Netflix subscribers hit 100m, but Mideast viewers slow to tune in

Updated 26 July 2017
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Netflix subscribers hit 100m, but Mideast viewers slow to tune in

LONDON: Earlier this year Netflix soared past the 100-million-subscriber mark, prompting Chief Executive Reed Hastings to celebrate with a Denny’s steak dinner, as he did when the streaming service surpassed 1 million users.
Growth has outstripped expectations this year, boosting the company’s market cap to $81 billion, seeing its share price rise from $158 to almost $190 in the past month.
But while Hastings may be dining out on growth figures worldwide, he may be less taken with numbers being served in the Middle East.
According to estimates by analytics firm IHS Markit, at the end of 2016 Netflix had just 137,000 subscribers across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA).
IHS Markit estimates that will tick up to 1.29 million by the end of 2021. Its forecasts are created by combining subscriber numbers from Netflix with their own in-house models, resulting in estimated subscriber numbers by country and region. Netflix was asked to comment on these estimates but declined to reply.
According to analysts, Netflix — makers of the popular series “House of Cards” and “Orange is the New Black” — faces multiple headwinds in growing its user base in MENA.
Issues include pirated content and the popularity of free-to-air content, but the growth potential is strong.
“Piracy and the offering of quality content for free have already played their role in keeping pay TV in MENA very low. Around 10 percent of TV households in MENA subscribe to pay TV,” IHS Markit analyst Max Signorelli told Arab News.
“These factors are definitely impacting upon the growth of services like Netflix. However, IHS Markit has noticed that in the last few years an ever-increasing portion of premium content is moving under a paywall. Operators like OSN and beIN Media... are investing heavily in acquiring and licensing premium content. So definitely there are challenges, but also the MENA region has a high potential for growth for SVoD (subscription video on demand) services.”
Hurdles to Netflix cornering MENA also include other Over The Top (OTT) services — internet-specific entertainment providers — already vying for market share, including Starz Play Arabia, icflix, Shahid Plus and Seevii.
“There are other OTT players that are working hard in the region. Starz Play recently announced another round of funding, taking it up to $125 million. Iflix… has a deal in place with Zain, so it’s present in quite a significant way in the GCC (Gulf Cooperation Council) markets,” Nick Grande, managing director of Dubai-based TV consultancy ChannelSculptor, told Arab News.
Grande added that these regional OTT players are already taking on the challenge of low pay-TV take-up, while confronting the region-specific problem of limited credit card use.
“A credit card is the most straightforward way to subscribe to an OTT service, but credit card penetration in the region is very low, especially outside the UAE and Qatar,” he said.
Internet infrastructure is also noted as a potential barrier to OTT expansion across MENA, with streaming speeds being fast in most GCC countries, but less so elsewhere.
Hassan Ghoul, a broadcast industry veteran and regional director of IABM, the international trade association for suppliers of broadcast and media technology, told Arab News: “Average connection speeds vary across the MENA countries. Broadband speed isn’t the same everywhere. The UAE has strong infrastructure to give a good connection speed to allow services like Netflix (to flourish).”
Internet speed differences mean that while watching streaming content in Dubai is easy — with the UAE boasting the second-highest fiber broadband penetration globally — it is less easy in Lebanon.
Ghoul said while it is still possible to watch streaming content in the Levant, the quality is likely to be affected by infrastructure limitations.
The big lure for many subscribers to Netflix worldwide is its content, and the deep-pocketed company has a $6 billion content budget in 2017.
A big question is whether any of that will be spent in the Middle East on Arabic-language shows to boost subscriber numbers.
“Pay-TV operators that have invested in acquiring and producing local content (such as OSN) have seen a huge increase in viewership for this particular content from their subscribers. Netflix has no option but to invest in local content in the region,” said Signorelli.
“Considering the scalability potential of Arabic content, we expect that Netflix will eventually roll out content-investment plans for the region.”
Grande agrees but says Netflix likes to make universally appealing shows “that will sell in South America, in the US, in France… like they achieved with ‘Narcos.’”
All expectations are that Netflix will invest in Arabic content at some point, with Hastings telling Campaign Middle East in April that the region is a “great market” and “there is strong interest in Internet video of all sorts.”
The TV market in MENA is forecast to grow by 30 percent from 2016 to 2021, according to a report by digital economy think tank IDATE.
AT Kearney predicts that the Middle East’s OTT sector could grow to $1.06 billion by 2020 were it to gain mass-market acceptance.
That would represent 25 percent of total TV revenue in the region, on par with the American TV market.

This article was updated on July 26, 2017. In an earlier version of the article, a quote made reference to a deal between Icflix and Zain. In fact, the interviewee was referring to Iflix, another company. This change has been reflected in the text above. Another quote was clarified to indicate that credit card use is low in the region outside the UAE and Qatar.


France tries five for kidnapping journalists in Syria

Updated 17 February 2025
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France tries five for kidnapping journalists in Syria

  • They were charged with holding four French journalists hostage for Daesh in war-torn Syria more than a decade ago
  • The journalists were held by Daesh in Aleppo for 10 months until their release in April 2014

PARIS: Five men went on trial in France on Monday charged with holding four French journalists hostage for Daesh in war-torn Syria more than a decade ago.

Daesh emerged in 2013 in the chaos that followed the outbreak of the Syrian civil war.

The militants kidnapped a number of foreign journalists and aid workers before US-backed forces eventually defeated the group in 2019.

Reporters Didier Francois and Edouard Elias, and then Nicolas Henin and Pierre Torres, were abducted 10 days apart while reporting from northern Syria in June 2013.

The journalists were held by Daesh in Aleppo for 10 months until their release in April 2014.

They were found blindfolded with their hands bound in the no-man’s land straddling the border between Syria and Turkiye.

More than a decade later, jailed militant Mehdi Nemmouche, 39, is among five men accused of their kidnapping at a trial to last until March 21.

Nemmouche is already in prison after a Belgian court jailed him for life in 2019 for killing four people at a Jewish museum in May 2014, after returning from Syria.

“I was never the jailer of the Western hostages or any other hostage, and I never met these people in Syria,” Nemmouche told the Paris court, breaking his silence after not speaking throughout the Brussels trial or during the investigation.

All four journalists told investigators they were sure Nemmouche was their jailer.

Henin, in a magazine article in September 2014, recounted Nemmouche, then called Abu Omar, punching him in the face and terrorizing Syrian detainees. He described him as “a self-centered fantasist.”

Also in the dock are Frenchman Abdelmalek Tanem, 35, who has already been sentenced in France for heading to fight in Syria in 2012, and a 41-year-old Syrian called Kais Al-Abdallah, accused of facilitating Henin’s kidnapping. Both have denied the charges.

Belgian militant Oussama Atar, a senior Daesh commander, is being tried in absentia because he is presumed to have died in Syria in 2017. He has already been sentenced to life over attacks in Paris in 2015 claimed by Daesh that killed 130 people, and Brussels bombings by the group that took the lives of 32 others in 2016.

French Daesh member Salim Benghalem, who was allegedly in charge of the hostages, is also on trial though believed to be dead.


West Bank booksellers say arrests reflect intensifying Israeli crackdown on Palestinian culture

Updated 15 February 2025
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West Bank booksellers say arrests reflect intensifying Israeli crackdown on Palestinian culture

  • Mahmoud Muna and his nephew Ahmed were arrested on Sunday after Israeli police raided the family-owned bookshops on accusation of selling books that supported terrorism
  • “Case is not isolated event, but part of series of attack against Palestinian cultural institutions,” Mahmoud said

LONDON: Two booksellers from the West Bank, recently arrested by Israeli police, say their detention is part of an escalating effort by Israeli authorities to suppress Palestinian culture.

In an interview with The Guardian, Mahmoud Muna and his nephew Ahmed, whose family has owned the Educational Bookshop in East Jerusalem for more than 40 years, described the raid on their store as part of a broader campaign to stifle Palestinian identity and free expression.

“We should not look at this as an isolated event,” Mahmoud said. “There have been a series of attacks on cultural institutions in Jerusalem and beyond. I think there is an awareness in the Israeli establishment that cultural institutions are playing a role in galvanising and protecting Palestinian cultural identity.”

The raid occurred last Sunday when plainclothes officers entered two branches of the bookshop on Salah Eddin Street — one specializing in Arabic books, the other in English and foreign-language publications. Mahmoud and Ahmed were arrested and detained for two days.

Israeli police accused the men of “selling books containing incitement and support for terrorism,” claiming officers found materials with “nationalist Palestinian themes,” including a children’s coloring book that contained the Israeli-contested sentence “From the river to the sea.”

The two men said that police confiscated about 300 books for examination, but all were eventually returned except for eight, including the coloring book, which they said had been sent for review and was not on sale.

After appearing in Jerusalem Magistrates Court on Monday, the charges against them were downgraded to a public order offense, but they were ordered to spend another 24 hours in detention, followed by five days of house arrest.

Their arrest sparked international condemnation, with journalists and diplomats closely following the case. In Israel, the incident also drew criticism, with journalist Noa Simone calling the raid a “fascist act” that “evokes frightening historical associations with which every Jew is very familiar.”

Recalling their time in detention, the booksellers described the conditions as “simply unfit for a human to live in.” They said they were held in overcrowded, windowless cells without heating, forced to sleep on mats on a concrete floor in near-freezing temperatures — treatment they likened to psychological torture.

While their experience was harsh, they acknowledged that their situation could have been far worse without international attention and support.

“If we were not working in a bookstore with an international outreach with good international connections, what would have happened?” Mahmoud asked. “Probably the case would have been manipulated against us.”

He also warned of the broader implications of their arrest. “The question is how far are they going to go? If they’re attacking Palestinian bookstores now, they will be attacking Israeli bookstores next.”


Bristling at ‘Gulf of Mexico’ name change on maps, Mexico threatens to sue Google

Updated 14 February 2025
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Bristling at ‘Gulf of Mexico’ name change on maps, Mexico threatens to sue Google

  • After assuming office as US president, Donald Trump declared that he was changing the name Gulf of Mexico to Gulf of America
  • Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said the name Gulf of Mexico dates back to 1607 and is recognized by the United Nations
  • Google has said that it maintains a “long-standing practice of applying name changes when they have been updated in official government sources”

MEXICO CITY: Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said Thursday that her government wouldn’t rule out filing a civil lawsuit against Google if it maintains its stance of calling the stretch of sea between northeastern Mexico and the southeastern United States the “Gulf of America.”
The area, long named the Gulf of Mexico across the the world, has gained a geopolitical spotlight after President Donald Trump declared he would change the Gulf’s name.
Sheinbaum, in her morning news conference, said the president’s decree is restricted to the “continental shelf of the United States” because Mexico still controls much of the Gulf. “We have sovereignty over our continental shelf,” she said.
Sheinbaum said that despite the fact that her government sent a letter to Google saying that the company was “wrong” and that “the entire Gulf of Mexico cannot be called the Gulf of America,” the company has insisted on maintaining the nomenclature.
It was not immediately clear where such a suit would be filed.
Google reported last month on its X account, formerly Twitter, that it maintains a “long-standing practice of applying name changes when they have been updated in official government sources.”
As of Thursday, how the Gulf appeared on Google Maps was dependent on the user’s location and other data. If the user is in the United States, the body of water appeared as Gulf of America. If the user was physically in Mexico, it would appear as the Gulf of Mexico. In many other countries across the world it appears as “Gulf of Mexico (Gulf of America).”
Sheinbaum has repeatedly defended the name Gulf of Mexico, saying its use dates to 1607 and is recognized by the United Nations.
She has also mentioned that, according to the constitution of Apatzingán, the antecedent to Mexico’s first constitution, the North American territory was previously identified as “Mexican America”. Sheinbaum has used the example to poke fun at Trump and underscore the international implications of changing the Gulf’s name.
In that sense, Sheinbaum said on Thursday that the Mexican government would ask Google to make “Mexican America” pop up on the map when searched.
This is not the first time Mexicans and Americans have disagreed on the names of key geographic areas, such as the border river between Texas and the Mexican states of Chihuahua, Coahuila, Nuevo León and Tamaulipas. Mexico calls it Rio Bravo and for the United States it is the Rio Grande.
This week, the White House barred Associated Press reporters from several events, including some in the Oval Office, saying it was because of the news agency’s policy on the name. AP is using “Gulf of Mexico” but also acknowledging Trump’s renaming of it as well, to ensure that names of geographical features are recognizable around the world.

 


124 journalists killed, most by Israel, in deadliest year for reporters

Updated 13 February 2025
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124 journalists killed, most by Israel, in deadliest year for reporters

  • The uptick in killings marks a 22 percent increase over 2023
  • Journalists murdered across 18 different countries, including Palestine's Gaza, Sudan and Pakistan

NEW YORK: Last year was the deadliest for journalists in recent history, with at least 124 reporters killed — and Israel responsible for nearly 70 percent of that total, the Committee to Protect Journalists reported Wednesday.
The uptick in killings, which marks a 22 percent increase over 2023, reflects “surging levels of international conflict, political unrest and criminality worldwide,” the CPJ said.
It was the deadliest year for reporters and media workers since CPJ began keeping records more than three decades ago, with journalists murdered across 18 different countries, it said.
A total of 85 journalists died in the Israeli-Hamas war, “all at the hands of the Israeli military,” the CPJ said, adding that 82 of them were Palestinians.
Sudan and Pakistan recorded the second highest number of journalists and media workers killed, with six each.
In Mexico, which has a reputation as one of the most dangerous countries for reporters, five were killed, with CPJ reporting it had found “persistent flaws” in Mexico’s mechanisms for protecting journalists.
And in Haiti, where two reporters were murdered, widespread violence and political instability have sown so much chaos that “gangs now openly claim responsibility for journalist killings,” the report said.
Other deaths took place in countries such as Myanmar, Mozambique, India and Iraq.
“Today is the most dangerous time to be a journalist in CPJ’s history,” said the group’s CEO Jodie Ginsberg.
“The war in Gaza is unprecedented in its impact on journalists and demonstrates a major deterioration in global norms on protecting journalists,” she said.
CPJ, which has kept records on journalist killings since 1992, said that 24 of the reporters were deliberately killed because of their work in 2024.
Freelancers, the report said, were among the most vulnerable because of their lack of resources, and accounted for 43 of the killings in 2024.
The year 2025 is not looking more promising, with six journalists already killed in the first weeks of the year, CPJ said.


Roblox CEO announces Arabic version at World Governments Summit

Updated 12 February 2025
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Roblox CEO announces Arabic version at World Governments Summit

DUBAI: Roblox CEO David Baszucki announced an Arabic version of the hit game platform during the World Governments Summit on Wednesday.

Baszucki said that the new feature enabled Arabic-speaking creators to reach audiences instantly all over the world.

Through the move, everything on the platform will be available in Arabic.

“Today, we launched worldwide in Arabic, everything on Roblox: Roblox Studio, the Roblox app, automatic translation. Anyone who’s building a Roblox experience in Arabic, it will automatically translate into languages around the world,” he said.

Roblox, an online game platform and game creation system, has more than 88.9 million daily active users.

Many brands use the platform to promote their products, from cosmetics to high-end luxury goods.

“Brands are using our platforms to build 3D experiences to help promote their brands — everything from e.l.f. Beauty to Lamborghini,” he added.

“We have been growing consistently for 18 years now, over 20 percent year on year.”

In the past, the gaming platform faced criticism over safety concerns regarding children on the platform. In 2018, it was banned for several years in the UAE for exposing children to swearing, violence and sexually explicit content.

Baszucki said that child safety is a major concern for the company and that Roblox is utilizing AI technology to ensure a safe gaming experience for users.

“AI is getting so good and evolving so quickly. We have over 200 AI systems on Roblox. We are clear that we are looking at everything on the platform for safety and stability. We are so into the notion of online safety — it’s a top priority,” he said.