Have you heard this one before? A scrappy entertainment company launches a small catalog of ad-free streaming movies and TV shows for cheap. It doesn’t seem like a big deal at first, because the content is mostly B-movies and reruns, but it proves popular with consumers and goes on to change television entertainment as we know it.

I could be referring to Netflix, which started down that exact path with its “Watch Now” streaming catalog way back in 2007. But I could also be prognosticating about Howdy , the $3-per-month streaming service that Roku launched just last week.

The parallels are obvious. Roku is starting with a small catalog, heavy on filler, and claims it’s not trying to compete with incumbents. But it’s also arriving at a time when consumers are increasingly frustrated with

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