Gyroscopic Investing

Anyone else watch "House of Cards" on Netflix, starring Kevin Spacey?

Pretty darn good. 

Don't forget the original!  http://movies.netflix.com/WiMovie/House ... C/70200744

Adam.

Yes - I watched all 12 episodes in Season 1.  Thought it was very well done.  I understand that they have begun production on Season 2 so we will need to keep an eye out for when it will be released.

Xan - didn't realize that there was an "original" House of Cards.  I'll need to take a look at it.  Thanks for the heads up.

Heh.  Thought it was another thread about the economy.

Love that show.

Saw most of the British version years ago. I remembering telling people it was only a matter of time until it made its way over here. DC is just way too target rich of an environment.

moda0306 wrote: Love that show.

Yeah...I watched the first few episodes and thought it was a pretty good political thriller-type show, but it just kept getting better and better.  Can't wait for season 2.

Hasn't exactly hurt Netflix's stock price either.



I hope they keep coming up with good original content like this.

AdamA wrote:I hope they keep coming up with good original content like this.

Now there I have to disagree...  I hate the idea of these streaming video providers producing their own content.  Vertical monopolies in this kind of thing would be dreadful.  Imagine if CBS, NBC, and ABC each had their own streaming service, and you had to subscribe to each one separately in order to see your three favorite shows?

Xan wrote: Imagine if CBS, NBC, and ABC each had their own streaming service, and you had to subscribe to each one separately in order to see your three favorite shows?

If they made shows as good as House of Cards, I wouldn't mind paying $9.00 a month to stream them, especially if I could do so on a Roku or X-box.

It's better than paying Time Warner $70.00 a month to watch NBC, CBS or ABC.

AdamA wrote:

Xan wrote: Imagine if CBS, NBC, and ABC each had their own streaming service, and you had to subscribe to each one separately in order to see your three favorite shows?

If they made shows as good as House of Cards, I wouldn't mind paying $9.00 a month to stream them, especially if I could do so on a Roku or X-box.

It's better than paying Time Warner $70.00 a month to watch NBC, CBS or ABC.

It's true that high-quality original streaming content for a relatively low monthly fee is a vast improvement on the cable/satellite TV business model. However, I agree with Xan that it would be inconvenient and clunky to have a separate subscription for almost every show one likes to watch. In that sense, the cable/satellite TV business model got one thing right that the streaming services have yet to offer: All content aggregated into a single, unified, user-friendly menu, paid for with a single monthly bill.

With recent offerings like House of Cards and the new season of Arrested Development, it seems like Netflix has capitulated and is moving away from its original lofty goal for its streaming services ("Watch all your favorite shows and movies, anytime!") and more toward the existing HBO/Showtime model ("Watch our original content, anytime!"). This, of course, is largely the fault of the major studios being unwilling to strike a deal with Netflix streaming for a reasonable price.

It annoys me that at least 90% of what I want to watch still isn't available for streaming on Netflix, Hulu, or other similar services. So I still have to watch most of my stuff via disc through Netflix. Having these plastic discs physically mailed to me, each with a 3-day turnaround time, seems humorously archaic to me in this age of ubiquitous high-speed Internet connectivity.

Tortoise wrote: Having these plastic discs physically mailed to me, each with a 3-day turnaround time, seems humorously archaic to me in this age of ubiquitous high-speed Internet connectivity.

I feel the same way, but it's amazing how fast Netflix' disc service went from feeling like amazing and modern to archaic. It only took a few years.

That reminds me of Dilbert author Scott Adams' comment around the time that a new technology called "E-Mail was getting popular in the 90s. I can't remember the exact words, but he said that something like putting a stamp on an envelope and bringing it out to the mailbox felt like clubbing a wooly mammoth and dragging the meat home.

I still get discs by mail because I can't bear it when a stream suddenly pauses and I have to wonder when it's going to resume.

Xan wrote:Imagine if CBS, NBC, and ABC each had their own streaming service, and you had to subscribe to each one separately in order to see your three favorite shows?

But that is the way it used to be!  You could watch CBS, NBC, and ABC, but you would have to suffer through the commercials on each, paying for the streaming service.

Fred Flintstone and Barney Rubble used to push Winston Cigarettes, The Beverly Hillbillies were inordinately fond of "the cereal from Kellogg's, Kellogg's of Battle Creek"!  K-E-Double L-O-Double-Good Kellogg's best to you!

I welcome the opportunity to pay