This is a mini-rant, a short essay refuting a common misconception among users of an Internet forum. If you think this essay is FUD, feel free to explain why on the essay's talk page.
Contents
Netflix vs. discs
Some people post comments to web forums in defense of Apple's decision not to include BD-ROM drives in any Mac computers and to remove the DVD drive from the base configuration of the 2011 Mac mini. They claim that Netflix Instant Watch or another Internet video-on-demand service can substitute for the vast majority of home uses of a BD-ROM drive in a computer. But video disc formats, such as DVD and Blu-ray Disc (BD), still have some advantages over Internet VOD:
- Discs are available in more markets. As of 2011, Netflix is available only in the United States and Canada, and LoveFilm operates only in Great Britain, Germany, Denmark, Sweden, and Norway.
- Discs work while away from Internet access, such as in an airplane or other vehicle.
- Discs are far cheaper in areas where the best available residential Internet access has a single digit GB per month transfer cap, such as areas that depend on wireless broadband using satellite or cellular technology. In fact, there are still parts of the developed world where average Internet speeds are well below 0.5 Mbps.[1]
- Disc rental from premium outlets such as Family Video is available 28 days before Netflix begins to offer a disc and often even longer before it offers a stream.[1]
- Buying a disc can be cheaper for discs that get watched repeatedly, such as a single-digit-year-old child's favorite animated film. When children rewatch movies like Frozen and Shrek 2, this is called "hedonic volitional reconsumption."[2] One reason is that they're still learning their native language, and they pick up more words each time through.[3] Kids don't care about the awful things that the movie is drilling into them about relationships with other people.[4]
Advantages of DVD only:
- A lot of people have either an SDTV or an HDTV produced before Netflix began licensing its client software to TV makers, and they aren't interested in playing console games or in connecting the family PC to a TV. For these, upscaling DVD players are still cheaper than Netflix boxes as of 2011.
Advantages of BD only:
- BD has 1080p video. Netflix over DSL connections is often limited to 480p.
These are part of why as of October 2011, Netflix still plans to rent discs by mail[5] and has even abandoned its plan to separate disc rentals into a separate brand.[6]
Netflix vs. pay television
Some people post comments to web forums claiming that a combination of pay Internet VOD, disc rentals, and over-the-air television can completely substitute for pay television such as cable or satellite. But there are still people willing to pay five to ten times the monthly price of Netflix for TV for several reasons:
News
Netflix doesn't have live breaking news or political commentary. Sure, local TV has evening and nightly newscasts. But some people don't want to wait for 6 PM or 11 PM for news or Sunday morning for political commentary, and they aren't willing to buy a digital video recorder and subscribe to its required monthly service to time-shift the regular newscast. Others like the specific kind of news found on pay TV, such as the progressive-slanted political opinion of MSNBC or the conservative-slanted political opinion of FOX News Channel.[7] Some specific news outlets' web sites offer a video stream to the public over the Internet, and others offer clips, but a lot of people don't want to sit at a computer desk to watch TV[8] nor buy a second PC for the TV.[9] Besides, a lot of channels' web sites and mobile apps use TV Everywhere authentication, which requires a username and password issued by a participating pay TV provider to its subscribers. Nor are some people willing to sit down and read the news in a web browser on a PC or tablet when they can just turn on TV news and crank up the volume while doing housework.
Sports
Netflix doesn't have sports. Sure, local TV shows some sports, but the U.S. networks show very little beyond professional baseball, basketball, and gridiron football. A lot of baseball and basketball games are shown only on the regional cable sports networks, not OTA. And in the 2010s, ESPN has the TV rights to the bowl games, the championship of U.S. college football, and to Monday Night Football.[7] NBCSN has half of the NHL's Stanley Cup finals, and TBS has much of the NCAA Division I Men's Basketball Tournament, including the Final Four in even-numbered years through 2032. Nor do the OTA networks often show out-of-market games during the regular season, which hurts fans who moved away from their favorite team or whose team moved, fans of the team associated with the university that a family member attends, and fans whose favorite player got traded to another team. An article in Ars Technica claims that American football and basketball are the two biggest things keeping survey respondents from dropping pay TV.[10] As of 2014, The Big Bang Theory is "the highest rated [television] program that isn't a live sports broadcast,"[11] but the fact that the columnist has to qualify that just shows how important sports are to a large segment of television viewers, which keeps them from being able to just drop pay TV to make room in the budget for Netflix.
In some cases, you might have a sports fan with pay TV among your neighbors, but other people in their household might not always appreciate regular invitations to watch the game,[12] nor are regular trips to Buffalo Wild Wings always an option. Some recommend buying a season ticket to watch a local junior,[2] college, or minor league pro team's games in person, but that ends up costing more than a year of pay TV especially with more than one sports fan or more than one sport, and you miss away games and the post-season. Besides, no one likes watching ice hockey in person anyway.[13] Or better yet, play instead of watching.[3]
On the other hand, the habit of many to care about the outcome of a professional sport match has led to a "festering pile of social ills." Professional and intercollegiate sports encourage people to just accept racist nicknames, compromise of universities' academic standards, squandering of taxpayers' money in teams' host cities, spikes in domestic violence, and player disloyalty.[14] But sometimes organized spectator sports are the only common interest among people at a social outing.[15]
Spoilers
Even for scripted series, the showings on Netflix tend to be delayed by several months. People who rely on Netflix become vulnerable to spoilers from people discussing plot developments at work[16][7] or on Twitter.
Equipment
Unlike cable boxes, Netflix boxes aren't rented. Those wanting to watch Netflix VOD on a TV monitor will first have to set up a wireless network, and for some, this involves buying a wireless access point for $40 to $80, roughly the same price as one month of cable TV. Then anyone who doesn't already have a BD player with Netflix or a seventh-generation video game console will need a dedicated Netflix player for each TV, such as the Roku or WD TV. These cost $50 to $100, or another month of cable TV for each TV set in the home. Even though switching to Netflix costs less than a few months of cable TV, some people can't budget more than a month ahead.
Discounts
Several cable Internet providers give a deep discount to people who subscribe to both Internet and TV from the same company, to the point where Internet + basic TV is only $5 per month more than Internet alone. Some reportedly charge less for Internet and TV than for Internet alone.[4] This isn't necessarily just the "limited basic" service with only the locals, public access, and home shopping; it's sometimes the "expanded basic" tier that includes ESPN. But watch out: some of these bundle offers may mislead because of fees that many cable providers itemize separately from the advertised price, such as cable box rental and retransmission consent for local channels and regional sports channels.
Availability
Satellite is where cable isn't. People living outside a cable or fiber ISP's service area rely on either dial-up Internet or wireless broadband, both of which are unsuitable for VOD, though they can still use Netflix DVDs by mail. And some countries simply lack a counterpart to Netflix.
References
- ↑ Stewart Mitchell. "48 hours to download a film - welcome to Suffolk in 2011". Alphr (formerly PC Pro). 2011-09-20. Accessed 2015-07-06.
- ↑ Laura H. "5 Childish Beliefs (Confirmed By Science)". Cracked, 2016-01-25. Accessed 2016-01-25.
- ↑ Jlovegren. "Answer to Can I learn a new language just by listening or watching videos?". Linguistics Stack Exchange, 2012-07-04. Accessed 2014-02-02.
- ↑ Lucy Thompson. "5 Awful Lessons Disney Teaches You About Relationships". Cracked, 2015-07-05. Accessed 2015-07-05.
- ↑ Erick Schonfeld. "Breaking: Netflix Splits DVD And Streaming Businesses; Creates Qwikster For DVDs". TechCrunch. 2011-09-19. Accessed 2011-09-19.
- ↑ Ryan Lawler. "Netflix kills Qwikster plans, backtracks on DVD separation". GigaOM. 2011-10-10. Accessed 2011-10-10.
- ↑ 7.0 7.1 7.2 Tommy Carpenter's comment
- ↑ Chris Foresman. "Despite rise in streaming, 99% of all video watched on a TV". Ars Technica. May 21, 2009.
- ↑ Jacqui Cheng. "Report: 95% of Internet video stuck looking longingly at TV". Ars Technica. March 21, 2008
- ↑ Jacqui Cheng. "Live sports keep people from cutting cable cord". Ars Technica. September 29, 2010.
- ↑ Luis Prada. "The 4 Most Overused Jokes It's Time to Stop Making". Cracked, 2014-08-14. Accessed 2014-08-14.
- ↑ "A Double-Edged Flat Screen". Not Always Right. Accessed 2011-11-12.
- ↑ Adam Tod Brown. "5 Supposedly Fun Activities Nobody Actually Enjoys". Cracked, 2012-05-09. Accessed 2012-11-26.
- ↑ J. F. Sargent. "5 Reasons You Should Hate Professional Sports". Cracked, 2014-08-19. Accessed 2014-08-19.
- ↑ Mark Hill. "5 Ways Professional Sports Benefit Society". Cracked, 2014-10-04. Accessed 2014-10-04.
- ↑ OffTopicRanter et al. "32 Things Awful People Secretly Suspect About the World" #16. Cracked, 2014-09-26. Accessed 2014-09-26.
Categories: Mini-rants