The great streaming panic of 2022 began with an errant quarterly earnings report four years ago.

Netflix, which had been riding high for years, reported a 200,000 subscriber loss , stunning Wall Street and missing its own expectations of a 2.5 million subscriber gain. On the earnings call, Netflix co-founder Reed Hastings shocked even his own staff by announcing that the company would launch an ad-supported tier.

That miss began an industry-wide pivot to profitability: The streaming wars, which had been about a land grab for subscribers, turned in that moment into a battle for survival, with profits at the core.

Four years later and we are once again in the throes of Q1 earnings. But what if … we weren’t?

On Tuesday, the Securities and Exchange Commission proposed amendments that, if adopted, would change how public companies share important information with Wall Street.…