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A comment on If Everyone Else is Such an Idiot, How Come You're Not Rich?. Parent comment

Re:If Everyone Else is Such an Idiot, How Come You're Not Rich? by BrokerChange on Friday December 02, 2011 @07:02PM (#3306325)
I think you're missing my point. Netflix taking out BlockBuster does not prove they can do no wrong, merely that Reed Hastings a perfectly capable CEO, and smarter than the media would have you believe.

If you read about the history of the company, they started by SELLING DVD's. They barely made any money renting them. But, Reed Hastings made the decision to split that company because it wasn't the future. His 10,000 customers complained but he stuck to his guns. And look at them now. The largest streaming company in the world.

He was placed in the same situation this past year. Stick to a business model with no future (DVD's-a dying medium), or split the company to improve negotiating terms for streaming deals(the future) and hopefully sell off "Quickster." It was a brilliant plan that poised Netflix for the next generation of digital distribution.

Instead they backed down and changed direction, looking weak in the process.

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Re:If Everyone Else is Such an Idiot, How Come You're Not Rich? by neutronicus on Friday December 02, 2011 @08:14PM (#3306543)
"Quickster" was also an absolutely terrible name. Orders of magnitude worse than "Netflix" which communicates perfectly what that company does.
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Re:If Everyone Else is Such an Idiot, How Come You're Not Rich? by sukuriant on Friday December 02, 2011 @10:25PM (#3306796)
Netflix was not originally an internet streaming company, that came later. I'm not sure I could call Netflix a "perfect communication of what the company does", given the name came around when the internet was only used to select your next mail-received movie.
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Re:If Everyone Else is Such an Idiot, How Come You're Not Rich? by learc83 on Friday December 02, 2011 @11:23PM (#3306905)
From what I've read his goal was always to start a streaming movie company. He just did the DVDs by mail thing while he waited for technology to catch up.
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Re:If Everyone Else is Such an Idiot, How Come You're Not Rich? by sukuriant on Saturday December 03, 2011 @01:21AM (#3307089)
Really? Truly fascinating that he had that foresight, then.
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