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Comment by Fnoord | Hacker News Reader

Its not as if Netflix is the creme de la creme of cinema. Netflix already sucks outside the US. Outside the US, there's far less content, and there is either way a lot of filler content anyway.

What is going to happen is that Netflix will get the rights to stream (hopefully quality) local movies and series. That's gonna differ per country in EU. For example, some movies get broadcasted once or twice on public TV and that's it. Youth however mainly or even only stream. So they can get to see the movies they paid for (via tax) but via Netflix now, and Netflix can acquire them [reasonably] cheap. Everyone wins.

Right now, there's a bunch of quality EU series on Netflix already such as Casa De Papel and Dark.

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I always find it weird when folks say Netflix sucks outside the US. Much of the library in the US feels like a mish-mash of old television and b-grade movies. When I'm in the UK, I have access to new episodes of television. Shows that you have to pay for on a per-episode, or per-studio basis in the US (Star Trek Discovery; The Good Place) were available in the UK on Netflix just after they aired in the US.

I felt like Netflix was amazing the first few years I had it - first with mail-in DVD service and then the early days of streaming. Once content rightsholders got wise to the idea that they have something to negotiate for, and Netflix shifted to producing their own content, it seems like what I liked about Netflix (large catalog of sometimes obscure movies) mostly vanished. I cancelled my subscription.

The Good Place is just an NBC show in the US.

Right -- and Star Trek Discovery is just a CBS show in the US. When either show airs in the US, the new episodes are available immediately on Netflix in the UK.

If I want to watch them in the US, I either have to pay per-episode/season on Google/Amazon/iTunes. CBS offers access to their entire library, but at $10/mo, it's more than a Netflix subscription.

My point is just that comments about the Netflix library being better in the US vs elsewhere holds true less and less every day.

Actually, Star Trek Discovery does not air on CBS in the US. It is exclusive to their streaming program.

Lack of quality streaming content in US is compensated by the huge DVD catalog though.

Something to think about, if Netflix comes in with their brand recognition and cash and buys the digital rights (more money for exclusive rights of course) to the local movies, this regulation basically locks up the market for them. As long as they have the bigger user base, they can pay more for any new local content, and effectively shut down any competitors. Amazon Prime might not be able to compete, forget about Hulu or whatever. So instead of a few big American companies and some local start ups in the market, you get just one big American company.

> Right now, there's a bunch of quality EU series on Netflix already such as Casa De Papel and Dark.

Just wanna add to this. Babylon Berlin is also shockingly great. Wish Netflix could introduce more series like this to the US market.

Not available for me at Netflix in The Netherlands. And I believe you right away. Everything Tom Tykwer had a hand in which I've seen was ace.

A lot of the removed U.S. content, is usually accessible in other countries (and vice-versa in some cases). I find more blockbuster movies when I am in Europe can be accessed via Netflix than in the U.S. (e.g. Black Hawk Down, House, Brooklyn 99, Lethal Weapon, Mad Max, Star Wars VII etc). There are a couple of search engines specific to find the right region.

Netflix from my understanding can pay less upfront for rights to well known movies outside the U.S. (https://flixed.io/newest-best-netflix-movies/).

The problem with Netflix from a non-U.S. region viewer is its lackluster offering of native language movies.

> Netflix can acquire them [reasonably] cheap

Why would the seller sell cheap, knowing that the buyer is forced by law to buy?

The law cannot force Netflix to not buy the cheapest content offered in a country if the quality is irrelevant. All these countries have their own Hollywoods that takes all the money, and tons of small productions and artists living in poverty; there will always be someone to offer dirt cheap content needed to fill the quota. And Netflix can always make its own local production company, produce some crappy reality TV program and generate as much local content as they want.

It's a problem with TV or cinema, since there is limited space and time on it, but with streaming, Netflix can just put it in the catalog and let everyone not click on it...

Not every place would bother making tons of money off of them because they'd rather have the programming out there. I'm going to guess many weren't making money anyway, since they were only shown once or twice on broadcast television. And overall, some of it might be a bonus for the production of new stuff.

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