In 2011, Netflix was minting money mailing DVDs. Streaming was clunky, low-margin, and threatened their own cash cow. The safe move: protect the DVDs.
Instead, Reed Hastings split the company and bet everything on streaming — a business that would cannibalize the one paying the bills. Wall Street punished him; the stock dropped nearly 80%. Subscribers revolted.
He did it anyway, because of one rule: if you don't disrupt yourself, someone else will disrupt you — and they won't be kind about it.
Blockbuster chose to protect its profitable stores. It's gone. Netflix chose to attack itself. It's worth hundreds of billions.