In its guidelines for its employees, Netflix establishes that “artistic expression” is one of its fundamental principles. But we have to believe that this freedom of expression stops where the subscriber base begins to grow.
According to information from Washington Post, Netflix has agreed to withdraw a dozen content from its catalog, at the request of several governments in Southeast Asia, such as Indonesia, the Philippines or Singapore. Thus, of the 18 films and series that the streaming platform agreed to withdraw between 2016 and 2021, more than half were considered unfit by these different governments.
Drugs, War and Sovereignty
The Philippines, for example, demanded the removal of two episodes of an Australian spy show because it featured maps of the South China Sea, the subject of numerous claim disputes between Asian countries. In Vietnam, it is a South Korean drama that was canceled due to the dialogues of one of the characters, who was supposed to play a veteran of the Vietnam War. The government judged that the declarations of the characters offended “the nation and the heroes of the nation.”
As for Singapore, the source of the largest number of censorship requests, Netflix was ordered to remove content that “glorified” drug use. Netflix would have even asked the different governments, as well as experts, for precise rules to determine what was considered offensive or inappropriate content in these countries.
60% new subscribers
If Netflix insists so much on appealing to the countries of Southeast Asia, it is because this part of the globe is currently at the heart of the growth of the streaming platform, which seeks to open more and more offices in this area.
After a year 2022 marked by the loss of subscribers, Netflix has recovered well. And this boom was made possible by the Asian market: Netflix gained 5.3 million subscribers in Southeast Asia in 2022 while, at the same time, it lost 1 million in North America. According to some forecasts, Southeast Asia will concentrate 60% of its new subscribers in the next five years.
A blessing for Netflix, which has long been overtaken in Asia by streaming platforms unknown in France, such as Viu or Vidio, but also by Disney +.
Source: BFM TV
