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Netflix Doubles Down on ‘Stranger Things,’ ‘Squid Game’ Spin-Offs
Christian Hetrick
Christian Hetrick is dot.LA's Entertainment Tech Reporter. He was formerly a business reporter for the Philadelphia Inquirer and reported on New Jersey politics for the Observer and the Press of Atlantic City.
Netflix’s subscriber numbers have been a bit Upside Down lately, with the streaming giant shedding customers last quarter instead of adding them.
But one thing that’s still worked well for Netflix is “Stranger Things,” the hit sci-fi horror series that just wrapped up its fourth season. The latest installment surpassed 1 billion hours watched, making it the second-most-viewed title in Netflix history. The show dominates the cultural zeitgeist like few others, with the ability to send singer Kate Bush’s “Running Up That Hill” near the top of the charts 37 years after its release.
So it’s no surprise that Netflix is now doubling down on “Stranger Things,” planning a spinoff series developed by the show’s creators Matt and Ross Duffer. On Wednesday, the streaming giant announced the Duffer brothers launched a new production company called Upside Down Pictures, which is working on several projects for Netflix, including the “Stranger Things” spinoff.
Details are light, but the Duffer brothers have said the new show will be a ”1,000% different” than the flagship series, one that’s unlikely to be centered on main characters Eleven (played by Millie Bobbie Brown) or Steve (Joe Keery). Netflix and the Duffer brothers also confirmed a forthcoming stage play “set within the world and mythology” of “Stranger Things.”
The announcements show that even at a time when Netflix is slashing staff to reign in costs, the company is investing more money into its fan-favorite franchises. The streaming service is making a reality TV series based on “Squid Game,” which Netflix claims will offer the biggest cash prize for a TV competition but presumably less death. That’s in addition to a second season of the Korean dystopian hit.
The company’s expansion into gaming includes a host of mobile titles based on popular series like “The Queen’s Gambit” and “La Casa de Papel.” “Stranger Things” has already gotten the video game treatment.
Building upon proven blockbusters is, of course, not a new idea in Hollywood. But the streaming wars have put the strategy on steroids. Just take a look at Disney Plus, which next month releases “Andor,” a “Star Wars” spinoff that’s a prequel to the spinoff “Rogue One,” as well as “Lego Star Wars Summer Vacation,” in which the galactic battles are put on hold for some much needed R&R. All told, Disney had planned for 10 new Star Wars series and 10 Marvel shows in the near future.
While Netflix lacks that kind of franchise firepower, “Stranger Things” is one of their biggest arsenals. It makes sense that, even as Netflix grasps at new ideas like reversing its resistance to advertising, the company is betting big on something that already works.
The streaming service needs all the help it can get: Netflix not only reported its first subscriber loss in a decade during the first quarter, but predicted that the second quarter would be even worse. That dire prediction came despite knowing that “Stranger Things 4” was set to stream this summer. It’s a sign that, for Netflix, simply adding more “Stranger Things” monsters won’t be a silver bullet.
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Christian Hetrick
Christian Hetrick is dot.LA's Entertainment Tech Reporter. He was formerly a business reporter for the Philadelphia Inquirer and reported on New Jersey politics for the Observer and the Press of Atlantic City.
Super73 Co-Founder and CEO Turned His Biking Passion Into a Business
12:55 PM | August 01, 2022
Image courtesy of Super73.
LeGrand Crewse has been biking for his entire life — but it wasn’t until he made his own bike that he knew he would “change the world.”
On this episode of the PCH Driven podcast, Super73 founder LeGrand Crewse talks about his journey from enthusiast and hobbyist to founding and electric, fat-tire motorbike company based in Orange County.
“My very first memory of what I’d call freedom was actually on my fifth birthday,” Crewse says. Why? “I got my very first bike.”
That He-Man bike with a three speed shifter is “all he wanted,” Crewse says. The bike let him explore his hometown in Arizona on his own and introduced him to biking, which he continued as a teen and into adulthood — until he got his first car. Then, he says, the bike went into the garage and he became fascinated with customizing his new gas-powered ride.
“[It’s] a little bit cringeworthy now, but I put this, you know, loud exhaust on it and spray painted the wheels and spent way too much money at Autozone on various little pieces,” he says.
It was his corporate job—and its miserable 17-mile commute—that would later match his flair for customization with his earlier love for bikes and inspire him to build his first electric vehicle
“I thought, ‘hey, well, maybe I'll ride my bike to and from work’. That only happened a few times— and I realized ‘this is not fun’, you know, especially at the end of the day—riding an hour and a half back,” he says “Eventually, that's kind of what led me to saying, hey, what if I put a motor on one of these things, and let's see what happens.”
By trial and error, Crewse taught himself how to convert his bike into an ebike over the course of months. He continued tinkering with it, adding different motors, power controllers and batteries. Eventually, he turned his bike into a vehicle that could get him to and from the office in comfort.
“It literally changed my life. Because at that point, you know, that commute went from being this horrible thing in the beginning of my day — and the end of the day, too. It was the thing that brought me joy, it was what I woke up and was looking forward to was the ride to work the ride back, because I didn't have to take the same roads that I normally did,” says Crewse, “And so just going through and not dealing with traffic and cars and all that frustration, it was everything… It completely changed my life and that I was so excited about this.”
At the time he began working on his first creation, Crewse was also starting grad school. To everyone who knew him at the office and in class, he was “definitely that annoying ebike guy.”
He says he showed off his custom ebike to everyone, and spent the next five years trying to create prototypes and monetize his creations. He began to work with small manufacturers to convert their bikes into electric bikes. During that time he developed a drive system and a process that could easily convert a regular bicycle into an electric bicycle.
“And so that became my niche.”
An old friend’s Facebook post inviting Crewse to join him on a vacation in China later became the catalyst for his own bike company. While there, Crewse met with electric motor manufacturers and suppliers, visited factories and learned about the Chinese railway system. He used the knowledge and network he developed in China to grow his business. Along the way, he met Aaron Wong and Michael Cannavo, who would later become his two co-founders.
The two had been trying to manufacture and market cargo scooters to large warehouses to help move materials from one area to another. The concept didn’t pan out and the two had been considering ways they could electrify their creation. That’s where Crewse came in as the expert in electric drive train technology. Together, they used the manufacturing space and equipment and paired it with Crewse’s electric bicycle converter to produce ebikes. Slowly the model started to take off.
Courtesy of Super73
The first Super73 product the trio produced together was born out of a heavily-modified Taco mini bike kit, a Southern California brand that was popular in the ‘60s, and combined it with a fat tire kids’ bike they bought at a chain outlet. Their first-edition Super73 had 500 orders in the first month of the startup’s Kickstarter campaign.
“All of us kind of realized, ‘Oh, we actually have to do this for real’,” Crewse says.
It took the group a year and a half to fill those initial orders. At the same time, however, they were working on the next generation of the Super73. Now, the company has grown to offer a line of ebikes, and will soon be expanding into electric motorcycles.
Now, with a successful company in their hands, Super73 still holds onto the same values of electrifying transportation, making it accessible and creating products for the next generation.
“One of the things that never gets old, I will tell you, to this very day, when I see one of our bikes blasting down, I see people having fun on it. I mean, it's just, it makes everything worth it,” says Crewse. “[For] people to be able to go and enjoy this thing that you know, that I got to experience 11 years ago…. It's deeply, deeply satisfying.”
Subscribe to PCH Driven on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, iHeart, Google or wherever you get your podcasts.
dot.LA Engagement & Production Intern Jojo Macaluso contributed to this post.
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Jamie Williams
Jamie Williams is the host of the “PCH Driven” podcast, a show about Southern California entrepreneurs, innovators and its driven leaders on their road to success. The series celebrates and reveals the wonders of the human spirit and explores the motivations behind what drives us.
Here's How To Get a Digital License Plate In California
03:49 PM | October 14, 2022
Photo by Clayton Cardinalli on Unsplash
Thanks to a new bill passed on October 5, California drivers now have the choice to chuck their traditional metal license plates and replace them with digital ones.
The plates are referred to as “Rplate” and were developed by Sacramento-based Reviver. A news release on Reviver’s website that accompanied the bill’s passage states that there are “two device options enabling vehicle owners to connect their vehicle with a suite of services including in-app registration renewal, visual personalization, vehicle location services and security features such as easily reporting a vehicle as stolen.”
Reviver Auto Current and Future CapabilitiesFrom Youtube
There are wired (connected to and powered by a vehicle’s electrical system) and battery-powered options, and drivers can choose to pay for their plates monthly or annually. Four-year agreements for battery-powered plates begin at $19.95 a month or $215.40 yearly. Commercial vehicles will pay $275.40 each year for wired plates. A two-year agreement for wired plates costs $24.95 per month. Drivers can choose to install their plates, but on its website, Reviver offers professional installation for $150.
A pilot digital plate program was launched in 2018, and according to the Los Angeles Times, there were 175,000 participants. The new bill ensures all 27 million California drivers can elect to get a digital plate of their own.
California is the third state after Arizona and Michigan to offer digital plates to all drivers, while Texas currently only provides the digital option for commercial vehicles. In July 2022, Deseret News reported that Colorado might also offer the option. They have several advantages over the classic metal plates as well—as the L.A. Times notes, digital plates will streamline registration renewals and reduce time spent at the DMV. They also have light and dark modes, according to Reviver’s website. Thanks to an accompanying app, they act as additional vehicle security, alerting drivers to unexpected vehicle movements and providing a method to report stolen vehicles.
As part of the new digital plate program, Reviver touts its products’ connectivity, stating that in addition to Bluetooth capabilities, digital plates have “national 5G network connectivity and stability.” But don’t worry—the same plates purportedly protect owner privacy with cloud support and encrypted software updates.
5 Reasons to avoid the digital license plate | Ride TechFrom Youtube
After the Rplate pilot program was announced four years ago, some raised questions about just how good an idea digital plates might be. Reviver and others who support switching to digital emphasize personalization, efficient DMV operations and connectivity. However, a 2018 post published by Sophos’s Naked Security blog pointed out that “the plates could be as susceptible to hacking as other wireless and IoT technologies,” noting that everyday “objects – things like kettles, TVs, and baby monitors – are getting connected to the internet with elementary security flaws still in place.”
To that end, a May 2018 syndicated New York Times news service article about digital plates quoted the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), which warned that such a device could be a “‘honeypot of data,’ recording the drivers’ trips to the grocery store, or to a protest, or to an abortion clinic.”
For now, Rplates are another option in addition to old-fashioned metal, and many are likely to opt out due to cost alone. If you decide to go the digital route, however, it helps if you know what you could be getting yourself into.
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Steve Huff
Steve Huff is an Editor and Reporter at dot.LA. Steve was previously managing editor for The Metaverse Post and before that deputy digital editor for Maxim magazine. He has written for Inside Hook, Observer and New York Mag. Steve is the author of two official tie-ins books for AMC’s hit “Breaking Bad” prequel, “Better Call Saul.” He’s also a classically-trained tenor and has performed with opera companies and orchestras all over the Eastern U.S. He lives in the greater Boston metro area with his wife, educator Dr. Dana Huff.
steve@dot.la
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