We May Be in Primetime for Streaming Services

“Every good thing has to end, so enjoy it while it lasts.” You’ve doubtlessly heard this sentiment expressed at times by someone who looks at life from a glass-half-empty perspective. It may apply to these current days regarding streaming services. We may be in a sort of “primetime” where streaming services are concerned. 

The perfect world of streaming services for consumers occupies a very fine line. Having your choice of several high-quality streaming services showing original content is the ideal scenario. When streaming companies have competition, it’s healthy for raising the quality level of the content. 

But when too many companies enter the streaming game, the revenue gets sliced too thinly, and the content production begins to suffer. Having Netflix, Disney, HBO, and JUST A FEW of the other streaming services works well for everyone. The companies share an amount of revenue that allows them to keep investing in new, original content. Content is king. Once made, it becomes an asset for the company and can be reshown to bolster their schedules. 

But it seems like every other day, you read about some US entertainment studio upstart that’s launching a streaming service. Unless the majority of these streaming services start pulling their blinders off and start looking beyond the US for viewers, as Netflix and HBO have done, they’re doomed to fail. It may be worse if they start churning out bland, low-budget content because that’s all they can afford. 

The streaming services that were launched first enjoyed a head start. If latecomers want to jump on the bandwagon, some worldwide internet grand poo-bah somewhere should introduce a law where the latecomer has to launch in foreign territories first. It’ll keep the subscriber numbers up and bring in more viewers. It’ll also ensure adequate revenue and, thus, original content for all. We consumers want to keep primetime going for as long as possible.