Disney bets on sequels and password crackdown for profit growth
Disney is banking on a password crackdown and spate of sequels as it pushes to make its streaming business profitable.
The company, which is under pressure as audiences move away from traditional pay-TV and cinema, said it was on track to meet its goals after new subscribers and price rises helped to narrow losses in its streaming business.
The password crackdown will work, sadly. However is it going to be enough to make up for the fact that Disney's got nothing right now except shitting out sequels?
I don't know that it will work. How many additional people sign up when these password sharing crackdowns happen? I doubt it's enough to make their number crunchers happy.
How many additional people sign up when these password sharing crackdowns happen?
Which every company saw, and that's why they're all gonna do this too.
The same was said about Netflix. That didn't appear to manifest
There is a lot of selection bias here on lemmy. The majority of us are technical enough to either know where to find free streaming sites or torrent.
The large majority of customers aren't.
It's why these crackdowns work. They've done the math. They know they'll make more money then they'll lose.
Onward, elemental, wish, soul, reya... Some of the original properties that Disney has released in the last 5 years and nobody went to see. The only originals that have done well were Encanto and turning red.
People like to shit on Disney's lack of originals, but nobody goes to watch them when they release them. People only want sequels so that's what they get. In truth, people like you who complain about Disney's lack of original films don't actually watch Disney films
How many of those were actually good, though?
Genuinely asking, I only saw 3 out of the 5 and don't remember being blown away by any of them. I'm not sure I even remember the plot of some.
But I can still immediately recall songs from both Encanto and Moana and I haven't seen either of those in years.
2 of those came out in 2020 and Raya was still during COVID, so it's really not fair to lump those in. I was mostly talking about the movies they released just last year, their big 100th year. Indy 5, Wish, The Marvels, Ant-Man 3. None of them did as well as Disney needed.
Meanwhile movies about long-established toys like Mario and Barbie each made a billion+, and people were willing to go see a 3-hour docu-drama about a scientist. So we know it's not the "people don't go to the theaters anymore" excuse. People just aren't getting dressed to watch crap and that's what Disney's been known for lately.
Now the real challenge is getting the cartoon titles under a single word
Disney has Hulu, and that's enough for some people.
Gentlemen . . . to evil!
clink
ice statue starts shaking and erupts
"Piratebay!"
shooting ensues
So looking forward to all the useful idiots shilling this crap without even realizing how they're being manipulated into doing it.
Netflix has been such a staple for so long it took a full Arr suite to get my wife to be ok that I cancelled it. When it came to Disney plus, she didn't care because she's not into Star wars and she hulk soured her on marvel. My 5 year old niece and nephew only ask to watch Netflix when they come over. As someone who has witnessed them kill so many franchises I love, I think Disney cracking down on password sharing is a great idea.
That's wild. Netflix has been kinda shit for so long, when they upped their prices we quit no problem. I'll probably sub for a month when Sandman or Stranger Things comes back.
On the other hand, we have Disney running most of the time. When it's not playing Bluey and Spidey and His Amazing Friends, it's playing one of their movies. And when the kids go to sleep I'm watching X-Men '97.
Also, I thought She-Hulk was fantastic. But it's kind of crazy to me that THAT was what soured the MCU. Thor Love and Thunder and Quantumania soured it for me (and on the TV side, Echo has Secret Invasion and Echo were not good). I didn't even see The Marvels, which turned out to be fine.
We actually both enjoyed most of she hulk, it was the ending going off the rails that was too much for my wife. She had no idea who Kevin was and all the other stuff didn't really pay off. I've been sour on the MCU since falcon and the Winter soldier cringe fest, but I keep watching the movies because I would find someone enjoyment to balance out the frustration of missed opportunities to adapt old comics storylines.
For my case we have been family sharing subscriptions and Netflix was always our responsibility even though I'm well versed in the skill set needed to sail the seas, and for years it worked out great. But the family sharing nonsense has finally made it inconvenient enough to go back to the sea. Cocomelon and love is blind show on Netflix a must have for the family.
People shit on Disney for only doing sequels, yet when they release original properties like they have the last 2 years, people ignore them and don't watch them. No wonder they go to sequels, viewers clearly don't want to gamble on new stuff. And all the people bitching about Disney only doing sequels, don't watch Disney movies anyways
I get what you mean, but I really feel like the quality of original stuff is not up to the standard that they were putting out 30 years ago. I just rewatched Lion King the other day and I couldn't believe how well it holds up. Every performance ranges from great to fantastic, every song is really good, the score is fucking phenomenal, the animation truly pushed the boundaries for the time, and the story and dialogue are straight up Shakespeare. Encanto and Onward are good, but they're not Little Mermaid, Aladdin, Lion King, and Beauty and the Beast good.
At the end of the day, Disney is not in the business of making art this century; they're in the money making business. They make a product, not art. It's more profitable to make something that's just good enough to get people's money, and that's all they actually care about. Remember that with every culture war stance they take. They don't actually give a shit about LGBTQ rights or representation, they just know that they can get extra attention and sales from barely doing anything, and it's not far enough to alienate the Chinese market. Win-win. When they fight that dorky Florida meatball, understand that they're not on your side; they're on their side. If they could have it their way, they would own all media and distribution, and you'd never see another movie or TV show again without first forking over everything they can get out of you.
and the story and dialogue are straight up Shakespeare
Well it is a cartoon animal version of Hamlet.
Excellent points. Disney couldn't care less about the groups it claims to support. Their actions are more in line with co-opting identity groups to sell them back to you as a commodity. This fact really ossified for me when visiting Epcot a while back. I realized that many of their recent (and planned future) films are literally designed around ethnicities or cultures so they can have tie-in IP in the world showcase at Epcot, driving more merch and premium ride sales.
There is always an ulterior motive.
What original properties? Not a rhetorical question, I'm curious
I dare them to cut me off. Every dollar not spent on streaming will go to selfhosting and piracy.
You should spend that dollar on self-hosting and piracy anyways, it's a better value.
I know this. Decisionmaking among extended family is rarely so simple however.
Not only that, it's a better product.
I pay for Fubo because I can't find a way to watch my team's games any other way. If I record something like The Daily Show I have to use their skanky interface to scrub through ad breaks. If I add the show to my Sonarr I get it shortly after it airs with the ads removed already.
or for the people who don't want to selfhost and like the convenience of a streaming app Kodi + Pov addon + Trakt +Alldebrid subscription
It's such a daunting thing. I used to Plex everything, but it became too much. There were ISP letters too. Does someone have a dummy's guide?