Netflix original titles released per year

Netflix released more original content and the US installed more charging stations between 2013 and 2022, and the two curves climbed together (r = 0.958) with the same decade-long determination to convert someone else's infrastructure problem into their own. One is charging the car; the other is charging the subscription. Both the car and the show are, eventually, plugged in.

Netflix original title releases grew from 3 titles in 2013 (when House of Cards launched the strategy) to over 480 by 2022, reflecting the company's shift from licensing library to producing content it would own indefinitely; public EV charging stations in the US grew from about 6,000 to over 60,000 in the same window, powered by Tesla's Supercharger network and the eventual arrival of Electrify America and ChargePoint at scale. Both are capital-intensive infrastructure bets by companies that had been asset-light just years before, and both reshaped adjacent industries (Hollywood, the gas station) whose incumbents were slow to notice.

A charger clicks into a port. A title card opens on a sofa. Both are infrastructure, pretending to be entertainment.