Seems like almost every industry is looking towards transitioning to a subscription model for its goods and services. Netflix may be the most iconic one such company, having acquired millions of subscribers that allow it to have a relatively stable, monthly influx of liquidity (yes, we can also count World of Warcraft on such a scenario). However, many other industries have taken to the same approach (think lootcrates, all kinds of crates, subscription services for online features, etc).

That said, few industries can take the same amount of data from their subscribers such as these media-consumption based ones, where an Internet connection is required, and user data - be it views or, the most interesting metric, engagement rates - are king in determining exactly what the user base expects and craves more of. Netflix's algorithms and view history have been responsible for the selection of its future investments. The base idea for the movie Bright, for example, was developed based on a mash-up of genres Netflix's algorithms indicated as the more captivating to the user base - and Netflix's sci-fi portfolio, for instance, has recently grown towards becoming the single biggest investment from the company, as users seem to gobble-up such content (I'm dully guilty as charged for that one sin as well, I have to admit).After that (slightly) lengthy introduction, we come to the real crux of the article, in the announcement, via press release, that EA has acquired game streaming service Gamefly. EA had already dipped its toes in the subscription-based world with its EA Access platform (which grants users access to a growing catalog of EA-published games, provided they make a monthly or yearly payment). However, that EA Access only distributed EA-made games severely limited EA's ability to gather user engagement information in the market as a whole - only EA-published games saw their data collected, which left EA with a sort of circular feedback loop, where it has to make changes to its own games to see and study user reaction, or otherwise, take some macro, distanced looks at other industry players' moves, successes, and defeats.Now, with a game streaming service under its proverbial umbrella, EA not only has another means of games distribution, but has access to user engagement and data collection on other, non-EA games, extending its reach further, and being better able to, a la Netflix, curate its investments, see what works, what doesn't, and when doesn't it work. It's a nice move, bringing EA up to speed to Sony and Microsoft's efforts to generate a streamlined revenue (and information) highway to serve the market exactly what it knows - or doesn't even know yet - it needs.