If you’ve been hearing about Netflix switching to a weekly release model, worry not! The binge model is going nowhere!

We all know the best part about Netflix is being able to sit in front of a screen for hours, not worrying about bathing or eating or sleeping, and surviving only on popcorn and pizza because the call of your favourite show is just. that. good.

Well, a viral post sent people into a tizzy earlier today by suggesting that Netflix might be moving away from the binge-release model and switching to a weekly-release one.

Meaning, you’d have to wait a week for a new episode instead of watching all episodes in one go. Weird, because Netflix CEO Reed Hastings recently claimed that traditional TV would be “dead” within the decade… yet the weekly release model seems to mirror cable TV in essence.

Rest assured, that’s just a rumour. Netflix is not switching their model to a weekly-release.

It’s easy to see where the misconception may have come from – a recent issue of the Puck News newsletter dove into the issues around Netflix’s declining supremacy in the streaming market, and seemed to put at least some of the blame on their binge-release model.

Simply put, the binge-release model did not make a lot of ‘sense,’ and could be considered detrimental to long-term business. At present, it is also the only streaming service that still subscribes to the binge-release.

Despite the decline in their numbers, however, Netflix found little evidence to support the argument that the weekly-release model retained larger subscriber counts.

Of course, this doesn’t mean Netflix hasn’t experimented – the releases for Ozark and Stranger Things Season 4 were split into two parts, and many upcoming shows also plan to release episodes in bunches rather than all-at-once. The platform has also been much more inclined to release episodes weekly for international releases like K-dramas, but that could also be attributed to the fact that such genres still follow the TV model, which remains predominant in their native countries.

So far, the piece said, ‘Hastings has seemed unwilling to pivot off the binge model because he hasn’t needed or wanted to. Now, it appears, he does.’

While at first this does make it sound like the company is considering changing routes, it is more likely – given the context – that it’s referring to the need to consider pivoting in the first place.

So far, the platform has gotten by with not making drastic changes to their release model, but given the recent drop in subscribers and the stiff competition from platforms like Amazon Prime Video, Hulu, HBO Max, and more, they just might need to.

Plus, there’s the fact that Netflix haven’t announced any changes in programming whatsoever, which makes us believe that this is simply a misinterpretation.

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