Abstract
Netflix Nations is Ramon Lobato’s internet-era update to the scholarship on international televisual flows. Using Netflix as a rich case study, Lobato situates the study of streaming television in the fields of both television studies and digital media studies. He begins by acknowledging the scholarship on Netflix that has centred the continuities between the company and broadcast television, as well as new media theory perspectives that have focused on the intersection of digital media services and distribution. Lobato argues for a ‘both/and perspective’ that asks how studying Netflix can add to our understanding of the relationship between global television and internet distribution. Additionally, he notes Netflix often ‘performatively enacts its association’ (p. 43, his emphasis) with both traditional and new media forms depending on its audience. To avoid government censorship and content regulation in a number of different countries, the company has claimed to be a digital media service. At the same time in its marketing to consumers, Netflix has famously claimed to be the first global television service. Utilising critical discourse analysis, Lobato effectively challenges Netflix’s PR claims and further demonstrates how the company can be understood as an important case study for reassessing critical debates in global media studies, such as theories of cultural imperialism, localisation, and international infrastructural development inequalities.
Across six chapters and a conclusion, Lobato works through a number of distinct arguments. Like Mareike Jenner, in her recent book, Netflix & the Re-Invention of Television (2018), he establishes how the discourse of effortless global market entry promoted by Netflix in trade and popular press fails to take into account the specific reception of the streaming giant in various localities. Indeed, Lobato argues, ‘the idea of digital markets as borderless, “flat” spaces of exchange and consumption is misguided’ (p. 181). Micro-level analysis of Netflix’s international rollout in specific countries shows that audiences still skew local in their tastes, that the global can coexist with the local and that uniform international pricing strategies price out lower income consumers. In other words, by the conclusion, Lobato convincingly argues that there is no coherent Netflix effect at a global level and that it might be best to ‘see Netflix as a collection of national media services tied together in one platform rather than as a uniform global service’ (p. 184).
The first chapter lays out the argument for analysing Netflix through both television studies and digital media ontologies. Lobato emphasises that Netflix is a hybrid technology that remediates a range of elements from television, cinema, and new media forms. It should therefore be studied from a wide range of critical perspectives that can move fluidly between different ways of knowing. Chapter 2 seeks to the place the transnational character of Netflix and other internet-distributed television within larger historical debates over transnational televisual flows that first surfaced with the advent of satellite technology in the 1970s.
The next chapter is an engaging look at the ‘infrastructural optic’ (p. 74) of Netflix. Again, Lobato challenges the idea of Netflix as a singular entity but suggests that it is better understood as ‘an ecology of small, purpose-built systems that work together to produce the effect of a singular platform’ (p. 79). Only by bringing into focus the number and variety of infrastructures that the company relies on, can one thoroughly place Netflix into larger discussions of the digital divide and net neutrality debates. This can also require scholars to take a significant look at how geographies shape impact. Lobato draws attention to how Netflix relies on unevenly geographically distributed layers of infrastructure that favour markets where Netflix has a strong market presence and growth potential. The company’s potential to be a global television network is thus finite in the sense that it has so far invested little in infrastructure in several countries where it is officially available.
Chapters 4 and 5 then offer specific case studies of Netflix’s presence in key Asian markets, as well as an analysis of the company’s global–local programming ratio that further complicate the notion of Netflix as a global entity. Putting himself in conversation with top scholars in the field of global television studies, including Jean Chalaby (2005) and Joseph Straubhaar (2007), Lobato argues that, like transnational satellite channels before it, Netflix must contend with the locality of taste that has limited its reach in many countries. Intriguingly, the company has used ‘long-distance localization’ (p. 116) that relies on algorithms and engineering, rather than having executives abroad, to try and address the logistics of launching in new markets. In terms of catalogue content, Lobato points out that for Netflix, the definition of ‘local’ versus ‘Hollywood’ or ‘international’ content remains purposefully vague. In any given market, both original titles and licensed content skew heavily towards U.S. productions (p. 136). However, rather than rehash cries of cultural imperialism and one-way flow theory, he advocates a model that considers Netflix in the context of particular markets. In other words, he encourages researchers to ask how Netflix fits into a local audience’s viewing ecosystem.
Finally, chapter 6 focuses on what Lobato calls the ‘proxy wars’ or how users across the globe have used UPNs and proxy services to work around availability restrictions. He historicizes Netflix’s policies on VPN use beginning with the company’s tolerant stance towards proxy workarounds in 2010 and ending with their commitment to geo-blocking as a principle in 2016. He posits that, as Netflix began to invest heavily in original content, copyright likewise became increasingly important to them. Consequently, geo-blocking has reminded users that the service is a territorial catalogue system and there is no borderless Netflix.
Lobato mentions in the preface that his study does not cover Netflix’s original programming strategy. While Netflix Nations covers a lot of ground that is often missed in both popular and academic discussions of Netflix, there are moments, particularly in his case studies on the streaming giant’s presence in Asia and Europe, where his arguments could have been solidified by further analysis of the company’s original programming operations in the region. Yet, Netflix Nations remains an essential read for television, new media, and technology studies scholars. Lobato offers a distinct framework for studying internet television distribution, as well as a compelling reminder that local dynamics of culture, consumption, and taste remain crucial to any inquiry into contemporary global flows of television and new media.