Netflix will show generative AI ads midway through streams in 2026

I'm all for services making a reasonable profit and being able to fund new shows and such endeavors...

But we're rapidly getting into an environment of "soaking viewers for all we can get out of them" simply to feed the fucking shareholders ever larger payouts.

Thank you Milton Friedman. 🖕

🙄 🤡 🖕

There's a word for that: enshittification
- the word is actually “capitalism.” it’s baked into its dna.
- Or sinisterization.
  There was a lot of pioneering in the 70's. The first home computers, the first video games, the first mobile phones, all right there in the late 70's. Most people ended the 70's living like they did in the 60's but now there's cool shit like the Speak n' Spell. The average American home in 1979 had no microwave oven, a landline telephone and a TV that might have even been color. There were some nerds who had TRS-80s, some of them even had a modem so they could 300 baud each other. Normies saw none of this.
  There was a lot of invention in the 80's. Home computer systems, video games etc. as we now commonly know them crystalized in the 80's. We emerged from the 80's with Nintendo as the dominant video game console platform, Motorola as basically the only name in cellular telephones and with x86 PCs running Microsoft operating systems as the dominant computing platform with Apple in a distant but solid second place. Video games were common, home computers weren't that out there, people still had land lines, and maybe cable TV or especially if you were out in the sticks you might have one of those giant satellite dishes. If you were a bit of an enthusiast you might have a modem to dial BBSes and that kind of stuff, but basically no one has an email address.
  There was a lot of evolution in the 90's. With the possible exception of the world wide web which was switched on in August of '91, there weren't a lot of changes to how computing worked throughout the decade. Compare an IBM PS/2 from 1989 with a Compaq Presario from 1999. 3 1/4" floppy disk, CRT monitor attached via VGA, serial and parallel ports, keyboard and mouse attached via PS2 ports, Intel architecture with Microsoft operating system...it's the same machine 10 years later. The newer machine runs orders of magnitude faster, has orders of magnitude more RAM etc. but it still broadly speaking fills the same role in the user's life. An N64 is exactly what you'd expect the NES to look like after a decade. Cell phones have gotten sleeker and more available but it's still mostly a telephone that places telephone calls, it's the same machine Michael Douglas had in that one movie but now no longer a 2 pound brick. Bring a tech savvy teen from 1989 to 1999 and it won't take long to explain everything to him. The World Wide Web exists now, but a lot of retailers haven't embraced the online marketplace, the dotcom bubble bursts, it's not quite got the permanent grip on life yet.
  There was a lot of revolution in the 2000's. Higher speed internet that allow for audio and video streaming, mp3 players and the upheaval those caused, the proliferation of digital cameras, the rise of social media. When I graduated high school in 2005, there were no iPhones, no Facebook, no Twitter, no Youtube. Google was a search engine that was gaining ground against Yahoo. The world was a vastly different place by the time I was through college. Take that savvy teen from 1989 and his counterpart from 1999 and explain to them how things work in 2009. It'll take a lot longer. In 2009 we had a lot of technology that had a lot of potential, and we were just starting to realize that potential. It was easy to see a bright future.
  There was a lot of stagnation in the 2010's. We started the decade with smart phones and social media, and we ended the decade with smart phones and social media. Performance numbers for machines kept going up but you kinda don't notice; you buy a new phone and it's so much faster and more responsive, 4 years later it barely loads web pages and takes forever to launch an app because mobile apps are gaseous, they expand to take up their system. A lot of handset manufacturers have given up so now there are fewer options, and they've converged to basically one form factor. Distinguishing features are gone, things we used to be able to do aren't there anymore. The excitement wore off, this is how we do things now, and now everyone is here. Mobile app stores are full of phishing software, you're probably better advised to just use the mobile browser if you can, mainstream video gaming is now just skinner boxes, and by the end of the decade social media is all about propaganda silos and/or attention draining engagement slop.
  Now we arrive in the 2020's where we find a lot of sinisterization. A lot of the tech world is becoming blatantly, nakedly evil. In truth this began in the 2010's, it's older than 4 years, but we're days away from the halfway point of the decade and it's becoming difficult to see the behavior of tech and media companies as driven only by greed, some of this can only come from a deep seated hatred of your fellow man. People have latched onto the term "enshittification" because it's got the word shit in it and that's hilarious, but...I see a spectrum with the stagnation of the teens represented with a green color and the sinisterization of the 20's represented with red, and the part in the middle where red and green make brown is enshittification.
I’m amazed that ads are so effective that they can make more cramming unwanted video in my face than just asking me for a couple bucks.
- No one wants to pay money for the services they're using. Ads is the way to go.
you just need to keep a shit list of brands that are now dead to you.
- I have a dwindling list of brands that are not yet dead to me.
- All of them.
they already make significantly more profits off of each ad-tier sub than they do the ad-free.. yet it still isn't enough. greedy fucking bastards.
- How is showing me ads for things I will make a point not to buy because I implicitly hate the products of people showing me ads more profitable than the twenty fucking bucks a month I already give them?
  Imagine if all that misallocated marketing budget got used to develop better products instead.

YAHAR!!!!! HOIST THE MAIN SAILS!!!!

ahoy!
Implying there's anything worth pirating on Netflix these days.
- Wednesday was pretty good
- I liked Kaos. Of course, it only got one season.
- The latest Black Mirror is excellent!
- Really enjoyed One Piece live action
The seas are truly splendid. I can only but pity the landlubbers.

They want the old cable tv days back, but worse

- Streaming was different for years and years. But then people got greedy.
- Way late to the party cuz im browsing top posts for the week, but you reminded me of how I refused to believe my father when he said cable TV used to be ad free. He said it was the whole point of paying for it back then cuz paying for TV didn't exist yet.
- Way late to the party cuz im browsing top posts for the week, but you reminded me of how I refused to believe my father when he said cable TV used to be ad free. He said it was the whole point of paying for it back then cuz paying for TV didn't exist yet.
It's quite something how they're trying to force the Internet to work as an artificial version of things we already have, instead of using it for the unique purposes which it can actually fulfill.
They want the old cable TV days, but worse, and filling their pockets instead.
Youtube is also trying to be more like TV. Apparently, TV wasn’t bad enough.
Nice thing is it can't come back. There are too many other sources of entertainment and information to make one feel like one is missing out by simply opting out.

This gem might need an update.

I'm kinda proud of myself, that I skipped Netflix and never took off my pirate hat.
- I never took off my pirates hat but I have had a netflix account for about a year...
  ...
  It wasn't my account. One of my kids friends signed in to their profile on my TV so I used it every now and again until the password sharing option was taken away.
Stremio plus real debrid for the win...

“[Netflix] members pay as much attention to midroll ads as they do to the shows and movies themselves,” Amy Reinhard, president of advertising at Netflix, said, per the publication.

Amy, I want you to be honest with me, are you an alien.

Because on planet Earth we do not, if fact, pay as much attention to the ads as to the things we're actually interested in. Famously our brains even produce this fascinating effect to spare us from the bullshit you're shoving into our eyeballs.

I'm just waiting for it to be like that Black Mirror episode where ads came on, the guy closed his eyes, and alarms went off until he opened them again.
- The bad thing about those kind of shows, is that while most people see that as a warning, and something to avoid.
  Some people immediately start charting a path to how to make it a reality, and sometimes those people are very very smart and can chart a path that might take decades.
  I say this while on the toilet, writing on a device that has cameras both front and back, always on microphones and location sensors, and facial recognition and 3D scanning equipment.
  When the personalized condom ads start popping up, I will only be slightly annoyed.
i think in netflix's case, they might actually be paying as much attention to the ads as they do the shows, which is to say none at all
- This is exactly how I interpreted that statement. No one is paying attention, who cares if they slip some garbage ads in?
"People watch ads," says the one selling ads.

Netflix will what now? Sorry, I was busy canceling my netflix account.

Kidding, I canceled it ages ago when the $10 version became SD-only with ads.}

Why do we keep paying people like this to enshittify everything?

Cause a lot of times it’s a family account and only one person actually realized how bad of a deal it is.
- I mean we keep signing up for services because they're convenient or fun or interesting and every single time they start cutting corners, worsening services, being more invasive with ads, and charging more and more for the 'privilege' of doing whatever it was you were doing there. Why do we keep falling for that and then being surprised when it ends up in the same place as the last 12 platforms or whatever?
Why do we keep paying people like this to enshittify everything?
Because if you refuse to destroy yourself, your family, and the rest of the world, they'll import 3rd worlders who will do it because they're being threatened.

They show me an ad, and they are out. It is that simple. Luckily, my life does not depend on streaming.

Haha, already there. I canceled my Netflix a year ago or so after the amount of cheap self produced stuff got too much and they removed more and more older quality content.
Now, whenever I want to stream I sign up for a single streaming service for a month or two - but the time where I was just subscribed all the time is over.
Ah one reason also was the sharing crackdown, I had kept the subscription long term as my kids used it when they were at my place or my ex-wife's. Nowadays it doesn't work anymore as (for example) the TV my son has at the ex-wife's place never is connected via my internet.
With added commercials, less quality etc streaming got less attractive. Hey, nowadays I regularly go to movie theaters, again.
And if things get worse, somewhere I still have my captain's hat and the wooden leg for sailing the seven seas...

i just subscribe to the netflix tier that serves all streams as torrents

Same here. Best part is that they even have non-Netflix media in that tier. Love it.

Between that, price hike, and some weirdly low quality content because you don't use this or that browser, netflix really wants people to stop their subscriptions it seems.

High seas baby!
There is surely a recognisable pattern here in which people leave because of this shit and to keep the flow of money going up they then have to further reduce quality by increasing ads.
I deleted my facebook a few weeks ago and signing in for the first time in years gave a look at what it became and it was unrecognisable.
Yup, I'm finishing off a couple shows and it's on the chopping block. Easy choice
99% of people won't care besides passive complaining at the water cooler, unfortunately
Netflix is the worst of the streaming channels these days.

If I pay for a service and get ads, that service is dead to me forever.

But you're only getting ads if you choose to get them. What's your problem exactly?
Always sad watching people complain about ads on free streaming sites which can be easily blocked with an adblocker while defending their subscription to netflix.
It really puts into perspective how 'intelligent' the average consumer is and how seriously their input should be taken, though.
- Since when is Netflix free?
- Huh?? If a streaming site (or any product for that matter) is free, the user is the product - be it their time, personal info, whatever. It is known and accepted that a "free" service will have a catch that allows the provider to make money.
  If a user PAYS for a service it is expected that the payment is enough remuneration for there to be no strings attached. Of course companies will look for shitty ways to do shitty things to make more money, and those companies ought to be punished, generally by a reduction in customers, for their shitty behaviour.
- They said if they PAY to use.. and get ads. They are right, I ditched tv for streaming because less ads. Now they want to go full circle? I feel like I can’t even open up the fridge these days without having some agenda or ad start.

Yarrr

The only limitation on sailing the high seas is that the video and sound quality are not as great as legit streaming. You get descriptions that claim it is ripped full 4k or HD, but when actually looking at the encoding, it is not the case. But what can we do? If we are being made to stream in shit, it is better to sail in blue ocean high seas.
- I hear a whisper in the wind about file size being a distinct though not foolproof hint of quality.
- You are aware that Netflix et.al. put compression on their streams (usually quite a bit in regards to bitrate) ? It is often the case that BluRay rips etc. are available better on the high seas...
- *only if you use the Netflix app on "supported platforms"
  I guess the answer to your question is to get on a private tracker for high-quality releases ;)
- atmos and even dts x content are very findable and vlc has the codec information in the tool menu
  have a 5.1.4 system hooked up by hdmi to the igpu and the video to the gpu and it sounds just like the theater but be sure to check what is available for the content you are searching because it might not exist
  for example Harry Potter just got rereleased on dts x and the news was on the official dts site but also check blu-ray.com to see what formats exists
  the green for atmos comes on and the amber for dts does too as well as the white for dolby digital but again vlc confirms this too in the codec information and atmos for home theater will do for dolby digital too
  be prepared for enormous file sizes but so worth it and you will have to use the atmos for home theater or the dts x for home theater under the windows spatial sound settings per the content and yes switch back and forth
- That's why you do several magnets, to be sure, and discard the ones that are bullshit, if you're worried about that. Haven't had any problems myself, other than theater cam for the newest new movies.
- I don’t give a fock about quality, I’m watching for the plot

94 million people decided $10 a month savings was worth watching ads rather than doing without. Fuck em. They are the reason many things only have an ad supported tier. Pay for stuff or pirate it, but don't use ad supported tiers when you have a choice.

I paid for the ad tier of disneyplus and use an adblocker. Seems to work well so far.
- I will call that a grey area. You still count on the roles as a sub of the ad tier. And probably in all the data it assumes you saw the ads. So it helps perpetuate the problem. But if enough people do it, it will reduce whar advertisers pay, which might reduce the problem.
This is straight up victim blaming.
- By what leap of logic do you come to that conclusion. We are talking about entertainment here. Not housing or food. Doing without is an option, and there is plenty of competition to use instead.
  People rail against the rich for caring only about money. But when they make thier own decisions, they do the same. Money first. You pay for ADs with your time first. Then you pay again when ever you buy anything, because advertising whether you saw it or not is part of the price of everything. Paying for your time back alone, would be worth the price. But people put money first. And we all lose. Well except the wealthy.

“[Netflix] members pay as much attention to midroll ads as they do to the shows and movies themselves,” Amy Reinhard, president of advertising at Netflix, said, per the publication.

In terms of attention, she's either lying or admitting that members barely pay attention to their content.

They have told writers to dumb things down and have the characters speak aloud what they’re doing because so many people doom scroll while it’s on in the background.
There not making quality. They’re making elevator music for your home.
She is exactly admitting members barely pay attention. It’s a pretty widely known issue in the screenwriting community. Netflix in particular wants more “second screen scripts.” Meaning they need shows that constantly remind you of what’s happening, have tons of expository dialogue—constantly—and that leans hard into the shallow end of story. Because they’re assuming you’re not watching and are on your phone.
- They pay for market research

I've gone back to books.

Spent waaay too much on a single volume illustrated edition of all the Earthsea books. My weekend is going to be lit.
- Oh shit….I need to go get that!
  (Speaking of books …. time to go see if that fancy hardback edition of Cibola**Burn is ever going to get released.
  edit: it’s not coming out any time soon 😤
- I've just been thinking of going back to Earthsea!
Ooh everyone look at Mr smarty pants over here being all literate.

No they won't 🏴‍☠️

Rejecting Netflix fixes things for you and me, but the article says Netflix has 93 million ad-supported subscribers. I'm really worried about the amount of influence advertisers have on our society, and it's only getting worse. Even if you and I can be above the direct influence of these ads, many people are not, and those people are influencing you and me. This produces a dangerous secondary influence that can reach most of society, and just fills everyone's mind with lies, for hardly any cost.
- Eh, people are dumb as bricks. If it's not ads it's some fake news, social media nonsense, ai bullshit. It's really pointless to worry about. You can either accept that you are sharing the planet with Trump voters and suckers who fell for NFTs or you will just go crazy.
- No different than the decades of ad supported broadcast television.
YoHoHo Arrrrghhhhhh!!!
They will. We just won't see them when we watch their shows.

You actually want most people to pay for this crap so stuff still gets made for us to pirate. Thanks, rubes!
- I want to pay. I want creators to be fairly compensated for their work. I just want a structure that doesn’t require a predatory middleman that adds no value.
Yo ho ho (and a bottle of rum)!

Either they have great technology, or they have great entertainment,” she said. “Our superpower has always been the fact that we have both.

Please. Your software is an image carousel and a video player.

Jellyfin does all that and more.
We're no longer in the days of competing with a USB stick and hoping the TV will play whatever format it's in, or using VLC and a laptop.
They don't even show you ratings for the stuff, because they want you to waste your time watching the junk tier shit they can still afford.
Eh to Netflix's credit, both their backend and frontend are much better than their competition. Much better ux, and streams much more consistently. We pick up a sub for a month here and there. But AI ads will make me never go back.
- Lemmy is the king of the disingenuous argument, as though somehow admitting that yes, Netflix is the gold standard for pay-to-stream, it somehow dilutes the argument against AI ads.
Their software is the best in the industry. Even on a gigabit connection I've had issues with both Amazon Prime video and Disney plus.
Both of those platforms have issues where their servers just seem to get bored and stops sending data, like they just forgot about you And you have to refresh the page to play any more of the video. As soon as you do that it starts playing again so it's definitely not a network issue. I've had this problem on both the website and the smart TV app.

"Millions of former subscribers will cancel their accounts in 2026"

FTFY

Sadly I think you're a optimistic with those numbers. It's probably gonna be a few thousand. The numbers can feel skewed if you only look at Lemmy.
- I think it'll be somewhere in the middle. Quite a few people have not had to deal with ads in streaming for many years now, if it's suddenly forced it'll piss off a lot
  I don't think they're all going to suddenly pirate again, I think many will just switch to other streaming providers.
  If they all start doing the shitty ads, we're fucked.
Nah, my cousins are normies. Every time I'm at their place and the TV is on, you almost can't tell if the ads get more play than the content they actually wanted to see. Their TV is treated like an old FM radio where ads are just a part of it. They complain, but they'll never actually do anything about it.
That absolutely won't happen.
Everybody on Lemmy and Reddit were saying the same when they banned account sharing and price increases. In reality their subscriber numbers went through the roof and so did their profits.

The sooner people realize that the subscribers are nothing more than super-slow-boiled frogs to them, the better.

They are the slow moving hand reaching for your wallet.

Pirating has never felt so good. Normally I'm indifferent to it but now I'm enjoying it.

Is this feature coming to Sonarr/Radar + Jellyfin? /s

Some people who use Ersatz (software to turn your media into tv channels) actually ADD ads to it. I don't get it.
- Nostalgia.

So the dead Internet extends to streaming.

Also anyone else interested in just crazy an ai add what will be.

Something like this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMuookENY90&t=137s
- Wow that's fucking horrendous. I feel terrible for little kids growing up on this shit that will start to feel like normal art for them.
  That video in particular is particularly grating because the source material-- a Bradbury short story-- is so beautiful on its own.
Like when they try to blend the the publicity into a stream, by continuing talking but suddenly it's a commercial. Urgh 🤢
- It's like people only do these things because they can get paid. And that's just really sad.

ads will continue until subscriptions improve

no ads on blockbuster movies!

I was looking to cut down on subscriptions and picked Netflix as an experimental one. I haven't missed it at all. Things like this make me less likely to occasionally reactivate for a couple of months as I was originally planning.

I wonder when they'll see a big enough effect to break their current run of fucking over their customers.

I also thought I'd miss Hulu and Netflix a lot more than I do. What used to irk me so badly was how utterly shit Netflix is when you just want to sit down and find something new to watch. Their front page would be list after list of things like "Hot New Comedies" "Best Independent Films of 2025", "Classic Action Flicks" and somehow it always felt like the same 30 or 40 movies randomly shuffled together. So I'd spend 15 minutes scrolling through the same slop in different orders, get frustrated and search for a movie that I remembered wanting to watch, only to find that it was on none of the services I was subscribed to, and cost $8.99 for a single watch of a 20 year old movie.
We had been Netflix subscribers since the very start when they delivered discs through the mail. Kinda sad how they went from having virtually anything you could think of to watch (and having a halfway decent recommendation algorithm to boot!) to where they are today.
- Kinda sad how they went from having virtually anything you could think of to watch (and having a halfway decent recommendation algorithm to boot!) to where they are today.
  They're not entirely to blame - once other companies saw that this streaming thing actually made money, they pulled all their stuff and put it on their own services, leading to the cable 2.0 we have today.
  Everything else that sucks about them now, though, yeah, they're to blame.
My kids have missed it more than me (which I don't) but they're easy to distract with one of the other streaming services I still have. The last price hike did it for me.

Soo... the ad income is higher than the energy costs of gen. AI? They lied about the pennies per visit? 😢

Also, 🏴‍☠️

Netflix showed time and time again that they are shit at counting money. I wouldn't be surprised if it turns out they're losing money on those ads but will do them anyway because managers eat the worst possible hype for breakfast.
I higly doubt they generate a custom ad per viewer, it's probably per show which can be re-used.

I'm sorry, did you say Netflix is going to be pirated aggressively for the few shows that aren't complete slop?

Soon may the Pirateman come,

To bring us movies, games, and... Rum.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yn6AOtkZxy4

Each day brings us closer to either Cyberpunk 2077 or Bladerunner

... or Terminator, or Mad Max. Dredd with Robocop are on the list too.
Or 1984, or Brave New World.
My money's on Terry Gilliam's Brazil, though.
It is intresting to see if we go that way, or if our future will be more Orwellian in its nature. Might go ine way or another.

Well piracy is the only way then.

Well, time to cancel finally I've gotten used to torrenting again anyway

🤮 Glad I deleted my account years ago and use kodi to host my own library

I wish Kodi could host the library from outside your home. So I could be at a friends house, and I just log in to my library from his house, and we watch season 6, episode 14 of the simpsons. Random episode, but whatever. You get my point.
Instead, I tried setting up JellyFin, and I couldn't get it to work. So I said "Fuck it. I'll delete this and try from scratch, and reinstall JellyFin."
Instead, it deleted 32 terabytes of videos. It deleted the "media" folder, which I set as JellyFins home directory. Every dvd I ripped, every tv show, every movie, every wrestling show, every comedy special. All of it. Gone.
Luckily I have a backup, but that was 2 years ago, and I'm never even home enough to WATCH the stuff, let alone try to restore these files one by one which took literal decades to assemble.
Somewhere is a folder called "N-Gage videos". Which is episodes of TV shows that in 2003 I formatted to fit on an N-gage screen size. Useless now, but it shows how old some of that collection is.
- There are ways to recover deleted files, at least partially. Especially if all you did was remove the directory and not the files themselves.
  Re-downloading 32TB would take a while but you'll probably download it faster than you can watch it. Usenet downloads are typically faster than torrenting.
  Plex is much easier to setup than Jellyfin and much more user-friendly in general, though it's not free for some of the more useful features like watching from outside your home.
- Hate to say it but deleting files when you mean to delete a program/docker container/whatever is definitely a skill issue...

I recently setup my own Jellyfin server with qbittorent search plug-ins and its so easy. Netflix is really playing with fire here cause people will leave when pushed enough as it's becoming so easy to switch. You can just hop on your friends server too

While I am in the same boat as you, you severely overestimate the tech-affinity of the average Netflix user.
Pirating content safely, setting up a media server for it, share it with other people... it is all possible, there is good documentation out there. But aside from having the drive to do this, you also need to invest time to keep it running and maintain it.
The average person out there is happy to pay Netflix money so they don't need to do that.
Edit: add to that also the fact that it is technically illegal in many countries. This is probably also a deterrent for the average person.
- But with Jellyfin you don't necessarily need to do that yourself. You can have a friend with a server or pay some shady dude 5$/mo to use his server.
- The normies can't do this argument never sat well with me when it comes to tech, as if their ignorance somehow diminishes the software or process for everyone else.
  I also appreciate them. If more people pirated, we might have a tighter crackdown from world governments over it, luckily the streaming services get enough pleb bux to keep the peace.

Luckily I haven't paid for a streaming service in years.

I won't watch even streaming when it comes to films, series... It's oh so nice to play back that video all by myself.

Bye Netflix, hello plex.

Edit: hello Jellyfin, as helpful users have mentioned the enshitification of plex to me.

You seems unaware of plex enshitification. Bye bye plex, Hello Jellyfin.
- I was! Thanks for the info, I’ll be checking out Jellyfin instead.
- Eh, tbh it still does the core basics of streaming my content and Metadata management, so I don't really care about enshitification of 'extra' features that I never use. It's still the easiest way to share media
I have some bad news for you
Tried Jellyfin because of Plex enshittification…
…stuck with Jellyfin for the better performance!

There is no way this doesn’t wind up making an ad that's misleading enough to get Netflix and/or the advertiser in trouble

These ads will most definitely not be generated on-the-fly; too risky and too costly. They'll be pre-generated and pre-approved AI-generated videos.
Imagine a collection of videos like that AI Coca Cola commercial (but for a soon-to-be-cancelled Netflix series instead of a soda), with a dozen different versions of it made for each "user archetype" Netflix identifies. That's going to be how Netflix implements this.
the tos will be updated to cover their asses
- And even if they get a fine, it will just be the cost of doing business and likely a tiny fraction of the additional revenue they pull in
Nobody gets in trouble for false advertising these days, and if they did, the consequences would be negligible.

I've cancelled my subscriptions to only subscribe to the platforms owned by our national broadcaster even if there's one of them I don't watch any shows on, fuck those American platforms.

Is there a way to poison the well so badly and so irrevocably that corporations won't dare use generative AI for anything? Can we somehow trick these overgrown chatbots to speak ill of their masters in the form of direct-to-stream advertisements?

Ask Musk. He managed to do it on accident.
You would think it’s already there, tbh - whenever I see an AI generated ad, all I think is “wow, that’s a business I will never patronize if even their ads are bottom-of-the-barrel slop”
- The new snoop dog video has me discombobulated on this fact

The shittyfication goes forward...

And canceled my sub

Annnnd goodbye Netflix subscription

why do people still pay for that shit

The older I get, the more I realize useful idiots aren't the exception; they're the rule.

I can't tell from the article what the AI side of this is? Are Netflix offering to make adverts for customslrs using AI? Are they just showing adverts in general from customers, including AI generated ones?

I don't know if I'm doing something wrong, but I've read the article twice and still don't know 😂

the streaming leader announced that it has created interactive mid-roll ads and pause ads that incorporate generative AI.
- interactive mid-roll ads
  Drink Verification Can To Continue
- Thanks! Somehow missed that, but I still don't really understand the details, like how and whyit incorporates generative AI, and if these are for Netflix or for Netflix ad customers.

Eventually they will start making shows based on the user watching the show.

Please see Black Mirror, Series 6, Episode 1, "Joan Is Awful"

Better yet, check out a book called QualityLand. Imagine Idiocracy where Amazon is it's own country...

I dunno at some point I’m just gonna stop watching tv and find other ways to entertain myself.

There are plenty of options.
You don't even have to stop watching videos. There are free streaming sites such as https://hydrahd.sh/ that have greater selections than netflix at no cost.
I shouldn't have to say this, but make sure you have an adblocker. For some reason, laymen get mad about the ads on streaming sites while pretending ads don't exist anywhere else.
yeah i recently stopped watching sports for similar reasons. cancelling the $84/month youtubetv sub and getting back hours and hours of my life every week. gonna try to learn drums or something.
- I’ve been learning drums for a bit. It’s a lot of fun. I’d recommend sticking with it.

Not to me, they fucking won't

Netflix can fuck right off as I cancel my subscription and board the Jolly Roger

Netflix doing their best to lose whatever customers they have left rofl

Sure, but they have a crazy large amount of data and an army of Data Science PhDs who sat down and calculated they'd make more money increasing their margins on people who'll put up with it, than they'd lose pissing the rest of their customers off.
All the rest of us can do is leave our Torrents running and keep our ratios up...
- Often enough execs are just impervious to math.
- I'm on FNP, where do you find other (private) trackers? If I might ask.
Are you high, kiddo? Their customer base is steadily growing by tens of millions each bloody year. Netflix is a publicly traded company, everyone has access to all of their financial information, including the customer base.
Their users have sadly doubled since last year.
Just think the CEOs of Netflix get $60 million a year to fuck it up while we work 1-4 jobs actually providing goods and services to barely make it.

~~plex~~ jellyfin ftw!

Couldn't pass up the opportunity to dunk on Plex, huh?
- The change about streaming outside my home left me salty. The fact that they changed the deal made stop recommending them. So yeah.

If I down vote this does it show my disappointment of netflix or the OP? 🤔

The OP. They're just the messenger.

Don't pirate, we're awesome!

Here, watch these ads!

Hey, where are you going?

Enshittification marches on

Ahhhh, man moving away from corps just keeps on giving (or in this case, doesn’t enshitify while proprietary ones do).

Jellyfin

I used this service in a rental for the first time in a few years. It sucks compared to other streaming services. I don't even know what people are possibly watching on this thing.

I started using it right after they launched their streaming service. Back then it was awesome. No ads, nice UI, and lots of great content, so for a good price.
But that was a long time ago.
I cancelled my subscription several months ago. And I should have done it much sooner. The difference between what is was way back in the day and what it is now is jarring.
I think a lot of people keep paying for nostalgia reasons, and because of a futile hope that Netflix might somehow go back to that earlier version. In retrospect I think that was a big part of why I kept my subscription for as long as I did (which was obviously a mistake on my part).
- I seem to be the rare person that notices that something has changed slowly and completely (ship of theseus or frog boil style) over time.
  I've cancelled and renewed Netflix a couple of times over the last decade but it's really a shadow of what it was at the start like you're describing. Occasionally, they have a single show worth pirating or binging over the course of like a year.
- I think a lot of people keep paying for nostalgia reasons
  I think you're talking shit. Netflix had 21m customers in 2011 and they have over 300m today. They're getting tens of millions of new customers each year and at least half of them are choosing to watch ads. Ad subscriptions have grown to be 1/3 of all subscriptions. Everyone loves ads and Netflix.

!piracy@lemmy.dbzer0.com Piracy ftw!

Got rid of netflix when they started their ad tier. NEVER going back.

Haha, the kicker is that it's pure greed. With their prices they don't need it and could improve it with what the community wants, but $$$, hey... been away for nearly 2 years now, thought of tipping my toes in again but with that they can f... right off.

Damn. Can't believe a media company would be driven by greed.
Line must always go brrrrr.

I haven't had streamslop subs in years.

Been sailing the seven seas ever since, and I'm watching it all burn from the crow's nest.

Everyone. This is what being above average really looks like.
Use your brains before your wallets. Most people immediately jump to the 'money option' because thinking is legitimately too difficult for them.
Don't be a useful idiot, even if it's what's popular.

Aside from 🏴‍☠️ there are simply too many legitimate pay streaming options in 2025 for Netflix to think they can do this. This will end like an arrogant urban cowboy being flung off a mechanical bull and I'm all for it.

Soooooo fucking glad I spent the last 3 days re-re-re-re-making and reworking my NAS into a proper homelab made out of my old gaming PC, holy shit

A year of depression and shame at not finishing it suddenly ends right before the enshittification hits harder, nice

Now if my new HDDs could show the fuck up

Is your egg too expensive?
Look no further. Our egg is much smoother and can be worn with most garments.

EggEgg. For your egg.

Half of new Netflix subscribers opt for the $8 per month option rather than ad-free subscriptions, which start at $18 per month, the company says.

Damn, when did it get so expensive? Assuming that's USD. That's a decent amount more than Disney+, right?

Actually not much more I think disney + ad free tier is like $16 now. Though I don't think they- charge extra for 4k so there is that.
- Oh I was comparing Disney+ Standard to Netflix Standard. Turns out there's also Netflix Basic which is a similar price to Disney+ Standard, but with many more restrictions.
  I think Disney+ Standard and Netflix Standard seem to be comparable. In NZD Disney+ is $16.99 (approx $10USD)and Netflix is $25.99 (approx $15USD) per month. Disney+ gives annual discounts as well.
  None of the plans in NZ seem to have ads (yet...).
  Though I don’t think they- charge extra for 4k so there is that.
  Out of the two plans I see, the Standard only includes up to 1080p and 4k requires Premium, $21.99NZD (approx $13USD).

Haven't had Netflix since the password debacle. Never even missed it. 🏴‍☠️

Same, no regrets

I mean, this is for the ad-supported tier. For $8/mo, it tells you right there it includes ads when you sign up.

Nobody read the article.
I'm all against ads and enshitification and Netflix's recent price hikes but people are just ranting now.
It just sounds like the ads have gotten more annoying is all. And worse for the environment. And more expensive for Netflix. But maybe higher value because they force you to interact with them?
Only sensible answer. It's still enshitification, but it's the open kind and there are still legitimate ad-free tiers. I don't think Amazon Prime even has that.

I like that they give everyone an exact date to cancel their membership.

If you see Netflix as part of a bundle, get the bundle without it. You having no choice to get out of the subscription is feeding into this.

byeeeee

What the fuck is up with that image of Wednesday?! It doesn’t look like Ortega’s Wednesday to me. Is it ai generated?

It looks like her to me but idk
- Yeah you’re right, it is her, it might be the camera angle or something or perhaps her bangs are slightly different than in the rest of the show. Something just felt off and I can’t put my finger on it.
Looks like she's got a bad toothache or a dislocated jaw.

i just finished a single month here, first one in a couple years. ran out of stuff by week three. it'll be at least another 2-3 years before another binge month, if i ever go back at all.

I canceled Netflix, and then soon after moved from Verizon to t-mobile. I got Netflix "free" through t-mobile, so I logged back into my "cancelled" account like I'd never left. Netflix raised the price and t-mobile passed it on, so I was paying $4.50 for Netflix. They raised the price a couple of more times, I think, and then a couple of months ago they raised it again, and I was paying $11.00 for Netflix. After I finished watching Kaos, I cancelled Netflix. I only kept it because it was so cheap, but I rarely watched anything.

All the time I had Netflix, I also was a sailor, because I want to watch things not on Netflix. I should have dropped it the first time they raised the price.

I've had Netflix on-and-off since the DVD in the mail days. I tried Amazon Prime for the shipping years ago, when they first started playing with streaming. Those are the only two I've had.

I have neither now, and if it turns out I can't get the few shows I want to watch through other means, then I just won't watch anymore. Passive media isn't especially valuable to me. I have other forms of entertainment, including games, and the old stand-by, books. Outside is fun, too, when the weather isn't crap.

"other means"

Not to me.

After that comes the part where the AI hallucinates a world where advertising guidelines don't exist and gets the company sued for some very illegal advertising.

One use for AI would be to eliminate all ads. The AI giveth and AI can taketh away. Lol

Not that it means anything here, but I'll definitely not partake. Hard pass.

Aaaand I'm so glad I cancelled Netflix this year. All the new shows are kinda trash anyway.

Took you long enough.
Did you know there are free streaming sites with greater selection and don't require you to make an account, let alone enter your credit card info and send them money?
- To be honest I don't watch a lot of Netflix myself, I paid the service because my mom liked watching it, and stuff like stremio was a little too complicated for her to use; But eventually Netflix got so bad, she had to learn to use the small Media PC i setup for her and stremio as well!

Torrents are great btw

The only reason I have netflix is because I stayed logged into my moms account after moving out. Once she dies or decided to stop paying it is when I will no longer have netflix. Im fine with losing it. I dont watch it much anyways. But now AI ads? Fuck no. They’ve been bad enough on youtube. Im considering getting a lyfetime membership to nebula and ditching youtube all together

Lol

Nice ahoy mateys!

Hey Netflix, the amount of Ads people are willing to endure for a paid subscription is ZERO and it will always remain so. In fact even the stupid games advertised on the top of the landing page made me use Netflix less and less, and now that they stopped password sharing I don't use it at all

Canceled two years ago. Not coming back.

hahahahahaha

Is there a plugin for Stremio that provides a kid's profile function? That's the only thing keeping me from canceling my Netflix subscription.

Netflix was canceled even before twitter. It was nice until 3-4 years ago, when the quality of their service started to fall.

Hate to see it but... it makes sense.

It's wrong, sure, in many ways (privacy, ecology, ethically depending on the dataset) but if there is 1 application where generative AI ads would make sense is through a personalized stream. So... yes it's bad, consumers might reject it, but it's not the actually dumbest way to use a terrible technology.

To be clear, again, I 100% hate it but if I was a greedy Netflix stakeholder I'd think "Hmmm yes, maybe!".

Annnnnnnnnnnnnd it’s gone

Cool. Won't affect me, but good to know.

Quit netflix ages ago, but is add blocking not going to work here? I addblock on hulu no problem.

Speaking of Hulu, does anyone know a way to get Hulu working on OSMC or other media player. Netflix works via API and keys.... I can't get other streamers on there correctly which pisses me off to to end.

I'm not familiar with how Netflix's ad tier works and am almost afraid to ask, but could someone ELI5?

If a company wanted to push an ad on Netflix, wouldn't it be up to them to decide whether to use AI make the thing? Or is this sort of the equivalent of a small business sending a script to the local radio station to have the DJ read it (i.e. rather than producing their own ad), except they add some AI-generated visuals?

I never subscribed to netflix because I'm not an idiot and just used free streaming sites for over a decade.
My peers would tell me that there are different pricing models and you can pay more to get rid of ads.
It's all fucked by design, but this generation is too stupid to realize it or do anything about it.

Netflix peaked when it was supporting shows like Dark and Mindhunter and drove off the cliff since. My wife will subscribe for a month to watch a new season of a show like You and then cancel it again. That's versus back in 2017 when I just had the subscription all year.

YAR HAR HAR HAR

Stremio plus real debrid. All the services easily on any device.

Amy Reinhard sounds like an asshole

Why would I care. If they think it's profitable, I have no arguments against it. I'm not paying attention to the ads anyways.

I’M HERE FOR IT. This is the future, and I’m genuinely invested in this (I’ve spoken to marketing industry people about how cool this could be).

How cool... advertising can be?
- Yes. I have a masters degree in digital marketing, and I’m very excited for this.

Ads are ads, who cares if it's AI generated?

Great point.
You gotta remember, this generation of idiots actually enjoys watching ads. Every year they gather around to watch the most egregiously expensive ads and debate which one is the 'best' while children starve.
- Damn you fucking here hard boy
  Amen!
They are substantially cheaper to make and therefore have a greater profit margin because they can charge more for the advertising space.
These types of comments from companies are for investors and not a warning to consumers of what is coming.
- My point was, fuck Netflix for their shitty business practices anyway. Ads are bad, AI ads aren't any better or worse.
at least with human made ads, people got paid for their work.
- At least with hand weaving, people got paid for their work.
  You realise your statement could have been made about literally any labour saving invention in human history?
- Counter argument: advertisement is shit, except it is less than shit because shit can fertilize a field. It is neither improved nor depreciated by human involvement. Every moment of human effort expended in producing advertising could be better spent on anything else.