​It was not Netflix‘s year to win big at the Primetime Emmy Awards, but the streaming video service’s influence on the media landscape still loomed large over Sunday night’s telecast.

Many pundits thought the Netflix drama “House of Cards” would take home the Primetime Emmy Awards’ Best Drama prize Sunday night, but that honor went to AMC‘s “Breaking Bad.” But even then, Netflix’s impact on the success of “Breaking Bad” was acknowledged by the show’s creator Vince Gilligan, who credited the company for keeping his series on the air thanks to the opportunities it gave viewers to catch up on past episodes they may have otherwise missed.

Tellingly, “Breaking Bad’s” second-to-last episode on AMC netted a whopping 7 million viewers Sunday night despite playing opposite to the Emmys, and the most-watched program on Netflix that same night was the “Breaking Bad” pilot. That phenomenon highlights the new digital television ecosystem’s way of both helping and hurting traditional broadcast. While streaming services like Netflix, along with Amazon, Hulu and others, can help promote network shows, those same companies are increasingly becoming competitors as well, pulling in top-dollar Hollywood producers, directors and writers for their own original programs. At the same time, streaming services have become huge revenue opportunities for broadcasters, as evidenced by Amazon’s recent purchase of rerun rights to CBS’ “Under the Dome” before that series had aired a single episode.

Read more on this story at The Los Angeles Times.

Brief Take: The relationship between new and traditional modes of TV consumption is complicated, and getting more so every day. As David Nevins, Showtime Networks’ president of entertainment, told The Los Angeles Times, “The only conclusion that you could draw from the Emmy awards is there is really good television coming from a lot of different places.”

Tags:


  Save as PDF