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We’re witnessing the globalization of television.

When all is said and done there’s going to be a few players left and they’re all going to be American by the current looks of things. You could argue movies were already like this, but for television that’s quite the change as most countries had many television production companies and stations.

Now it seems like they’ll be a few global media companies and maybe some local production houses that have to sell their stuff to these guys or setup their own services like the BBC does with iPlayer in the UK, with somewhat limited success compared to these giants.


They won't be American. The balance of power has already shifted east. There are now more productions, more money and more facilities east of Madrid than west of it.


Look I get how Ne Zha 2 was a big success and showed signs of good production quality, but lets be honest: The movie was boring. I'm sure the mostly Chinese audience that sat with me in the theater enjoyed it but I fell asleep halfway in.

The "east" has more work to do to capture that magic that the western imperial order (Hollywood) has wrought upon the world.

I will continue to watch and observe how things play out.


So the companies in charge of distributing the content are American-based multinationals; production leaks out of the US toward prettier places and more amicable laborers; if you’re American and want to tag along—in or behind the scenes—you’re going to need a passport or a visa.

Or something like that?


> The balance of power has already shifted east. There are now more productions, more money and more facilities east of Madrid than west of it.

This is wild fantasy.

the global power centers of TV distribution, monetization, and intellectual property ownership remain overwhelmingly American.


You might be referring to the remnants of broadcast television. I'm referring to the screen-based productions capturing the eyeballs of tomorrow.

One serious strand of America's whip of many thongs is the inability or refusal to acknowledge the rise in power and influence elsewhere.

As Gandalf - the last remaining talkshow host - gets pulled off the bridge into the abyss, he looks up to see a motley brigade of multi-cultural hobbits dashing for the surface with their wits and wallets thankfully intact.

Please excuse my excruciating reimagining of your wild fantasy metaphor.


American companies control:

* The largest global streaming platforms (Netflix/HBO/Max, Disney+, Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV+)

* The largest content libraries by revenue

* The most extensive international distribution networks

* The vast majority of high-budget scripted shows (budgets > $5M/episode)

* The highest global licensing revenue streams

* The most valuable franchises (DC, Marvel, Star Wars, Harry Potter, LOTR rights distribution through Amazon, etc.)

No European or Asian company has anything close to this global reach.


This a highly focussed western lens but is not representative of global media culture and business.

If you completely discount Tencent Video, iQIYI, Youku, Bilibili, Kuaishou and so on in this outlook then that is the whip of many thongs in action.

I realise some of these platforms operate behind a wall you can't see over but don't think for a minute that wall isn't coming down.


The things China does strictly within the walls of its own insular society is a very far cry from representative of "global media culture and business".

It is very much dominated by American media companies at every level. Funding, development, production, distribution.


Its nothing to do with the wall they are behind, the market and companies are just smaller.

For example, Tencent Video ranks 4th largest streamer in the world by subscribers after Amazon, Netflix, and Disney+. All American companies.

Your argument doesnt really seem to hold water.


Something doesn't happen until it happens. And even when it happens, it might fail.

So far China hasn't broken down many walls, for example I'm fairly sure they can't do what TSMC does.

And for media... guess what, they need to open a lot of things up. There's a lot more freedom of speech in the US, so US media can be about a lot of things interesting to the rest of the world. The US even has a lot media catering to other countries (for example media targetting Chinese audiences).

I mean, China could try that, we have the examples of Japanese and South Korean media, but both of those are democratic, and even then, it took them a long time to develop. Plus neither of them are near the levels of influence US media has.


I haven't heard of any of them, which I am open to being because of my own ignorance. Can you give some examples?


Ne Zha 2 comes to mind. One of the largest box offices ever and it came out this year. In my opinion: Good attempt but I dont see them supplanting Western media yet.

Here is some history: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W2J0pRJSToU


Why on earth would Madrid be the dividing line between east and west?


Because really we can split into three or more. US on one side, EU, middle and far east on the other.

East of Madrid is booming, West is in decline.

More accurately the line should be in Lagos but many are more familiar with EU film production centres.


> Because really we can split into three or more. US on one side, EU, middle and far east on the other. East of Madrid is booming, West is in decline.

But the EU is "the west". Europe is where "the West" started. It's bizarre you would group EU with the middle east and far east rather than with the US.

Your comments make no sense. India, China, Nigeria, etc may have their own film productions, but they all watch american films. But that's not true of indian, chinese, nigerian films which are consumed locally. Beyond film production, what is india, china or nigeria's equivalent to netflix or hulu or amazon prime?


China has its own movie industry that is highly isolated from the US one. Just look at the most successful movies and shows in China the past few years


Wholeheartedly agreed. I used to work very closely with economists in asset management. What looks like efficiency on a spreadsheet can look very different on the ground.


I think the issue is horizontal vs. vertical monopolies. Apple do have a monopoly, but it's vertically integrated one. That's arguably their unique selling point; tightly integrated products without a great deal of customization.

Google on the other hand have a monolithic market share in a number of key markets. There's really no competition to them in search or video for instance, whereby they command extremely dominant market share.

Apple on the other hand do not dominate any markets, they just have a locked down product. Pretty similar to luxury cars, Nintendo, and other companies that think their customers value the integration over an open ecosystem.


I've been told in the past that the Japanese government would never let a national icon such as Nintendo be acquired by a foreign firm. I personally am not qualified to answer that though.

With that said I completely see where you're coming from and think that their games in particular match a lot of the ethos of Apple's own products. I do wonder if the internal cultures are vastly different though? The Bay and Japan have very different approaches to problem solving and business in general.


Yeah, I can see that getting stuck on ideology.

It just feels to me Nintendo doesn't have many options. Other than the IP, people would rather use the Steam Deck over the Switch. This was also a similar hardware story for non-mobile consoles.

Meanwhile, both the Switch and Deck are roughly an iPad with dedicated controllers. And the future is VR, but Nintendo is struggling with frame-rates even on the Switch.

I can see Apple making a deal with Nintendo, to build its next console as a peripheral on-top-of the iPad / visionOS. All the power of Apple Silicon and all of the inspiration of Nintendo IP.


With Nintendo Switch currently at 130 million sales compared to 3 million for the Steam Deck, I’m not sure Nintendo has much to worry about. Admittedly, the Steam Deck has been out for much less time, but it also went through a big hype cycle at launch. The Switch is lighter and thinner, has more battery life, is less expensive, and to a significant extent is targeting a different audience. In 2023 it’s long in the tooth, but supposedly it will be replaced next year. As for the iPad, well, the Switch has been competing with it for its whole lifetime and has succeeded anyway. If nothing else, the iPad is much more expensive than the Switch - never mind the Vision Pro’s price!


> Other than the IP, people would rather use the Steam Deck over the Switch.

This is very tech people loop take. Targeted people just want to play games.


Not only doesn't Nintendo have to worry about the SteamDeck sales, the competion in ramping up with devices from Asus, Lenovo and others, all running Windows proper instead of emulating it.


Nintendo is a massively successful company that is still somehow selling tons of Switches even though it's an ancient device.

They're not going anywhere, nobody's going to buy them.


I walk my dog two hours a day.

I just work around my meetings (sometimes can take the meeting whilst walking) and ensure I still work 5-8hrs on tasks.

Is your gripe that you think she should be glued to her desk 9-5?

I don’t know what her role is, but as a software engineer I can’t say I’d ever be interested in a job where someone wanted to micromanage me like that. As long as the work gets done why care?


I'd be willing to bet that the problem is the work isn't getting done. I've seen this many times now. No one is going to care how much you time you spend walking your dog if you're getting your work done - you only draw attention to yourself when you're lacking, and then your manager starts looking for reasons, sees you work 20% less than expected, and then what would you say? You'd call them on the carpet, too. I'd give them a part time job since that's what they seem to be capable of.

I've religiously filled out time-sheets, in various forms) for 30 years, and I don't think they have been looked at more than a few times by my managers since my work gets done, and more. But I know for damn sure the laggards get scrutinized.


I worked for this NHS trust about 15 years ago as my first job after university.

One thing not mentioned here is how poorly run the administration is. Getting a process changed was an absolute nightmare and the place had very high levels of nepotism. Most managers had kids that worked there too for instance.

I ended up leaving after a couple of years and after working in finance and tech, I’ve never seen anything quite as poorly run.

Hopefully large scale reform, particularly on the hospital administration level will occur. For the sake of my friends and family still in the Romford area.


Had the exact same experience. I actually got the role, but the feedback provided asked why I didn't build out something fully featured, despite them stressing to me the importance of doing it within 4 hours.

The worst part was that after working there I found them to be terribly unproductive and it would have likely taken a team there a week to build what they were suggesting...

But yeah as you said, either ignore the time constraints if you really want the role or just politely decline due to the red flag / inconsiderate nature.


It’s self reinforcing. Other people spent more than 4 hours on it and lied, so their expectation of what can be achieved in 4 hours is warped. It’s really just a way of selecting for liars, although that goes for most interview tactics.


well, obviously you failed their test but you were the best option they had.


Deep sea submersibles such as the Alvin.


I’d strongly urge you to watch an interview with him or one of the many documentaries he’s been a part of.

Personally I think he knew the outcome earlier this week and waited to speak to the media out of respect for the families. His first interview was hours after the implosion announcement.

As he says, it’s a very tight knit community in which he is a part of and has been for almost 30 years. I think he’s trying to use his voice to ensure that collateral damage does not occur to other less reckless submersible makers, who in turn tried to warn OceanGate.


> waited to speak to the media

I saw him saying it was an implosion several days ago. I think the media just didn't follow up with him until there was more hard evidence.


Ah that’s interesting!

I was surprised when he told ABC that he had heard they were trying to resurface and that they were probably aware that the hull was failing due to the alarm system the Titan was equipped with.


I know a lot of people that will only use HN for that post alone. Don’t know if you’ll get a true representation here.


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