Movie Industry News: Netflix Research vs MoviePass Experiment

MoviePass sounded too good to be true — maybe because it was.

The monthly subscription fee of $9.95 that allows users to see one movie per day isn’t doing so well — which is curious, considering the average theatre ticket price in North America costs $9.16. So is it just that it was too good to be true? It’s looking like it. The cost of the service is not being covered by the ticket sales, and Wall Street short sellers are so skeptical of the business model, they’re now hoping to cash in by betting that the company’s stock price will fall.

In the world of Video On Demand, Netflix has launched a website entirely dedicated to sharing with the world information on their VOD marketing strategy. It gives details of their research methods, algorithms, data analysis, and more ways that allow them to supply unique content to each user. This is an interesting choice from the streaming giant, whose only real competition comes from YouTube (Amazon Prime and Hulu don’t even come close). What are their intentions with sharing so much of their TV show & movie marketing plans with the industry?