Narrative: Disrupting TV
Each narrative page (like this) has a page describing and evaluating the narrative, followed by all the posts on the site tagged with that narrative. Scroll down beyond the introduction to see the posts.
Facebook, Amazon, Twitter and YouTube are bidding to stream the NFL’s Thursday night games – Recode (Mar 24, 2017)
When Twitter won these rights last time around in their first year as a separate set from television rights, it turned out to be something very different from what many of us expected. Rather than a massive splurge on a very valuable set of rights, it turned out that the winner merely got the right to show the games along with advertising mostly already sold by broadcasters, meaning there was very little additional revenue opportunity, and as such Twitter got the rights for a paltry $10 million. These NFL games have actually been a good fit with Twitter’s overall live strategy, which has mostly been focused on winning audiences rather than lots of new revenue, but it seems others are interested in taking another crack this year. It would obviously fit well with Facebook’s recent push into professionally produced live video, but also with YouTube’s recent investment in e-sports rights and with Amazon’s foray into TV bundles and Twitch video streaming. It’s less of a good fit with Apple’s current focus in the TV space, so it’s not surprising that its name doesn’t appear here. I’ll be very interested to see if the NFL is pitching the same kind of package as last time or whether the winning bidder will have the right to sell more of its own ads this time around.
via Recode
Comcast Said to Gain Rights to Offer Web TV Service Nationwide – Bloomberg (Mar 23, 2017)
I’ve held for quite a while that there’s a game of chicken going on between the various big pay TV providers over who will be first to take a streaming version of their service nationwide, and it looks like Comcast is taking steps to ensure that it can do so if and when it decides to move forward. That’s not a guarantee that Comcast actually will do so, and indeed this piece suggests Comcast has no immediate plans on this front. But it’s clearly in a very strong position to do so, as the second largest TV provider in the US and the largest cable company, and also the pay TV provider with the strongest user interface through its X1 platform. That platform could potentially run as an app on third party boxes like Roku, Amazon Fire TV, and Apple TV should it choose to run a nationwide service. And there is, of course, big upside from a revenue perspective in offering its service nationally, especially as a hedge against cord cutting within its existing footprint. The downside is that such a service would be standalone, and with content costs rising as a percentage of video revenue, margins there are being squeezed. In its footprint, Comcast can offset that by charging more for broadband or up-selling voice or home automation services as part of a bundle, but that’s not possible when selling online TV as a standalone product. Still, at some point I believe Comcast and other big pay TV providers will finally take really compelling TV offerings (rather than the watered down stuff we’re seeing from Sling and DirecTV) national, and that will be a big deal.
via Bloomberg
Netflix still has a huge lead in the streaming wars, but Hulu’s smaller service has loyal users (on TV sets) – Recode (Mar 22, 2017)
I added the parenthetical in the headline because that’s the key caveat here, as the piece itself points out. There’s a great chart in here comparing penetration of TV viewing over WiFi by various services with the average hours spent viewing those services in households that use them, and it highlights Netflix’s dominance as both the most popular and most used service within that narrow viewing category. Hulu does well on time spent too, though with far fewer households, while Amazon Video comes bottom of the four, and YouTube has reasonably high penetration but low time spent (again, on TVs in homes). Obviously, all four services can be viewed outside of homes too, and it’s YouTube in particular would score much higher in a mobile-only comparison. But for the other three services, in-home viewing on a TV is a critical segment of the audience, and it’s worth noting the order on that basis: Netflix first, Hulu second, and Amazon third. Sadly, there’s no traditional content in here for comparison’s sake – much higher percentages take pay TV services in the US than any of these services, and time spent is quite a bit higher too. The full Comscore report (linked below) is well worth reading in its entirety – lots of other interesting data points.
via Recode (source Comscore report here)
Cable Network Owners are Culling Underperforming Networks (Mar 21, 2017)
Today, both the Wall Street Journal and Variety published in-depth pieces on the way major cable network owners are culling some of their underperforming networks, either shutting them down entirely or shifting investment to their more successful properties. Both articles have lots of good history, and each also features an interesting graphic with lots of detail that helps readers see which are the worst performing networks. All of this is, of course, a reflection of several trends impacting the TV industry, from cord cutting to cord shaving to increasing content costs and a shift from linear live viewing to VOD and streaming. For now, the focus is on these underperforming channels, and the pieces seem to suggest there are magic subscriber numbers above which the problems are either smaller or don’t exist at all. But the reality is that even big networks like ESPN are struggling. As I argued in a my weekly Variety piece last week, the only thing keeping most cable networks from seeing negative growth is contractual rate increases, which won’t last forever. Interestingly, though, cable networks continue to be some of the most lucrative segments of the overall TV market, with high margins relative to pay TV providers and broadcasters.
Hulu unveils new website for upcoming live TV service, shows off new UI, more – 9to5Google (Mar 16, 2017)
There’s not a ton of new detail here – Hulu briefed reporters on a lot of this back at CES, but there are a couple of new tidbits. Notably, it sounds like the DVR function will feel a lot less DVR-y and more like an online read-it-later service for video, which sounds a lot more user friendly than a lot of the cloud DVRs I’ve seen. The multiple simultaneous streams and profiles are interesting too – that makes it much more of a pay TV replacement than most of what we’ve seen. I have to say, as a cord cutter, I’m probably more excited about Hulu’s entry in this market than all the others I’ve seen. Big questions, as usual: local content and whether/where it will be available, and which channels get left out to hit the usual $30-40 price bracket.
via 9to5Google
Netflix Tries to Outdo Theaters With Films a Studio Can Envy – Bloomberg (Mar 14, 2017)
Netflix is seriously ramping up its original content investment, something it’s been talking about for some time. And recent flops notwithstanding, it’s had some really good content over the past couple of years. Now it’s shifting its focus to commissioning and acquiring more and bigger budget movies, and plans to release around 30 in 2017 including some starring big names like Will Smith, Brad Pitt, and Tilda Swinton. That number is impressive – none of the major traditional studios or distributors had more than 24 movies in market in 2016 and Disney, for example, will have only eight movies on its slate in 2017. Now, Netflix’s productions are generally smaller budget affairs – it’s acquired movies at Sundance and other film festivals, where the average acquisition price has risen from $2 to $5 million over the past few years but it’s also commissioning some bigger budget films, though nothing in the multi-hundred million range just yet. But this is yet another way for Netflix to set itself apart from Amazon, HBO, and other big names in the subscription video business. As of right now, Netflix has 119 originals slated for future release listed on its website, and 28 of those are films, so its main focus is still on series (each of which will obviously provide far greater total viewing time than a single feature), but movies are going to be increasingly important going forward as part of that mix.
via Bloomberg
Hulu Live TV Service Won’t Have Viacom Networks – Variety (Mar 10, 2017)
As I mentioned in the context of the YouTube TV launch announcement a couple of weeks ago, every one of these streaming pay TV services has to make a set of sacrifices from the traditional TV lineup in order to hit the target $35-40 price point. In the case of Hulu’s service, it looks like Viacom’s channels will be among those sacrificed, which is in keeping with both the end of Hulu’s recent video on demand deal with Viacom and with Sony’s dropping of the Viacom channels a while ago, as well as their absence from YouTube’s service. DirecTV Now and Sling both continue to carry at least some Viacom channels, but those channels have become less and less popular over recent years as flagships MTV and Comedy Central have faded in cultural relevance. There’s something of a revival going on at MTV at the moment under Viacom’s new leadership, but these are still probably the easiest set of major channels for a new service to live without. Based on what I’ve seen so far of Hulu’s service, it looks like being one of the more compelling offerings to launch, particularly if it bundles in the traditional Hulu VoD service.
via Variety
‘Power Rangers’ Streaming Free on Twitch in 17-Day Marathon – Variety (Mar 10, 2017)
Another reminder that Amazon has a much broader future in mind for Twitch than just gaming videos – it’s paying out of pocket to stream the Power Rangers TV series in a free marathon over the course of 17 days. Its investments in TV content for Twitch have mostly been very small (and often somewhat obscure) in relation to its original content and other investments for Prime Video, but they seem to be building steam. And as this piece points out, Power Rangers is probably a better fit for the core Twitch audience than old Bob Ross or Julia Child shows.
via Variety
Netflix lets you literally choose your own adventure – Axios (Mar 6, 2017)
The headline here should be in future, not present, tense – Netflix is only experimenting with this idea for now, not rolling it out to users on its service. For one thing, content has to be created with this objective explicitly in mind, and it will take time to create that content, as well as to create the user interfaces to enable the interactivity which currently doesn’t exist in Netflix. But this does highlight how a digital native platform like Netflix can do things traditional TV companies simply can’t. Whether or not that ends up being compelling for users will depend a lot on the content – I can see this being a novelty at best in the early running until it shows up on some really top notch shows or movies.
via Axios
23% of US Adults Stream Netflix Daily – Leichtman Research Group (Mar 6, 2017)
There are lots of interesting numbers in this Leichtman Research Group survey, and I just picked one of them for the headline here: that very nearly a quarter of US adults use Netflix every single day. That’s pretty remarkable off the back of under 50 million paid subscriptions in the US. Also worth noting: the vast majority of Netflix viewers (81%) watch Netflix on a TV (by implication, at least sometimes) – this isn’t just people watching on phones and computers, meaning it’s a much more direct substitute for traditional TV viewing. More US households now have Netflix (54%) than have a DVR (53%) for the first time. And there’s lots more here too – the reality is that viewing habits are shifting dramatically, while the underlying spending on pay TV still hasn’t shifted at all, and that’s because many households still feel that traditional pay TV offers either decent value or the only way to get the content they have to have, even if they’re also paying for Netflix, Amazon Prime, Hulu, or something else. Somewhere in the next couple of years, that reaches a tipping point – no market has ever gone for too long with a dramatic mismatch between usage and spending – but it doesn’t feel like we’re there yet.