On Jun 7, 2006, at 7:29 PM, Louis Proyect wrote:
A friend of mine has been recommending Netflix to me. Although I
eventually plan to sign up, this article from the NY Times's
business section motivates me to do it sooner rather than later. It
seems that if you want to avoid Blockbuster type mediocrity, you
have to stay away from the video stores and patronize Netflix. It
also explains why the same stupid movies keep showing up on HBO and
all the other cable stations. God knows who hasn't seen "Pulp
Fiction" or "Batman" already. Give me Ousmane Sembene any day of
the week.
[...]
Its return from oblivion is a nice illustration of a brainteaser I
have been giving my friends since I visited Netflix in Silicon
Valley last month. Out of the 60,000 titles in Netflix's inventory,
I ask, how many do you think are rented at least once on a typical
day?
The most common answers have been around 1,000, which sounds
reasonable enough. Americans tend to flock to the same small group
of movies, just as they flock to the same candy bars and cars, right?
Well, the actual answer is 35,000 to 40,000. That's right: every
day, almost two of every three movies ever put onto DVD are rented
by a Netflix customer. "Americans' tastes are really broad," says
Reed Hastings, Netflix's chief executive. So, while the studios
spend their energy promoting bland blockbusters aimed at everyone,
Netflix has been catering to what people really want — and helping
to keep Hollywood profitable in the process.
I thought this was really interesting - the public doesn't have
anywhere near the debased tastes that either elitists or mass
marketers think. This confirms Bourdieu's argument in his excellent
little book about TV - that competition in the media promotes not
diversity but dumb uniformity.
And yes, there are a lot of dumb movies on HBO, but The Sopranos is
like the best TV show ever - and it's very popular. Further to the
point that the public doesn't always like crap.
Doug
