The Future of Netflix

It feels incredibly odd to sit here and consider the future of Netflix when years ago it was the only streaming giant that was poised to take over the world.

Everyone had the same words on the edge of their tongue 'Have you seen xx on Netflix?'. This was the trend for years before organisations that provided content for Netflix saw success and began to create their own platforms, with only one inevitable conclusion, piracy returned to the waters of the internet.

With a cost of living crisis that is affecting the world, who has £100 a month to pay for Amazon Prime, Netflix, Paramount Plus, Disney and any other platform such as Britbox out there?

Add to this the TV licence in the UK and you cannot blame people for heading back to the troubled waters that are piracy as it is not practical to pay for all these platforms. It was great when your £10 provided you with the best that Netflix had to offer, but now, even with the original content, it is a stretch.

My wife and I have cancelled Disney and maintain Amazon Prime as we do buy a fair amount of items from there, so it makes sense. This is the split that we have maintained for years and it works but with the clampdown on profile sharing it may begin to prove difficult to maintain and we need to adapt further.

We do not miss Disney as most of the content on there is generic and we would watch it in the cinema/have seen it before. There was a great series that involved a psychologist and serial killer but this was technically not Disney and the consideration that we could get this content elsewhere means that we do not miss it. It is easy to replace and whilst their organisations still have enough people paying for their services to justify the costs, for the user it is disappointing.

It is always easier in life to have one source of the truth and having multiple streaming services that you need to login to means that as well as having a high cost, you need to remember numerous logins.

It is much easier to have one source of reference and this is what Netflix used to be. It is now a skeleton of itself that is attempting to secure its underlying costs by securing costs per household and splitting new series releases in half. Two elements that are understandable but it is sad.

Netflix used to be a sole source of entertainment that you could never conceive of completing and now, it is the new releases that keep us here. Sex Education, The Witcher, Stranger Things and You. Many programmes that we love but are they enough to keep us purchasing?

The sad truth is that I really don't know anymore. I want to say that we will stay loyal and continue to purchase but then loyalty can be misplaced and I have seen this with services that I regularly use such as my chiropractor.

I have been going to see him for nearly a decade but the last few appointments have simply felt passive-aggressive, to say the least, and given how much I pay, I deserve more and I cannot look at the decision emotionally.

I need to analyse everything as I do so at work, unemotionally and with a data-driven thought process. There is a cost involved and whilst I may have received a great service for years, it is not to say that I will receive a perfect service for life.

Everything has its time and everything dies. Sometimes friendships that we consider lifelong fizzle out due to differences in opinion and the same can be due to services.

Different people take charge of companies and focus on different areas such as profit because shareholders, whilst they are great in the short term, they add a great deal of pressure in the long run as their investment needs to be paid back.

Money needs a return and with the splitting of the market, Netflix no longer releases everything in one go and is now clamping down on profile sharing, which will add money in the short term but in the longer term, push more people towards piracy.

Piracy is naturally not the preferable option and it is frowned upon in the legal sense but you cannot blame people for going down this route. Greed has moved corporations towards each stealing their own slice of the pie and this is understandable but it is annoying in the user sense as we are all now required to purchase multiple platforms, resetting the system back to the days when Sky was the only way to get this additional content.

With the repealing of the release of new series first in America and sharing at the same time around the world, alongside having Netflix and its originals, piracy began to die, yet this was not enough.

Greed took over and the demands increased on users, with the requirement to purchase multiple licences or to stream snipe. To wait until a new series is fully released, take a month of service and then cancel, moving to the next service and continuing until we have seen everything.

This is easy to do but in reality who has the time to open accounts and then cancel them every other month, whilst also keeping track of release dates?

It is a lot of admin and you cannot blame people for moving down the piracy route instead as it is much more user-friendly. Click and go or add an additional level of project management to your weekend.

I know which I would choose and the writing is beginning to be seen on the wall for Netflix. With profile sharing removed, more people will cancel and whilst some will open new accounts, all they will do is choose short-term gain for long-term loss.