It’s difficult to remember what tv on the internet was like prior to Netflix began streaming original programs as needed. Perhaps that reality just highlights the massive influence the platform has actually had over the shows we enjoy and how we enjoy them. Today on Gizmo Laboratory, Peter Kafka, cohost of season 2 of the Land of the Giants podcast from Recode, joins us to talk about the rise of Netflix, its influence on our culture, and how the pandemic has affected our use of the service. In the second half of the show, we broaden the conversation to talk about the state of streaming video in basic, and Peter offers some recommendations on how to browse the confusing trenches of the streaming wars.
Show Notes
Listen to Recode’s Land of the Giants: The Netflix Effect podcast here Read more about HBO Max on WIRED.com. Read Kate Knibbs’ story about Palm Springs here You can likewise read all of WIRED’s coverage of Netflix here Register for our brand-new podcast Get WIRED here
Suggestions
Peter suggests the show ZeroZeroZero on Amazon Prime and likewise Vermont Lauren recommends the movie Palm Springs on Hulu. Mike advises the totally free streaming service Kanopy
Peter Kafka can be found on Twitter @ pkafka Lauren Goode is @ LaurenGoode Michael Calore is @ snackfight Bling the primary hotline at @ GadgetLab The show is produced by Boone Ashworth (@ booneashworth). Our executive manufacturer is Alex Kapelman (@ alexkapelman). Our style music is by Solar Keys
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How to Listen
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Transcript
Lauren Goode: Mike.
Michael Calore: Lauren.
LG: Mike, this is not how we generally open this program.
MC: Right, simply saying each other’s names is not the normal treatment around here, however things are going to be a bit different going forward. Before we enter into this week’s program, and prior to we induce Peter Kafka to discuss Netflix and the streaming wars, Lauren, I understand you have a statement.
LG: Yes. I’m really thrilled to reveal that beginning July 20, we’re going to be launching a new podcast every week called Get WIRED. It’s a weekly narrative show that’s going to check out the bizarre world of innovation that all of us live in right now. It’s going to feature a great deal of our coworkers on the WIRED personnel, our fellow WIRED authors, who are incredibly clever and working on some really incredibly engaging stories. And they’re going to pull back the drape on those stories that they’re dealing with. I’m going to be the host, so I’m really delighted. We have actually been dealing with this for a while now, and I’m enjoyed be able to simply, I don’t know, release it to the world, I guess.
MC: What would you say to the loyal Gizmo Laboratory listener who is now horrified that you are hosting another podcast on WIRED?
LG: I would inform them that they require not fear. I’m not going far. I suggest, I’m literally not going far since we’re all still at home, but I’m still going to be cohosting the Device Lab with my buddy Mike here. And Mike, there are also some modifications to Gadget Lab that are coming?
MC:. We’re going to have some new sections that we’re going to be introducing. We’re going to make the program a little bit more about buying suggestions and a bit more about consumer products. We’re going to be talking about consumer choice. In general, the show is simply going to be more concentrated on the words that remain in the title, the Gizmo Lab. So we’re going to make it more of a gadget-focused show.
Over the last however many months, we’ve been talking a lot about the pandemic, and we have actually been inducing science writers, and we have actually been inducing people to talk about political situation in Facebook, and we’re going to be doing less of that and more of what the program originally was now that we have this new outlet for all of those big meaty topics.
LG: Although we might still discuss Facebook from time to time, yes?
MC: From time to time.
LG: Safe to state, yeah, Facebook’s kind of a huge item.
MC: Yeah, kind of a big item. We’ll yap about Portal.
LG: That’s. You may have likewise observed that the Gizmo Lab has new art. I love this art, do not you, Mike?
MC: Yeah. The robotic blowing the bubble.
LG: Maybe we should ask our listeners, what do you wish to hear from the Gizmo Lab? What do you desire us to speak about? What are your customer tech questions? Do you have pointers for us? Do you want to tirade or rave about an item? We wish to hear all of it. Tweet at us at Gadget Lab. We still have the same handle.
MC: I in fact just switched on the notices for that Twitter account on my phone. So whenever someone tweets at us, it appears on my screen. You will be shooting your recommendations directly into my eyeballs. Just take solace because. All right. Well, Lauren, thank you for the statement. All the best with Get WIRED. It’s going to be fantastic. Look forward on Monday. It’s going to appear in this feed for this podcast, and it’s going to have its own feed. Just the very first episode will reveal up. If you’re a Device Lab subscriber, you’ll have the ability to listen and then hopefully you will choose that it’s for you. And then you can register for every other episode of Get WIRED after that. All right. Now let’s get on with the show. OK.
[Intro theme music]
MC: Invite to Device Laboratory, everybody. I am Michael Calore, a senior editor at WIRED. I am joined as typical by my cohost WIRED senior author, Lauren Goode.
LG: Hey, Mike.
MC: Hi, Lauren. We’re also signed up with today by a senior correspondent at Recode, Peter Kafka.
Peter Kafka: Hey, people.
MC: Hey, Peter. Peter is the cohost together with Rani Molla of the new season of Recode’s podcast Land of the Giants, a program that covers huge tech business that define our present era. Season 2 is about the rise of Netflix. It details the business’s modest starts, its very odd corporate culture, and how the service grew to control the entertainment industry. Peter, it’s difficult to picture the media area today without Netflix, however for a long time, it was a 2nd- or even third-tier player. Why did Netflix appear so not likely to be successful in the beginning?
PK: Well, first off, Netflix was unlikely to prosper since it was a start-up. It was traditional start-up in a strip mall in a valley that was handling Smash hit. It was small, small, small, and it’s hard to picture how big Blockbuster was back when Netflix started, but it was a giant. Therefore, nobody ever believed Netflix would take down Hit, and that includes the CEO of Netflix who tried to sell the company to Blockbuster and was rebuffed. Even Netflix didn’t think Netflix would get rid of Smash hit.
It did, which we information. We have invested a whole episode on that. Even then, after Netflix had actually pushed out Blockbuster, it was still seen as a supplier, because that’s what it was. It was distributing other individuals’s stuff. That is how Hollywood viewed it, the exact same method they ‘d saw a Walmart or anybody else who took their stuff and got it to the end client. What Netflix did that the other media business didn’t understand for a very long time was, due to the fact that Netflix had an established relationship with its consumers online, it remained in a position to be a lot more effective than the media business it was dealing with.
We could invest episode after episode discussing how it did all this in plain view of the media business, however the media companies made it possible for Netflix for a long period of time without understanding what they were doing. I think it’s a fascinating story, and that’s why we’re investing 7 hours on it.
LG: Peter, I listened to episode 2 recently. I think I’m three episodes into Land of the Giants, and episode 2 was everything about this competition with Blockbuster in the early days, and it hurts to listen to. There are some missteps, there’s some external forces, like Hit had a lot of debt, and after that the 2008 crisis occurred. However at the same time, they’re firing the one guy who understands how online distribution works and doubling down on retail at a time when online streaming is on the growth. Is this like a Coca-Cola business case? Is it Coke or Coca-Cola. It’s Brand-new Coke, right? That was the famous service case. Is this a service case that individuals are going to study for several years to come when they consider disturbance?
PK: I believe they are. I believe there actually is a lot of Harvard Service Evaluation things that we even mention here. The important things you and I are used to, and most likely Mike as well, reading and informing stories about how a nimble, digital disruptor comes up and deals with the giant who’s not prepared to take it on. Which is what happened here, other than that Smash hit in fact, in numerous ways, did an excellent job of handling Netflix. There were individuals at Smash hit, consisting of among its CEOs, who understood what was happening and had a plan to handle Netflix, and they might have won numerous different times. That I believe is why it’s more thinking about your standard tale of disruption.
LG: I extremely advise that everyone, when you’re done listening to Device Laboratory, go listen to this podcast that Peter and Rani put together. By the way, we would like to have had Rani on the show. She’s currently on maternity leave, however it’s a terrific listen.
PK: Yeah, we don’t care what order you listen to the podcasts in. You can listen to them when you listen to every episode of Gadget Lab, and then listen to all 7 of ours, just, you’ll like it. Go subscribe.
LG: Netflix occurs to be reporting profits today, the day we’re taping this podcast on Thursday, however we’re not really going to cover those since we wish to make sure that we can respond to individuals’s concerns about Netflix as a service, and likewise all of the rivals that are appearing these days. One thing that I keep hearing analysts say is that they’re seeing a great deal of upside for Netflix right now, because this year, they may get like a bajillion subscribers, which’s due to the fact that everyone’s sitting home during the pandemic, which even in fully grown markets there’s still a lot of room for growth for Netflix. My concern is, the number of people are subscribing right now to Netflix during the pandemic? And then, if life ever returns to “normal,” the number of people will drop off due to the fact that all of us get to go hang out with each other once again?
PK: One thing we know is that 9 million more individuals than Netflix anticipated registered in