After losing money left and right for the whole year, Netflix was forced to introduce ads into its streaming services. In 2020, nobody thought this would happen, but Netflix is dying.
It is a sad tale, really, that of Netflix. Two years ago, during the pandemic, everyone was signing off epitaphs, clearing out their schedules for the upcoming funeral of cinema. In 2020 everyone thought that Covid had just accelerated a trend: the death of cinema theaters and the rise of streaming services.
Already in 2020, however, things were not looking as bright for Netflix, the father of the modern streaming service. What started as basically a monopoly over the industry, Netflix was gradually losing ground to new platforms with more exciting content. Amazon started its streaming service, then HBO. Then Hulu came along and then Peacock and then, as a final nail in the coffin, Disney started its own streaming service.
Netflix was not the new cool guy in town, as other platforms had more interesting content to offer. But on the other hand, there were too many platforms. When given a choice, the customer decided to either abandon streaming services altogether or only get the couple of ones more interesting to him. And more often than not, Netflix was not part of this choice.
In early 2022 the bubble exploded. Netflix announced that they had lost customers for the first time in 12 years, basically since the streaming era started. One month later, Top Gun Maverick surpassed 1 billion dollars at the box office. Cinema theaters were more alive than ever and Netflix was dying.
Netflix introduced ads
So, Netflix was forced to introduce ads. Starting from November, there will be a cheaper streaming option: $6,99 with the addition of advertised content. Ads will be shown at the beginning and in the middle of a movie or TV series and they will last from 15 to 30 seconds.
Netflix is not the only streaming service to introduce this option. Other platforms to offer a cheaper subscription with ads are:
- Peacock TV,
- Paramount +,
- HBO Max,
- Hulu,
- Disney +
The option will be available in the US, Canada, Australia, Brazil, France, Italy, Germany, Japan, South Korea, Mexico, Spain and the UK. If the system will be profitable, Netflix said, they will extend it to other countries as well.
It appears like streaming is becoming much more like cable TV than previously thought. If things keep going down this path, the only difference will be that you won’t need a big TV to watch content. When Netflix announced that linear television was going to die in 5 to 10 years, they never mentioned they would completely take their space instead.
