Writes Roy Price, chief executive of an entertainment studio and former head of Amazon Studios, in "If Netflix Eats Warner Bros., It Will Be the End of Hollywood" (NYT).From "Monopsony" (Wikipedia): "The term 'monopsony' (from Greek μόνος (mónos) "single" and ὀψωνεῖν (opsōneîn) "'to purchase fish") was first introduced by the British economist Joan Robinson in her influential book, The Economics of Imperfect Competition (1933)...."Fish, eh? It has been noted that the word was miscoined. But is the coinage really fishy? The OED describes the etymology this way: "< mono- comb. form + ancient Greek ὀψωνία purchase of provisions (< ὀψωνεῖν to buy provisions (see opsonation n.) + ‑ία ‑y suffix), after monopoly n.""Opsonation" is a new one for me. It's archaic. It's supposedly a feast, a catering, or a buying of provisions, according to the OED, which does not mention fish.But back to the big merger — perhaps we will get more fish movies. Like this Warner Brothers classic:
December 6, 2025
"In making a case for approval, Netflix may argue that the market in which it operates is not limited to premium film and television but rather encompasses the entire universe of human amusement..."
"... TikTok, YouTube, sports, games, books and even taking a walk. This is a standard tactic: Define the market so broadly that dominance becomes mathematically impossible.... A Netflix merger with Warner Bros. would create a monopsony problem: too few buyers with too much bargaining power. Writers, directors, actors, showrunners, puppeteers, visual effects artists — all are suppliers. The fewer buyers competing to hire them, the lower their compensation and the narrower their opportunities.... "
Writes Roy Price, chief executive of an entertainment studio and former head of Amazon Studios, in "If Netflix Eats Warner Bros., It Will Be the End of Hollywood" (NYT).From "Monopsony" (Wikipedia): "The term 'monopsony' (from Greek μόνος (mónos) "single" and ὀψωνεῖν (opsōneîn) "'to purchase fish") was first introduced by the British economist Joan Robinson in her influential book, The Economics of Imperfect Competition (1933)...."Fish, eh? It has been noted that the word was miscoined. But is the coinage really fishy? The OED describes the etymology this way: "< mono- comb. form + ancient Greek ὀψωνία purchase of provisions (< ὀψωνεῖν to buy provisions (see opsonation n.) + ‑ία ‑y suffix), after monopoly n.""Opsonation" is a new one for me. It's archaic. It's supposedly a feast, a catering, or a buying of provisions, according to the OED, which does not mention fish.But back to the big merger — perhaps we will get more fish movies. Like this Warner Brothers classic:
Writes Roy Price, chief executive of an entertainment studio and former head of Amazon Studios, in "If Netflix Eats Warner Bros., It Will Be the End of Hollywood" (NYT).From "Monopsony" (Wikipedia): "The term 'monopsony' (from Greek μόνος (mónos) "single" and ὀψωνεῖν (opsōneîn) "'to purchase fish") was first introduced by the British economist Joan Robinson in her influential book, The Economics of Imperfect Competition (1933)...."Fish, eh? It has been noted that the word was miscoined. But is the coinage really fishy? The OED describes the etymology this way: "< mono- comb. form + ancient Greek ὀψωνία purchase of provisions (< ὀψωνεῖν to buy provisions (see opsonation n.) + ‑ία ‑y suffix), after monopoly n.""Opsonation" is a new one for me. It's archaic. It's supposedly a feast, a catering, or a buying of provisions, according to the OED, which does not mention fish.But back to the big merger — perhaps we will get more fish movies. Like this Warner Brothers classic:
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48 comments:
As a little kid, one of life's great joys was when Mr. Limpet appeared on television. I assume it doesn't hold up but it was just about the greatest thing in the world back in the day.
encompasses the entire universe of human amusement
Another subhead for the Althouse Blog?
Limpet still holds up.
Awesome!
Sounds like the Writers Union has spoken.
Trying to put something on for the wife prepping in the kitchen I’ve learned Netflix has cornered the market on crap. There’s gotta be a law against that. Crime against humanity to platform the exiled royal and the Suits Rachel woman? I’m sure if Hollywood doesn’t want the marriage Hollywood will break up the love birds…
Well, yeah, The Netflix/WB-HBOMax merger will hurt writers, directors, actors, showrunners, puppeteers, visual effects artists. But on the "positive" side, there will be many more Negroes in your movies and TV shows...
The Fake News narrative already is that Netflix is hated by Trump because the CEO gave the Obamas a big money deal.
Opsonation has made my day. A new word at last. Love it.
Who cares. The movie studios are all going broke anyway.
I used to live about a half a mile from the founder of Netflix in Santa Cruz. They Blockbuster at the bottom of the hill from the neighborhood was abysmal. You would return a video the stoned teenager responsible for collecting the returns loses it, then 2 months later you get a letter from a collection agency demanding several hundred dollars. People called it the Blockbuster that started Netflix.
In any event that wasn't very long ago. Maybe this is the fatal move that Netflix makes that'll turn it into Blockbuster
Hold on. Wait a minute. I think I get it. Net. Like network. Like internet. Flix. Like flickers. Like movies. NET. FLIX. NETFLIX! INTERNET MOVIES!!!
Hollywood is dead for a lot of reasons.
Mostly it is that kids in basements are making cinema quality videos with the new generative AI tools coming out.
People don't seem to understand how quickly this technology is improving.
Within a year most of the people on this chat board will be able to make their own movie minus plot and conflict of course.
Our classic present monopsony is the defense *cough* WAR department and its contractors. One client, many providers who do nothing but satisfy the client's needs. On a cost plus basis.
How much control do any of us have over that?
"Entertain yourselves while we work out the details." - what I'm hearing.
If you were a public intellectual during the Enlightenment one of your projects was to make English as much like Greek and Latin as possible. There was no one around to tell you to stop trying to make "opsonation" happen.
After letting fox, disney, warner, and comast take over almost the whole media space, we.re now going to worry about this?
Who cares? The antitrust law has been a dead letter for a long time. Look at what's happened to sports. ESPN and Disney have taken over huge hunks and put it behind their paywall.
Our classic present monopsony is the defense *cough* WAR department and its contractors.
Well, we don't want competing war departments do we ? Any conflict could turn deadly.
I'm old. I remember when George Steinbrenner defined himself as shipbuilder. That gave him a lot of street cred as an industrialist. Owning the Yankees might get him a better table at The Stork Club, but building ships was what made him a heavyweight. Those days are dead and gone.....Americans don't spend a lot of time building ships. We've got a lot of free time. Filling up the free time of Americans with amusing stuff is what industrialists do nowadays. I suppose maybe if Steinbrenner had started making cruise ships, he could have stayed afloat as a shipbuilder for a few more years, but buying the Yankees was his shrewdest investment.
I just recently watched The Beast in Me on Netflix. It stars Claire Dane who, once again, is on the verge of a nervous breakdown., She's very good at nervous breakdowns. She plays the part of a lesbian writer who investigates the misdeeds of a real estate developer and his family. This family has some parallels to the Trump family. There is a Puerto Rican elected official, somewhat like AOC, who opposes their plans. There is never any suspense as to whether or not the real estate developer is evil. The suspense is learning who is the most evil of the family and the depths of their depravity. Claire Danes does a good job and Matthew Rhys looks appropriately sinister in the Eric Trump; role. The acting is good and some of the scenes are well written, but as the series unfolds it loses credibility. Agitprop, Thank God for lesbians, Puerto Rican activists, and obsessive FBI agents. They're our last line of defense against real estate developers. .
Video games dwarf theatrical films in annual revenues. More people watched the finals of a recent video game competition than watched the Super Bowl. Defining the relevant market for entertainment consumption will be impossible, unless you just start with a conclusion and work backwards.
Allegedly its based on a town and country story by howard gowen obviously not one of obamas neighbors on marthas vineyard
encompasses the entire universe of human amusement...
Estelle: I go out for a quart of milk. I come home and find my son treating his body like it was an amusement park!
https://youtu.be/JFioUBgefAY?si=bC3zGI9BA7BRsa1r
He has a whole collection of these
Don Knotts's glasses don't have any earpieces. And they are perfectly round. Does a pretty good job of suggesting fish-eyes. Nice touch.
I miss the Gong Show. Now there was some quality television!
And re making videos, very easy. Yesterday was grandson's 17th BDay and I wanted to do something more than sing happy birthday over the phone.
I grabbed some clips of Chuck Barris from the Gong show, mashed them up with Sinatra singing how when it was 17 it was a very good year and the three stooges sinnging a birthday ditty ending in an exploding cake. (I Use Adobe Premiere Elements 2021used to cost about $75)
Took me about 20 minutes to find the clips, download them and put the film together and load to YouTube. Would have taken less but I watched more of the Gong Show than I should have.
https://youtu.be/ETMrbu1nAkI
John Henry
Presumably AI could have done it but would probably have taken longer and less fun.
John Henry
I was a Netflix subscriber for years, DVD and streaming. Then I saw the News that Obama had gone onboard for some ridiculous amout of money. The same day I go an email saying my Netflix would go up by $5-10 a month. About 10 minutes later I canceled.
About a year later I switched to a new, cheaper, plan at T-Mobile and they threw NetFlix in for free. Screw 'em
Here's a tip, if you have Roku (maybe even if you don't) there is a streaming service called Tubi that has great selection of older movies. (Including Irma LaDouce)
John Henry
Jean-Jacques Rousseau would not have been as troubled and tormented if he had been allowed to patent "going for a walk" and live off the proceeds.
I am reminded of the first lines of Bronte Sister's Jane Eyre: "There was no possibility of taking a walk that day. Scraping up the cash to pay the royalties was a real bitch."
Jonathan banks is the head villain (its been ages since hes been a player)
Give someone a fish and he eats for one day.
Monopsonize the provision of fish and you'll eat everyday.
I got distracted in the Limpet vid by the hottie in purple and a brief uncredited appearance by Karl Malden. You just can't miss that rotten-potato nose!
I had forget his roles in breaking bad and better call saul
Movies have not gotten better, but I did watch a decent one, Blue Moon, starring Ethan Hawke, who I only started following after reading about him on this blog, but it is kind of depressing, and it's pretty deep, it's about the purpose of entertainment. Is it to show off the brilliant wit of the artist who creates it, or is it to please the audiences who pay money to see it? It was sort of framed as an on and off debate between Rogers and Hart, and the example of a perfect "Give the yokels sitting in the dark what they want to see on stage" was "Oklahoma!"
I have a personal theory that our classic works, including the great Hollywood movies, are our cultural firmware, and when a woke company like Netflix decides that they are going to "update a piece for modern audiences," like Midsummer Night's Dream, or whatever, what they really mean is that they intend to update the firmware of modern audiences.
Thats malware not firmware
Take 'house of dynamite' it had all the incredients of a tense political thriller a star writer a good cast but it didnt stick the landing
You probably have to have a head of white hair to remember it, but there was a time when the Walt Disney brand was central to brining the American family together around the TV, all across America, on a Sunday evening.
It had to be nuked.
They cant do good noir because they cant even really find the light take that perry mason revamp with matthew rhys
Back when kurt russell first was a teen star in the 70s
While I am not opposed to the Netflix purchase of Warners, there is no question that the business looks sharply different than 40 years ago when there were 6 major studios and dozens of large independents plus networks and developing cable outlets. However, the quality of television production is considerably higher today. One hour series episodes were produced for $1million/hr on a 7 day shoot. Today, the price per episode is many $$ millions and much longer shooting schedules. The quality of writing is orders of magnitude better. The squawking of the guilds and others is incessant when changes come. They yowled the same songs when television showed up and replaced radio.
- Krumhorn
If Netflix Eats Warner Bros., It Will Be the End of Hollywood"
Sounds good to me.
You're going to need a bigger boat (for all of the fish movies).
"Today, the price per episode is many $$ millions and much longer shooting schedules. The quality of writing is orders of magnitude better."
Not sure what that is supposed to mean. What I see is a lot of intentional cringe and a lot of stuff that is just intended for shock value, but sure, the camera work and the sets are better.
So say we all
"The "hottie in purple" is likely the live-action actress Carole Cook, and the "brief uncredited appearance by Karl Malden" appears to be a mistaken reference to actor Richard Herd, who was often mistaken for Malden."
- Google AI.
Karl malden was a villain in one of those matt helm film i think
Say what you will about AI but the fact that it found the quote in a Blogger comment and correctly identified the two actors all in the blink of an eye is pretty amazing.
I simply and without nuance pasted this quote in the search box a prompt:
"Limpet vid by the hottie in purple and a brief uncredited appearance by Karl Malden."
David Ellison thinks he's Edgar Bronfman Jr all over again?
“It’s a little bit like, ‘Is the Albanian army going to take over the world? I don’t think so’,” Jeff Bewkes, the former chief executive of Warner Bros’ parent company, said in 2010.
This seems a remarkably obtuse statement even for 2010 considering all the creative upheaval Steve Jobs had already unleashed on the entertainment industry over the previous 15 years. It's all about tomorrow's cash flows, not the comfortable prestige of yesterday's cash flows.
One can also surmise that Netflix can realize significantly more value out of this acquisition that serves mass market consumers rather than the database-centered Ellison fortune which meets the needs of the corporate world.
One suspects the Ellisons are going to leave behind billions in extinguished value when they find themselves in an entertainment industry dead end and head for the exits.
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