Not sure why Quibi failed. Maybe trying to get distribution/tech and content right at the same time didn't work for them. Netflix doesn't have distribution problem, just content and it should try to iterate on what works.
Personally, there are so many short stories (e.g. by Greg Egan, Borges, others[0]) which I would like it to reach mass audience. Rights are tricky issue though.
Quibi was interesting - the more I think about it (I work in this space) the more I think they actually might have had something.
The reason they failed is mostly because they went too big too fast. They spent almost a billion dollars in content at launch and expected to get a ton of people subscribed quickly at $8 a pop. Had a bit of a chicken and egg situation there. They needed enough quality content to justify that amount per month. But it was all new, untested content. When they didn't get the subscribers they had pretty much zero runway to ride it out and iterate.
Quibi failed because they over capitalized it and then pulled out when it didn't have the xxM DAUs. They basically launched and had an amazing journey in the same month.
To be fair to the backers (such winning personalities as Jeffrey Katzenberg and Meg Whitman, ugh), it wasn't a case of 1M DAUs when they wanted 5M. It was more like 5k DAUs when they wanted 5M. The idea was dead on arrival, no amount of money and effort would've saved it.
Personally, there are so many short stories (e.g. by Greg Egan, Borges, others[0]) which I would like it to reach mass audience. Rights are tricky issue though.
https://qntm.org/responsibilit [0]