Chill, it’s only Netflix
Anurag Chakraborty
Just like McDonalds in the 1990s, Starbucks in 2012, and Amazon in 2013, the advent of Netflix in India has thrown up a strange conundrum. Prima facie, as we Indians love to say, it was an occasion for jubilation. The sentiment? Yes! We are truly part of the new age, second-millennium-second-decade internet. The American video-on-demand giant has finally considered India worthy enough to grace us with its presence! And, as long-delayed 4G LTE connectivity lumbers into our lives, we will finally get to…oh wait, we had video streaming in India for years now.
Just as the realisation had dawned after the initial gulp of excitement that we have had Nirulas, Café Coffee Day and Flipkart all this while, way before their flashier American cousins decided to waltz in, it takes little time to fathom that from Hotstar to Spuul, Hooq to Muvizz and Eros Now to Ditto TV, we haven’t exactly been gasping for video-streaming services. But the next level of that same train of thought takes us to the stage where we realise that though we have almost always had enterprising, indigenous first-movers, the neatest stuff and all the firecrackers really follow after the Americans walk in.
That will change, one day, our ambassadors of ‘Stand Up India, Start-Up India’ tell us but prophetical conjectures aside, yes Netflix, we are really happy to have you here. And though the Netflix catalogue here is substantially smaller than the US one (between 7 and 13 per cent, early, unverified estimates show), it’s still a great thing. Why? Because now that Netflix is here, we expect the company that is really good at what it does in the US will not exactly be interested in slouching on the couch waiting for someone else to take the lead. Even if it does not lead from the front, it will definitely push our homegrown offerings to get their act together in sprucing up their affairs.
And the first signs of that are already there. Just days after the Netflix launch, satellite TV operator Tata Sky announced that its Everywhere TV service was now free. Everywhere TV, as the name suggests, lets Tata Sky subscribers stream live TV channels and even video on demand (get used to hearing more about VoD, by the way) on smartphones and computers. Just download the app, activate the services and start streaming. The service will work on up to two devices per subscription.
For non-Tata Sky subscribers (and those who are but refuse to watch it to protest against Aamir Khan), there are quite a few options. From good ol’ YouTube, which has been steadily ramping up its movie and TV show catalogue with even paid content to any of those already here, perfectly fine but sporadically clunky desi options we mentioned.
In the days to come, as we inch at a painstakingly slow but sure pace towards all-round internet penetration with non-frustrating speeds we are likely to see a few more indigenous players jump in the game. YouTube Red, the subscription-based service that provides advertising-free streaming of videos hosted by the service, offline and background playback of videos on mobile devices, access to new original content, and access to advertising-free music streaming is one. Hulu, the main Netflix competitor, is another.
For millennials, who have never owned a TV set-up by themselves, there definitely seems to be more sense in paying for one pipeline — a really fast internet pipeline — and then choosing what to watch and when to watch. As devices like Chromecast and Teewe get more ubiquitous, it’s going to liberate your TV from the whims and fancies of satellite dishes and middlemen and let directly control what you consume. You know, how we only Uber (or Ola) for cabs now? We shall Netflix (or whatever) to be entertained.
On a different note though, India is just one of the 130 other new countries that Netflix has forayed into. So that’s 130 more countries where the American dating phenomena (cough, cough) of ‘Netflix and Chill’ is now available. That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind. Though, you know, procreation.
