Netflix Releases Comprehensive Streaming Data

[Mister Mets]

In a change of its usual policy of keeping streaming information quiet, Netflix has released comprehensive data for 99% of its catalog.

Netflix today has revealed viewership data for 99% of its entire catalog, or more than 18,000 titles available around the world. It published the numbers in a report, What We Watched, capturing viewing from January to June of 2023. It is the first edition of a planned semi-annual look at viewership. The initiative aims to document the the full picture instead of the existing glimpses of only the top-performing programming. The company pointed out that its existing Top 10 lists have a large degree of overlap with the full data, with 60% of the titles in the first-half study having made appearances in the Top 10 at some point.

“This is a big step forward for Netflix and our industry,” the company wrote in a blog post. “We believe the viewing information in this report — combined with our weekly Top 10 and Most Popular lists — will give creators and our industry deeper insights into our audiences, and what resonates with them.”

Hollywood guilds had long objected to the lack of transparency in streaming data and WGA and SAG-AFTRA both made the issue a key bargaining point in this year’s dual strikes. The oft-used metaphor was that the data was locked away in a “black box,” accessible mainly to the company looking to mine it for ways of increasing subscriber rolls and profitability. Netflix, which has volunteered significantly more information than any of its streaming peers, started publishing its weekly Top-10 lists in 2021. Its titles are also represented in Nielsen’s weekly snapshots.

The majority of viewing hours is Netflix original content.

The top-ranking title in the new report was The Night Agent, with 812.1 million hours of viewing. It was among several new series to chart, along with The Diplomat, Beef, The Glory, Alpha Males, FUBAR and Fake Profile. Familiar originals also fared well, among them Ginny & Georgia, Alice in Borderland, The Marked Heart, Outer Banks, You, Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story, XO Kitty and film sequels Murder Mystery 2 and Extraction 2.

Sarandos was asked about the significant percentage of viewing (45% of the total) accounted for by licensed fare in the report. The dominance of Suits in 2023 has become a major storyline for Netflix, with Sarandos declaring at a Wall Street conference last week that the rise of licensing opportunities as rivals pull back on originals is “the more natural state of the business.”

You could get the report from Netflix's blog.

https://about.netflix.com/en/news/wh...agement-report

This may be motivated by the WGA and SAG strikes pushing for compensation based on streaming success, as well as Netflix's confidence that their numbers are better than any other streaming service. It'll be interesting to see how Amazon Prime, Max, Disney+, Peacock, Paramount, Apple+ compare, or if we get enough information to make a judgement.

[exile001]

Wow, that's cool. I'll have a delve into this later.

[BeastieRunner]

I believe "hidden data" was something fought to be published across the board as part of the strikes.

[80sbaby]

I believe "hidden data" was something fought to be published across the board as part of the strikes.

Yeah, I was going to say this likely had to do with the strike terms.

[Mister Mets]

Yeah, I was going to say this likely had to do with the strike terms.

I think that's part of it.

Netflix seems to be dominating on various metrics, so it's a smart move to release this if Amazon Prime, Max, Apple+ and everyone else don't have comparable info.

Netflix seemed to face an existential threat recently.

There was a consensus that some of their decisions were costing them money, especially with ignoring theatrical releases (which are a revenue stream that helps to promote the project) and releasing new seasons all at once, which means the conversation on a hit show is shorter than if it was one episode a week.

Their stock was overvalued.

And there was an understanding that its IP was not on the level of Disney or Max, so that those streaming services might dominate.

Fortunately for Netflix, other companies paid way too much money for projects with mediocre receptions, leading to an argument that maybe it's best for companies like Paramount, NBC and HBO to get out of the streaming business and just collect paychecks from a company that can license their product and knows what they're doing.

So Netflix can share impressive numbers which surpass their competitors and point to the strength of their own IP, which is the majority of watched hours (this serves to reassure investors, and keep rivals from charging too much to license new movies and shows.)