The broadcasters were always going to get into the game.
The Office was Netflix's single most watched show (https://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/tv/ct-mov-netfl...) at the time. They'd rather have kept paying for the content than lose it; "go to one place for most of your stuff" was their key value prop for a long time.
> They'd rather have kept paying for the content than lose it;
No they wouldn't. They don't own any part of The Office. Leaving their business dependent on third-party inventory suppliers is something every analyst hammered the CEO on during earnings calls.
The whole point of creating their own shows was to be able to free themselves off the licensing yoke and sell their own IP. Not just on Netflix, but also to cable TV stations internationally.
They have done a terrible job in that respect. Modern Netflix reminds me of British TV in the '80s; extremely stale shows with low budgets.
Doesn't matter. Amazon doesn't own a lot of the products they sell, either. It'd be a big hit to them to lose the third-party sellers. Same for Netflix.
> The whole point of creating their own shows was to be able to free themselves off the licensing yoke and sell their own IP.
This is inverting cause/effect. "We're losing the licensed content" was the motivation for building up their own catalog.
The Office was Netflix's single most watched show (https://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/tv/ct-mov-netfl...) at the time. They'd rather have kept paying for the content than lose it; "go to one place for most of your stuff" was their key value prop for a long time.