Netflix DVDs: ‘We’re in the endgame now’

As I predicted in February, Netflix stopped giving subscriber numbers for its legacy DVD-by-mail service starting with its first-quarter report released on April 21.
The U.S.-only DVD service ended the fourth quarter of 2019 with 2.15 million paid subscriptions. In the December quarter, the unit generated a profit of $31.1 million on revenue of revenue of $68.5 million.
In the first quarter of 2020, Netflix’s DVD.com subsidiary generated revenue of $64.3 million, down 20% year over year, according to filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. That’s the only statistic it gave on the DVD business for the most recent quarter.
Of course, the DVD unit is a drop in the bucket compared with Netflix’s global subscription streaming video service, which generated $5.7 billion in sales last quarter.
Netflix doesn’t promote its legacy DVD business so it’s no wonder why it is fading away.
The business is so different from its streaming video service I wonder why Netflix doesn’t sell the unit while it still has some value to potential buyers.
I can only imagine that Netflix doesn’t want to compete with the service if some buyer manages to return the business to growth. I can see potential buyers including Amazon.com and Redbox, now owned by private equity firm Apollo Global Management.
Another reason Netflix doesn’t divest the unit is because it’s likely still attracting streaming subscribers from the DVD service. It’s also likely that certain software assets are shared between the DVD unit and the streaming service.
Maybe some investor will ask Netflix what it plans to do with the DVD-by-mail service at its virtual annual shareholder meeting on June 4.
If Netflix’s DVD business goes away, so will access to many older movies, including classics and rare films. Those that are available for streaming will be split across a variety of separate online video services.
Netflix has shifted its streaming business away from licensed content and more towards new original content that it owns.
It would be a shame to see Netflix just let the service die. Especially when studios are still releasing movies and TV series on DVD and Blu-ray Disc.
But the end of physical media is inevitable. To quote Dr. Strange in “Avengers: Infinity War”: “We’re in the endgame now.”

Related articles:

The perfect virtual video store isn’t Netflix. It’s DVD.com. (Vox; April 23, 2020)

In Defense of the Disc: DVD, Blu-ray Disc Collectors Speak Out (Media Play News; Feb. 24, 2020)

4K Disc Players Conspicuous By Their Absence From CES (HD Guru; Jan. 20, 2020)

Covid-19 the latest scary disease to target humans

The Covid-19 coronavirus pandemic has officially killed nearly 166,000 people worldwide and sickened more than 2.4 million to date, according to Worldometer. The actual numbers are probably much higher, due to under-reporting by China, where the disease originated, and lack of testing supplies.
The global response to combating Covid-19 has been unprecedented, with governments shutting down non-essential businesses and warning people to wear masks, social distance and self-quarantine. It could permanently change how people work, play and school.
The pandemic also is likely to spark an increase in people seeking careers in virology and immunology.
Communicable diseases are scary things. Some of the terrible diseases my parents grew up worrying about like smallpox and polio have been vanquished by medical advances. Others like measles are making a comeback thanks to the irrational anti-vaccination movement.
My maternal grandfather, William O. Kelly, had polio as a young man. He had to learn how to walk again. He eventually recovered, got married and fathered my mother. Thank God for that!
Covid-19 caught governments unprepared even though we have had warnings for years. Most recently there was the swine flu pandemic that killed 200,000 in 2009-10.
But the outbreak most historians point to is the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic. The worldwide death toll from the Spanish flu is estimated to have been anywhere from 17 million to 50 million, and possibly as high as 100 million.
Meanwhile, few Americans know about the Asian flu pandemic in 1957-58 that killed 1.1 million worldwide, including 116,000 in the U.S. That’s likely because the U.S. was ready with a vaccine before that strain of the flu hit here.
My mother, who’s now 87 years old, doesn’t recall that flu outbreak. At the time, she was raising two young children in Madison, Wis., while her husband and my to-be father was getting his Ph.D. at the University of Wisconsin.
“It didn’t impact us at all. I don’t even remember it,” she said recently. “Everything is so different now because of the kind of media we have. Something happens and five minutes later it’s on the news.”
And air travel wasn’t as prevalent in the late 1950s either. That helped spread Covid-19 so rapidly worldwide.
I was born in 1962 and remember certain diseases scaring me. I saw a movie or TV drama series episode about a man spreading diphtheria in a big city that shook me. I also was frightened of leprosy after watching an epic Bible movie.
I recall staying home from elementary school when I was sick with the mumps.
I also was among the last U.S. elementary school classes to get the smallpox vaccine. I still have the scar on my upper left arm from the booster shot. Routine vaccinations for smallpox were discontinued in 1972 in the U.S. I can remember kids lining up in the gym to get their shot. Quite a few cried after getting it. Not me, but it did sting.
Unlike my older siblings, I didn’t get the measles or chickenpox.
“We had both the chickenpox and red measles around the same time,” my mother said. “One followed the other. I don’t remember which came first. One of dad’s friends or coworkers, his wife said to him, ‘Boy, Alice really got a double dose having them both together like that.’”
My siblings were confined to the house for about two weeks when they were sick with the measles and chickenpox in the late 1960s.
“I remember them all upstairs in our house in Royal Oak,” Michigan, she said. “I had three beds up there and that’s where they were. I had had it as a child, so I was immune.”

Related reading:

Visualizing the History of Pandemics (Visual Capitalist; March 14, 2020, and updated April 18, 2020)

How the 1957 Flu Pandemic Was Stopped Early in Its Path (History; March 18, 2020)

How Will Coronavirus Pandemic Deaths Compare to the 1957 Flu Pandemic? (Reason; March 31, 2020)

Photo: Covid-19 coronavirus (CDC image)

When clickbait articles tout photos from North Korea, they’re lying

One of the most common lying clickbait categories I’ve seen are articles that tout surprising photos of life in North Korea. They always use pictures of pretty women who aren’t from North Korea.
Here are two recent examples.
One article from Smartfeed was headlined “A Brave Photographer Smuggled These 28 Photos out of North Korea.” It used a photo of South Korean model and actress Jinri Park who is based in the Philippines. The photo is from reality TV show “Pinoy Big Brother.” (See article from ABS-CBN News and video from 123Vid.

An article from Taboola was titled “This Photographer Snuck 20 Illegal Photos out of North Korea.” It used a photo of five sexy women presumably lined up for military training.
The photos were from Chinese fashion photographer Liu Jianan. He did a series of fantasy role-playing photos featuring sexy female soldiers called “Online Game 2.” I’ve posted a few pictures from the series below.
This article is part of a continuing series on lying clickbait tactics.