Hasta La Creative!

The viewership numbers on China’s streaming sites hint at just how huge online video is in China. “Orange is the New Black” got 54 million views over two seasons on video site Youku Tudou; “Downton Abbey” had 112 million views there in five seasons.

Here’s another big number: There are 649 million internet users in China (that’s twice the entire U.S. population), two thirds of whom watch online video, according to the China Internet Network Information Center. And with stakes so high, China’s online giants have been battling to outdo each other by creating content and paying massive sums to license programming from at home and abroad. Much of what’s online is viewable for free, from “Downton” to “Orange is the New Black” to “Homeland” to “Breaking Bad”; people just watch a few ads to view them. The problem is that ad revenues alone aren’t enough to turn a profit.

There are already several subscription services, but internet and e-commerce giant Alibaba made waves this week by announcing it would launch an ambitious service requiring people to pay for most content. (Alibaba sees it as a Chinese take on HBO or Netflix; Netflix itself has also been looking for a way into China.) Another streaming service backed by search giant Baidu, iQiyi, said this week that its own subscription service has 5 million signups.

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