission mechanism and to be able to predict lightning strikes. He gambled a large chunk of the money from Netflix on the stock market and cryptocurrencies. He spent millions of dollars on a fleet of Rolls-Royces, furniture and designer clothing.

wtf, I was expecting some chaos on a Hollywood studio, but that's a bit much.

toasted-subs• 3 years ago

Which is why "inning" people should be illegal.

Modified3019• 3 years ago

What is that referring to? All I get is baseball.

rootsudo• 3 years ago

unrelated but this is why whale hunter companies exist. Why bother with volume when if you position a product to extract the most value from someone that can make one purchase $$$$ vs hundreds/thousands of smaller ones.

isoprophlex• 3 years ago

That's... interesting. I had no idea, but of course that's a thing.

btown• 3 years ago

Not to mention F2P games, which make a small amount of money on their “monthly pass” IAPs, but make tremendously more on the “whales” who will buy $99 pack after $99 pack to stay competitive/max-out the characters they love.

mike_hock• 3 years ago

He predicted that [the article] would “discuss the fact that I somehow lost my mind … [...]"

Well, he was right about that.

jkhdigital• 3 years ago

Sounds like he had a schizophrenic psychotic break. His behavior and especially his conspiratorial comments are classic schizophrenia. (Source: My sister and late aunt are schizophrenic)

mock-possum• 3 years ago

Somebody was having a manic episode…

mathiscool8888• 3 years ago

meh, sounds like Netflix just funded his manic episodes, nothing much to see here

NibsNiven• 3 years ago

This is the fourth horror story I’ve seen in the last two weeks where someone went crazy while taking Vyvanse, a powerful amphetamine.

Flatcircle• 3 years ago

What a story!

lifeisstillgood• 3 years ago

>> He claimed to have discovered Covid-19’s secret transmission mechanism and to be able to predict lightning strikes. He gambled a large chunk of the money from Netflix on the stock market and cryptocurrencies. He spent millions of dollars on a fleet of Rolls-Royces, furniture and designer clothing.

Oh wow. From a mental health stand point we hope he gets support

from a netflix stand point, oh brother.

potatosalad21• 3 years ago

How is this under arbitration not criminal charges? A director taking funds from the production to gamble them on crypto seems like it's wildly illegal right?

gwern• 3 years ago

Poor guy. Bipolar disorder has destroyed what sounded like a promising career in SF movies & TV.

thimkerbell• 3 years ago

Is it common for a journalist at Carreyrou's level to invest so much effort into this sort of story?

The $55M saga of a Netflix series nobody will ever see

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