Hollywood’s “summer of strikes” may be about to wrap, but don’t pop the champagne just yet. Existential issues still loom large.
https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/lists/writers-actors-strikes-end-hollywood-crises/
The problem with streaming is too much vertical integration. The studios own the content, the streaming channels, the cable channels, the broadcast channels, the set top boxes, and even the internet connection. It’s strangling competition, and preventing content from being shopped around.
Studios would rather take the content off the air for a tax write off than let their competition have it. And the content creators have little to no access to information about how successful a show actually is, making it difficult to sell (if the studio allows it at all). In many ways it’s similar to when the movie studios owned the movie theaters.
It’s going to take more time, but studios will eventually learn that exclusivity isn’t worth it. Video game publishers eventually learned this, you can make way more money being everywhere than taking a single bigger check for one place.
Hollywood is well overdue for a wake up call, and not just the producers. Points 2 and 5 are basically the same, but there’s no easy solution for Hollywood as a whole for the “too much content” problem. They can try to cut streaming catalogs, but that’s just going to lead to piracy, and $15/household is better than 0. It’s probably not that hard to get the complete run of friends or whatever popular show most people binge constantly anyway.