Netflix to Stream 4K Content In a 'Year or Two' > Won't be a market for it

reply to Kamus

Re: Won't be a market for it

3D isn't the driver of HDTV demand. People buy that LG set because it is 55 inches for 800 bucks. If 3D was the demand driver you would see WAY more 3D content. 3D was all hype and ooh and ahh, but it is a failure in the marketplace. The market simply doesn't care about 3D.

HDTVs are cheap because they are produced in very high volume and it took nearly 20 years of HDTV sales to get to this place.

There are always exceptions. There will be 3 people who buy 4K now just as you are an exception that replaces a working TV. But the market in general doesn't replace near new working appliances and to get 4K anywhere near as cheap as current HDTV's you would need that to happen.

4K will always be more expensive than 1080P just as 1080P is more expensive than 720P sets.

That isn't to say 4K won't eventually be popular...it just won't happen any time in the near future. It will be years and years and years away.

4k will be as much a 'niche' as the ipad retina. As long as the networks keep a decent bitrate (they won't), or at least one, and as long as bluray looks amazing it will take off. Maybe slowly at first but it will.

That is fine if a 4K TV were as cheap as an iPad. Point one out to me that is and I'll buy one. I was eyeballing a 4K TV and it was 5X the price of the previous poster's new LG.

The market will ignore 4K just as it ignored 3D and D-VHS.

reply to hitachi369

reply to skeechan
The assumption that Netflix can't do 4K until everybody has a 4K TV is flawed. This is true perhaps for optical, where putting out a 4k bluray would be pointless if not enough people had he hardware to play it (and so buy it), but as a streaming platform that doesn't apply to Netflix. It will already automatically scale to the best bitrate and resolution supported by the target platform, and the same will happen here. Super HD didn't mean that users with 5 meg DSL couldn't keep watching stuff in HD, it just meant they didn't get any benefit out of it.

The absence of that hardware barrier is key. If the cost of 4K content isn't too high for Netflix, they avoid the whole chicken and egg problem.
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Developer: Tomato/MLPPP, Linux/MLPPP, etc »fixppp.org

Oh sure they can...it's just no one will use it. They'll pay licensing for content no one is interested in.

4K is simply not compelling enough for people to give up their current sets. Netflix may very well do it, just as TV makers advertise 3D all over the place, but 4K won't be a demand driver for Netflix just as 3D isn't a demand driver for HDTVs (price and size are).

From a marketing perspective, no one is going to sign up for Netflix to get 4K, not enough to make the effort worth it anyway. Why? Those people will already be a subscribers whether 4K is there or not.

reply to skeechan
Well,I'm looking for 4K capability in my upcoming sets.( In the market for 2) so...at least capability to do Ultra.They're even working on 8K.
Japan will start broadcasting in 4K next year.

reply to skeechan