On January 6th, during the Citi 2016 Internet, Media & Telecommunications Conference, Netflix CFO David Wells opened the possibility for Netflix to accept Bitcoin payments.
Netflix already accepts payments in some local currencies, for example in India, Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, Vietnam, Thailand, Singapore, Taiwan and Hong Kong, because governments there impose restrictions that restrain the adoption of credit cards for international transactions.
Netflix vs. Competitors
This could be a good reason for Netflix to adopt bitcoin all around the world; and keep in step with and beat competitors such as Dish Network and Lionsgate that already accept bitcoin.
On May 2014 Dish Network, a domestic U.S. pay-TV provider, announced the acceptance of bitcoin on their platform.
“DISH delivers choice and convenience to our customers with our award winning technology, and we think that innovative approach should be matched in how our customers can pay their bill. Embracing technology also means having a meaningful relationship with tech-enthusiasts, and accepting bitcoin certainly helps us connect with a forward-thinking consumer”, said a Dish spokesperson.
And Dish Network works toghether with Coinbase to provide this service: “Our partnership with Coinbase made Bitcoin’s introduction easy for us to implement. Because of this simplicity, we saw Bitcoin as a way to continue delivering high-quality customer service to a segment of our customers and potential customers”, she continues, “Customers can pay on mydish.com, DISH’s online personal account portal, or right from their Hopper Whole-Home HD DVR. They simply choose to pay with bitcoin for a one-time payment. While we’ve selected Coinbase as our payment processor for bitcoin transactions, customers can use the bitcoin wallet of their choice”.
SiamoSoci CEO and BlockchainLab member Dario Giudici commented:
"I think bitcoin and the blockchain represent the largest digital revolution after the Internet. The revolution is not only the digital money, but also the technology behind because it has a significant impact in many areas of our daily life, including the movie industry. If you think about it, our life is a continuous transaction: payments, contracts, etc. The blockchain allows a seal of authenticity on transactions. And this is the reason why, for example, it can solve the problem of movie piracy”.
About movie piracy we have to quote Custos, a new startup that is trying to stop this big problem through an interesting system of reward and bounties.
Blockchain applications in the movie industry
As we know, Bitcoin technology has a lot of applications in many areas, including the movie industry.
For example, a similar service to Netflix is provided by Streamium that links video streamers and viewers. It is a peer-to-peer (P2P) video streaming service with payments in bitcoin.
“Streamium is quite different from Netflix in that it is built for live streaming and live payments in a p2p fashion. Netflix, who recently announced that their service was now available in 186 countries, has the infrastructure necessary to accept payment all around the world, so Bitcoin is not of as much use to them in the sense of cross-border payments, as it might be for a smaller service. However, it might help reach customers who do not have bank accounts or credit cards, in its function as "internet cash". In the first world it's easy to forget that the vast majority of people on Earth don't have access to the same financial tools we take for granted. As for actually implementing Bitcoin for payments, it’s almost trivial, especially for a company with the engineering talent that Netflix has. Accepting Bitcoin has its particular quirks and challenges (one of which is accounting), but it is far from difficult or expensive to implement. Also, fraudulent payments/chargebacks are non-existent, so some costs are even reduced”, comments Streamium co-founder Alex Batalles.