Streaming was supposed to free television.
No schedules. No missed episodes. No VHS tapes with the ending accidentally recorded over by Coronation Street. Just an endless library of stories waiting whenever you wanted them.
For a while, it felt like liberation.
But once television became something delivered through a pipe, the pipe became more valuable than the programmes moving through it. Netflix went from DVD-by-mail upstart to data-driven studio. Disney built its own digital fortress. Every media company wanted its own kingdom. And somewhere along the way, abundance became fragmentation, discovery became algorithmic fog, and shows could vanish from platforms that once promised permanence.
In this episode of Geekstorians, Dave traces the rise of streaming from the red envelopes of early Netflix to the platform wars, Quibi’s spectacular faceplant, the cancellation machine, the return of advertising, password crackdowns, and the strange new bargain between viewers and the companies competing for their attention.
Because more than you could ever watch is not the same thing as abundance.
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