Netflix Buys Warner Bros.
Dominic Preston (Hacker News, MacRumors, Slashdot):
Netflix has announced that it’s struck a deal to acquire Warner Bros. for $82.7 billion. The purchase will go through after Warner Bros.’ planned split from Discovery, now expected to take place in Q3 2026.
[…]
Netflix suggests it has no immediate plans for drastic change at Warner Bros., describing HBO and HBO Max as a “compelling, complementary offering” alongside its own streaming service, and saying it will maintain the studio’s current operations, including theatrical releases for films.”
[Today’s] news immediately made me think of Netflix Co-CEO Ted Sarandos’s GQ interview (Web Archive link) back in 2013 when he was the Chief Content Officer:
“The goal…is to become HBO faster than HBO can become us.”
[…]
What’s funny is that fifteen or twenty years ago, this merger wouldn’t have been plausible, but if it had, the Netflix brand would have most likely gone away. At this point, the Netflix brand is strong enough that I could seem them simply building out sections of select legacy brands under the Netflix umbrella (not unlike what Disney+ currently has and Warner Bros. Discovery had done initially after that merger.)
I don’t know if this deal makes sense for Netflix, but Netflix has earned my trust. Netflix is a product-first company. They care about the quality of their content, their software, their service, and their brand. If you care about the Warner/HBO legacy, an acquisition by Netflix is a much, much better outcome than if David Ellison had bought it to merge with Paramount.
For now, I’ll just tout my predictions from last year, both that WBD would be acquired, but also that Netflix would eventually backtrack on their theatrical release stance. Book look good right now.
Infinite Timelines, Netflix just becomes Comcast in 20 years and charges $250 a month for hundreds of ‘channels’ that still have advertisements but nothing good to watch.
Previously:
- YouTube at 20
- Apple TV+ Losing $1 Billion Per Year
- Netflix Ads, Password Sharing, and DVDs
- Arrested Development Leaving Netflix Soon
- Netflix vs. Blockbuster Total Access
- All the Streaming Video
- An Unsolicited Streaming App Spec
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🤦 people like Gruber still don’t realize how bad media conglomeration has been for art and consumers?
This is *always* a bad thing. It always results in less creative output, lost jobs, and higher costs
If we had an even slightly decent government, this would be blocked without a second thought. There’s no upside to anyone outside of Netflix’s C Suite. Even employees of both companies are going to suffer because of this
Gruber always gets snowed by companies until they've fully enshittified. Netflix's content quality has very famously been on a downhill slide, and its movies are synonymous with mediocrity. And no company that cares about service makes the user hunt up and down the page for what they're looking for, but that's what people searching for their "Continue Watching" tab have had to do.
I just want TCM to be left alone and without ads. If it's left alone with the Discovery Garbage-plex management, I don't think TCM can survive.
