Netflix killed the cable star

After a weekend frenzy I can only describe as metafictional and mostly desperate, I decided to write about what I devoted my weekend and skipped class time to — “House of Cards.”

House of Cards has been incredibly lucrative for Netflix, despite the naysayers, and it proves we don’t need cable anymore.

It cost Netflix $100 million dollars to produce both seasons, so it’s difficult to imagine the company being able to break even, let alone actually turn a noticeable profit.

Well, fret no longer — Netflix is doing just fine. CNBC reports that the day before the show’s season two Valentine’s Day launch, Netflix’s stock climbed to an all-time high of $439.49 a share .

Additionally, the CNBC article reports about 16 percent of Netflix users on one particular Internet service supplied by an unspecified U.S. cable operator watched at least one episode of the show on its launch date.

Sixteen percent may not sound like a big number, but think of the huge selection Netflix has to offer. And out of that selection, about one of six Netflix watchers tuned into the same show — “House of Cards.”

This is all fine and dandy, but what about users who binge and then cancel their subscription before their free trial is up?

Subscribers for Netflix are also at an all-time high at 40 million, which means they have surpassed HBO. This is revolutionary.

HBO has been around since 1972, while Netflix’s instant streaming service began in 2007. You do the math.

Netflix is retaining its users at incredible rates.

Television is changing. We can’t deny that any longer. People are cutting their cable cords — 1.8 million in the second quarter of 2013, according to Business Insider — and heading to the Internet TV route.

And with the impending merger between the two tyrants of the cable industry, Time Warner and Comcast, expect these numbers to increase.

My parents’ cable and Internet bill from TWC usually runs around $250 a month.

Internet TV is making the cable part of that almost obsolete. Imagine how much money we could all save if we cut off the cable we don’t really use that much anymore.

And with the success of Netflix original series like “House of Cards,” “Orange is the New Black” and the fourth season of “Arrested Development,” Netflix proved that we don’t need cable for quality original programming.

Maybe the instant gratification of Netflix is a bad thing. But we’ve all known staring blankly at a screen for hours on end isn’t good for you for years now. So I don’t really see a problem with Netflix specifically.

But what I do see a problem with is the expense of cable television. So, by all means, Netflix away. Unless you have, like, a class to go to.

­— zipperr@indiana.edu