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this is a really good piece by @BilgeEbiri, though i would challenge film/TV reporters to begin thinking about the lack of transparency from streamers a bit differently https://www.vulture.com/2020/07/the-rise-of-the-netflix-hit.html
the trouble here is that we on the journalism side of things still tend to conceive of ourselves as consumers in a sense, but box office numbers or Nielsen ratings were never really meant for us. they’re for honesty between business partners.
a studio can’t, in theory, fudge its numbers too badly because there are exhibitors to consider, and contracts with talent and crew, etc. and you might think that’s their business, but then you remember that entertainment is a huge, multi-billion dollar industry.
what the streamers upend is not just a mode of delivery or a way for TV writers to know what’s actually popular. rather, they are creating monopolistic enterprises with which to extract more money from consumers while aiming to pay artists and crew less overall.
that’s a serious problem, and one deserving of at least being properly exposed if not actually corrected. it’s incumbent on journalists to try to pull back the curtain on what these companies are doing. because they’re still companies and must be held accountable.
for all the reports about Quibi and it’s failings, for example, where was the serious investigation into claims that it operated as a scam to get around guild rules for proper compensation of creators? seems far more important than whether Meg Whitman likes TV.
i guess my point is, i don’t actually care whether Extraction was a hit for Netflix, but i do care whether their execs and investors are laughing all the way to the bank while loading up billions in debt and fucking over workers in the long term.