Netflix to Open Pop-Up Store at L.A.’s The Grove, Featuring Limited-Edition Merch — and a Life-Size Vecna

The 2022 Netflix miniseries, Inventing Anna, brings to life Jessica Pressler’s 2018 New York magazine article, “Maybe She Had So Much Money She Just Lost Track of It.” Based on true events, the series follows the unexpected rise of the faux socialite and con artist Anna Delvey — a pseudonym for Russian-born German Anna Sorokin, who relocated to New York City in 2014.

Online clothes retailer ASOS is potentially planning to open up a pop-up store on the high-street that will sell clothes to its customers at a discounted price.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Just over three years ago, Netflix unequivocally shot down the idea that it would ever roll out an ad-supported streaming service. “When you read speculation that we are moving into selling advertising, be confident that this is false,” the streamer said in its second-quarter 2019 investor letter. “We believe we will have a more valuable business in the long term by staying out of competing for ad revenue and instead entirely focusing on competing for viewer satisfaction.” Clearly, Netflix’s thinking about advertising has changed. Both Netflix and Disney+ are launching ad-based tiers this fall, seeking to broaden their addressable markets and tap into a new revenue stream as subscriber growth has slowed — in Netflix’s case, it lost 1.2 million in the first half of 2022, compared with a net gain of 5.5 million in the prior-year period.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Despite rumors to the contrary, Netflix says it has no plans to stop dropping all episodes of a TV show at once for binge-friendly viewing. “We think our bingeable release model helps drive substantial engagement, especially for newer titles,” Netflix said in its Q3 shareholder letter, as part of announcing quarterly results Tuesday. “This enables viewers to lose themselves in stories they love.” The company’s comments come after the Puck newsletter last month reported that Netflix execs were mulling a change to binge strategy and release major titles on a weekly schedule. Netflix, which pioneered the practice of binge-releasing TV seasons in their entirety, said it’s sticking with that game plan.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor After two straight quarters of subscriber losses, Netflix returned to growth in the third quarter of 2022 — and told investors it’s expecting a strong Q4 to finish the year, even though it doesn’t expect big gains right away from the launch of its cheaper, ad-supported plans. The streaming giant reported 2.41 million net new paid subscribers in Q3, including a gain of 100,000 in the U.S./Canada region, to stand at 223.1 million worldwide as of the end of September. That handily topped Netflix’s previous forecast of a 1 million pickup for the period. For Q4, Netflix expects to gain 4.5 million new streaming customers, compared with 8.3 million in the year-earlier quarter. Netflix Basic With Ads is slated to launch in the U.S. on Nov. 3 and priced at $6.99 per month — three dollars less than the regular Basic plan. Similar ad tiers are also coming next month to 11 other countries: Australia, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Mexico, South Korea, Spain and the U.K.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Netflix will no longer share projected subscriber targets in upcoming earnings reports — a closely tracked metric among investors — as the company looks to shift the narrative to its financial performance. Starting with Netflix’s fourth-quarter 2022 earnings report in January 2023, it will not provide guidance for the next quarter (Q1 of 2023). The company will continue to provide guidance for revenue, operating income, operating margin, net income, EPS and fully diluted shares outstanding for the following quarter, but not paid membership. Click here to sign up for Variety’s free Strictly Business newsletter covering earnings, financial news, and more. “As discussed in previous letters, we are increasingly focused on revenue as our primary top-line metric,” Netflix said in its Q3 shareholder letter. “This will become particularly important heading into 2023 as we develop new revenue streams like advertising and paid sharing, where membership is just one component of our revenue growth.”

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Netflix wants to make it as simple as possible for people who have been using someone else’s account — possibly in violation of the company’s terms of use — to set up a separate paid membership. On Monday, Netflix is launching Profile Transfer, a feature that lets anyone on an existing account migrate their profile to a brand-new account while preserving all of their personalized recommendations, viewing history, My List, saved games and other settings. Profile Transfer, which Netflix says has been “much requested” by customers, will roll out to all members worldwide starting Monday. Users will be notified by email when Profile Transfer becomes available on their account.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor G4 is shutting down — again. Comcast Spectacor, the cable and entertainment giant’s sports and esports division, told G4 TV employees Sunday that the gaming network was shutting down effective immediately. The decision has resulted in 45 staff members of G4 TV losing their jobs. In a memo, obtained by Variety, Comcast Spectacor chairman and CEO Dave Scott cited low viewership and said the network had not achieved “sustainable financial results.” “Over the past several months, we worked hard to generate that interest in G4, but viewership is low and the network has not achieved sustainable financial results,” Scott wrote. “This is certainly not what we hoped for, and, as a result, we have made the very difficult decision to discontinue G4’s operations, effective immediately.”

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor After years of Netflix execs spurning the idea of serving up commercials to viewers, the streaming giant is flipping the switch on its first cheaper, ad-supported plan next month. Netflix Basic With Ads will launch in the U.S. on Nov. 3 at 9 a.m. PT, priced at $6.99 per month, the company announced. The cheaper plan will be available in 12 countries: Australia, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Korea, Mexico, Spain, the U.K. and the U.S. It will first roll out in Canada and Mexico on Nov. 1. Basic With Ads will be $2 cheaper than Netflix’s Basic plan ($9.99/month in the U.S. currently), which provides the ability to stream on one device at a time. Previously, the Basic plan has not supported HD, but with the launch of the ad tier, Netflix will provide video quality of up to 720p HD for both Basic With Ads and the plan with no ads.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Netflix has taken peak TV to a new peak. In a data point sure to fuel more quantity-versus-quality debate, Netflix broke its own record for number of original episodes released in a single quarter — with 1,026 in the third quarter of 2022, according to a tally by Wall Street firm MoffettNathanson. That’s more than five times any other streaming rival: Amazon Prime Video and Hulu released 223 and 194 episodes, respectively, and Disney+ debuted 140 original episodes, per the report. HBO Max, now owned by Warner Bros. Discovery, released 114 episodes in the third quarter — significantly fewer episodes than usual and comprising the lightest slate for the service since Q2 2020, the second quarter after launch. WBD has been paring back HBO Max’s content slate in recent months as it looks to cut costs.

Netflix show ever. The platform’s statistics for the week of Oct. 3rd to the 9th showed that the drama, starring Evan Peters as notorious serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer, drew in 205.33 million hours of viewing time worldwide.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Netflix fans continue to flock to binge-watch “Dahmer,” the unsettling drama series starring Evan Peters as the infamous killer cannibal, in record numbers. Ryan Murphy’s “Dahmer — Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story” topped Netflix’s English TV Top 10 list for the third week in a row, with 205.33 million hours viewed for the week of Oct. 3-9. That means the limited series is now Netflix’s second most popular English-language series of all time in its initial release, with 701.37 million hours watched, behind only “Stranger Things 4,” which was watched 1.35 billion hours in its first 28 days. “Dahmer” has now garnered more watch-time than seasons 1 and 2 of Shonda Rhimes’ “Bridgerton” in their first four weeks on the service.

Ryan Murphy’s true crime limited series Dahmer – Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story has been a massive hit for Netflix, a dominant #1 series globally since its Sept. 21 release and on track to become the streamer’s second most popular English-language show only behind Season 4 of Stranger Things. Released Wednesday, Oct. 5, horror film Mr. Harrigan’s Phone, which Murphy produced, also quickly shot up to the top spot, giving the prolific writer-producer-director the #1 Film and #1 TV Series in the U.S. on Friday. It is believed to be the first time a producer has held the two top spots simultaneously.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Any Slingboxes still out there are about to get bricked. Dish Network this week emailed reminders to users of Sling Media’s Slingbox — the once-controversial devices that “place-shift” pay-TV services by streaming live TV over the internet — that the servers that power Slingboxes will be permanently taken offline on Nov. 9, 2022. The Slingbox, which never achieved mass adoption, came out before the ascendancy of video-streaming powerhouses like Netflix and YouTube. But some of the technologies developed by Sling Media have since become widely adopted by the industry.

There are few artists have effected the music industry like George Michael.