Netflix loaded with enough content for COVID-19 lockdown

WIth COVID-19 outbreak putting Hollywood to a halt, all the productions from TV Shows to movies are currently on pause or the releases have been postponed or canceled. But it seems that Netflix is better equipped to handle the scenario.

Netflix’s chief content officer Ted Sarandos did an interview with CNN and assured their company has enough content completed so that the volume of new shows won’t really see a drop for a few months:

What’s happening now is we work pretty far ahead. We deliver all of our shows with all the episodes at once. So we’re pretty far ahead, so we don’t see any disruption in our output over the next few months. You know, maybe later in the year if this progresses longer we’ll start feeling some of that as the production side isn’t operating.

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But Ted Sarandos admitted that the Coronavirus pandemic is a major disruption to the whole process, and Netflix production around the world is also shut down.

Netflix has asked its employees to work from home, they are taking advantage of video conferencing.

It is pretty clear that Netflix usage over this time has significantly increased with people sending more time on streaming services.

To handle the surge of usage and limit the load on broadband networks, Netflix has lowered the bitrate in Europe to lower the data usage, which is in par with other companies as YouTube also lowered their default streaming quality to standard definition.