Apple's TV Plans Fell Apart Over Content Owners' Resistance to Skinny Bundles

[mkldev]

Lol. You know both sides have to agree to a purchase right?

Do you mean purchasing programming or purchasing a company? If you mean programming, I'm pretty sure the content providers would at least consider a bundle-only scheme.

If you mean purchasing a company, no they don't. A publicly traded company can be taken over by purchasing enough of the shares, and most companies do not hold enough of their own shares to prevent a hostile takeover. In fact, that is by far the exception rather than the rule. And Disney/ABC is a publicly traded company.

 

[maroontiger2k9]

There's no way I'm spending $30-40 for content. No way. There's a reason I don't pay for cable, I don't want to pay for a bunch of channels that I'll never watch.

for HD? cable companies are charging at least $60/month on promotions (if not more) for HD cable..

the cable companies are limiting you to a specific (often 1-2) number of cable boxes... and charge you monthly on them if you go over that number [add additional boxes] ($9/mo).. apple wont

i hope that apple keeps working on this... it might take mean that they need to remove some channels and get the price lower... and then other channels can come in..... reports came out that ESPN is losing a ton of money from cord cutters... they'll forfeit in a matter of years...

i really hope that apple makes this happen.. apple beats struggled to get done and it was postponed but its out and people might not use it, but they know it works and its a good product

 

[lparsons21]

I don't know where you are getting your $60/month with cable for hd subscriptions from, but I can tell you that I'm paying slightly less than $40/month on 1st year promo for my subscription which includes the HD channels they have. Of course, I could add some 'digital packs' and run it up, but why would I want to?

 

[flux73]

The Apple hardware can run competitors' video services too, and those also run on more popular platforms like Android. As much as I like Apple's ecosystem, it's not going to ever be the one that dominates.

It already does:
http://www.macworld.com/article/300...d-roku-to-become-the-leading-set-top-box.html

You're missing the point. This isn't directly about Apple. Even if Apple TV weren't dominant, the bigger picture here is that the content providers are fighting a losing battle against the changing content consumption (viewing) habits of the public. There will be an inflection point where if they don't start making themselves more easily available on Apple TV (or other set top boxes), viewers will simply start watching other content rather than stay with a cable subscription.

But with Apple TV being the dominant set top box, and with so many users of Apple devices in general, Apple is in the best position to get the content providers to fall in line.

 

[npmacuser5]

I don't know where you are getting your $60/month with cable for hd subscriptions from, but I can tell you that I'm paying slightly less than $40/month on 1st year promo for my subscription which includes the HD channels they have. Of course, I could add some 'digital packs' and run it up, but why would I want to?

First year promo, second year it doubles so your average is actually $60 a month, as an example.

 

[mantan]

If Comcast gets it way (and like the telcos the others will likely follow) they will cap our bandwidth. With more data going over IP they will find a way to get their cut out of folks that don't want to use traditional cable. On top of that they have already been complained to for not counting their own IPTV services in that cap.


I would love to get rid of cable (once my 20 month commitment us up), but somehow I can see that I'll be paying as much for what I pretty much watch now.

It's similar

Actually, with the exception of sports fans, everybody is right. The overwhelming majority of the money that cable companies pay to content providers goes towards sports programming. If sports could be completely segregated into a sports package, then consumers would have more control over that cost, and consumers would see the actual cost of sports reflected in their bills.

The non-sports viewers would pay about $10 a month, and the sports viewers would pay an extra $20. Now suppose that the non-sports viewers continue to spend $30 per month towards their TV viewing rather than cutting their bill so dramatically. Suddenly there would be more money for everything else but sports.

Let me put the true cost in the proper perspective.... In 2014, ESPN signed a $24 billion dollar, 9 year deal with the NBA. Thats almost $2.7 billion per year for access to just a single sport by a single network. If you took a major network's average cost for prime-time drama (about $3 million per episode), that means ESPN's deal cost them about as much as two entire seasons of prime-time drama, for three hours per week, seven days a week. They have to bring in a lot of revenue to cover those sorts of costs.

This is why Disney/ABC is so adamant about ESPN being part of the base package. Most of their revenue actually goes to a single, enormously expensive channel, and they know that a sizable percentage of users would dump ESPN if they could. Given how few new shows Disney Channel produces each year, their half-hour format, and the relatively low budget under which they operate, you could probably pay for all of the Disney channel's new programming for the rest of our natural lives for less money than ESPN spent for a single year of NBA coverage.

Right now, TV networks are producing shows that aren't nearly as good as the shows of even ten years ago, and one big reason for that is that all the money is being siphoned off to pay the sports franchises. Fix that problem, and everything except sports will get significantly more money than it does now, the quality of shows will improve, and the performing arts as a whole will benefit from it.

ESPN and their recent NBA and NFL contracts are a whole other issue. That deal hasn't even kicked in yet and seems is a disaster waiting to happen. That's pretty common for them though. They are paying the University of Texas 25 million a year for the Longhorn Network. They shook down the cable and satellite providers to allow this to be included as part of the package - even though a minuscule percentage of customers want the channel.

The sports money bubble is a whole separate topic. Networks covet sports because it's DVR-proof programming that gets huge numbers. But many networks (national and regional) have over leveraged themselves in the sports world. Many of the Fox stations paid HUGE long term deals to local baseball teams for programming. With the assumption they would be able to feed off the bundled trough.

I do disagree that sports is the lion's share of the current cable bill and somehow non-sports fans are going to get everything they want for $10 a month. That math just doesn't fly. Look at the HBO model. They pay zero sports rights (other than limited boxing events) and charge $15 a month for content. And that's just one family of networks. The 15-20 channels a non-sports fan enjoys would likely cost $40-$60, if not more.

 

[hudson1]

I’m just wondering how this is any different from paying for Apps that you don’t want or use……….Stocks, Game Centre, Tips, Watch - in fact anything you don’t want that could be replaced with something better or not at all.
Their business model depends on including some useless crap. Just like Apples.

Are you paying a large monthly fee for apps you don't want?

 

[bpeeps]

People don't care about channels they care about content. Apple doesn't need a skinny bundle of channels they need a device that makes it dead easy for people to find, watch and subscribe to content they're interested in. Put all their efforts into Siri and universal search. Revamp the UI so instead of seeing a screen with rows and rows of apps it shows me new episodes of shows I might be interested in watching or new movies or music that just dropped that I might be interested in. Give me an option in settings to choose sports/teams I'm interested in and provide an easy way to get scores and tune in to a live game or match right from the scores screen if available. I'm a huge golf and tennis fan but as far as Siri is concerned those two sports don't even exist. There is so much Apple can do, so much potential Apple should forget the skinny bundle and focus on making TV software/platform better.

Many people don't seem to understand that Rome wasn't built in a day. You don't progress from dirt to the Colosseum.

Apple already allows you to purchase the content you want right now. You can purchase episodes available in the iTunes store or a season pass. Your purchased programs will appear at the top left corner of the Apple TV under the Purchased section. You can watch all the episodes and shows you want and skip whatever you don't. Voila, the ala carte programming everyone already wants. The problem being, nobody wants to pay $30 for a full season of episodes. In comes the channel.

Say your favorite show is Friends and it is still on the air. Warner Brothers produces Friends and then sells it to NBC to distribute. NBC makes up what they pay to Warner Brothers through advertisements. You can purchase that content through iTunes by episode or season or you can watch it OTA for free. Channels pay for the content you want to watch through ads. Without channels, you are left with the above option of paying by episode or season.

There is definitely a lot that Apple can do, but they are limited to pre-existing contracts on content. Friends can be offered in iTunes for a price, but not on demand through a one-all subscription. The best method is not to get rid of channels, but to start to break down the cable business model the way it stands. What Apple wants to do IS start to break down bundling and offer less channels. This is a step in the right direction and could eventually lead to ala carte pricing on specific channels or content providers.

 

[npmacuser5]

Many people don't seem to understand that Rome wasn't built in a day. You don't progress from dirt to the Colosseum.

Apple already allows you to purchase the content you want right now. You can purchase episodes available in the iTunes store or a season pass. Your purchased programs will appear at the top left corner of the Apple TV under the Purchased section. You can watch all the episodes and shows you want and skip whatever you don't. Voila, the ala carte programming everyone already wants. The problem being, nobody wants to pay $30 for a full season of episodes. In comes the channel.

Say your favorite show is Friends and it is still on the air. Warner Brothers produces Friends and then sells it to NBC to distribute. NBC makes up what they pay to Warner Brothers through advertisements. You can purchase that content through iTunes by episode or season or you can watch it OTA for free. Channels pay for the content you want to watch through ads. Without channels, you are left with the above option of paying by episode or season.

There is definitely a lot that Apple can do, but they are limited to pre-existing contracts on content. Friends can be offered in iTunes for a price, but not on demand through a one-all subscription. The best method is not to get rid of channels, but to start to break down the cable business model the way it stands. What Apple wants to do IS start to break down bundling and offer less channels. This is a step in the right direction and could eventually lead to ala carte pricing on specific channels or content providers.

What I was paying for cable 100 plus channels I can watch at least 23 high priced seasons shows. On average I get 30. For the same price I prefer quality, flexibility, over quanity.

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

First year promo, second year it doubles so your average is actually $60 a month, as an example.

Check out DISH's "This is how we do it" promo:

2 years with (IMO) a good HD DVR for $50/month. That's 190 channels, many in HD for $50/month. Are there a bunch of channels in that 190 that you or I won't be interested in watching? Yes. But is the rumored 25 channels for $40/month Apple bundle of channels likely mixed into that 190 too? Probably.

So, 25 channels for $40/month or 190 channels that probably includes those 25 for $50 with a DVR and free OTA local networks? Did I mention that the latter will not eat one byte of your broadband cap? Did I mention that it's very easy to hide upwards of the 160 or so channels that "I'll never watch" so that only the 15-30 that I do want to watch would be all that shows in the on-screen guide? Did I mention that one can still have an TV and get all of it's benefits too? Did I mention plenty of live sports for people that want those? Local HD news & programming for people that want that? Etc.

So what's the downside besides the extra $10? In a multi-TV home, Dish will charge about $8 for additional boxes. But DISH also has a good iOS app that can airplay to TVs hooked to those other TVs if one doesn't want to pay for additional boxes. I suspect a variation of their app will soon show up for TV 4 so that one wouldn't even need to airplay.

It's not that I feel any particular love for DISH but, at least for me, I know which way I'm going even if Apple does roll out this rumored 25-channels-for-$40 package in the next few months. Inevitably, Apple will leave out desirable channels in their selection of 25 channels. AND, the difference of only $10 to also get a HD DVR with local OTA inputs for local HD channels is well worth it IMO.

 

[Weaselboy]

There's no OTA because Apple can't make money off it. But yes, your entire concept is spot on.

Do you think Apple could make some money providing a Tivo type service with the ATV for OTA? I'm thinking there is some money to be made there perhaps.

 

[lparsons21]

First year promo, second year it doubles so your average is actually $60 a month, as an example.

Well you might think so, but since I'm on a no-contract deal it won't actually ever do that. I learned that lesson many years ago.

 

[npmacuser5]

Check out DISH's "This is how we do it" promo:

2 years with (IMO) a good HD DVR for $50/month. That's 190 channels, many in HD for $50/month. Are there a bunch of channels in that 190 that you or I won't be interested in watching? Yes. But is the rumored 25 channels for $40/month Apple bundle of channels likely mixed into that 190 too? Probably.

So, 25 channels for $40/month or 190 channels that probably includes those 25 for $50 with a DVR and free OTA local networks? Did I mention that the latter will not eat one byte of your broadband cap? Did I mention that it's very easy to hide upward of the 160 or so channels that "I'll never watch" so that only the 15-30 that I do want to watch would be all that shows in the on-screen guide?

So what's the downside besides the extra $10? In a multi-TV home, Dish will charge about $8 for additional boxes. But DISH also has a good iOS app that can airplay to TVs hooked to those other TVs if one doesn't want to pay for additional boxes. I suspect a variation of their app will soon show up for TV 4 so that one wouldn't even need to airplay.

It's not that I feel any particular love for DISH but, at least for me, I know which way I'm going even if Apple does roll out this 25-channels-for-$40 package in the next few months.

Had Dish for several years, they have many loop holes to raise your rate. Not a terrible experience with Dish, more they are not really forthcoming in their business practices. You may see overtime. Maybe all of us who got rid of them may have changed Dish for the better. We the consumers have the power to force change if we are willing to walk away. If it works for you perfect. I would watch my bill each month.

 

[npmacuser5]

Well you might think so, but since I'm on a no-contract deal it won't actually ever do that. I learned that lesson many years ago.

What do you do in the second year if they double you rate?

 

[lparsons21]

Had Dish for several years, they have many loop holes to raise your rate. Not a terrible experience with Dish, more they are not really forthcoming in their business practices. You may see overtime. Maybe all of us who got rid of them may have changed Dish for the better. We the consumers have the power to force change if we are willing to walk away. If it works for you perfect. I would watch my bill each month.

This is an entirely new deal from Dish. If you take the $50/month with one Hopper, or other 2-year deals that they also have, and don't change a thing in your subscription level or equipment, the rate is locked tightly into the contract.

That said, I firmly believe that Dish expects many of those that get the 2-year deal will want to change something during that period of time which would allow for 'adjustments'. I'm not on that deal as it wasn't available at the time I re-signed up with them but if I were, I would have ended up wanting a change just as I did. I decided I needed more tuners, got the SuperJoey and if I were under the 2-year deal I'd bet there would have been some adjustment that wouldn't just be the lease fee of the SuperJoey

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

I have DISH now (and TV too). My experiences have been great. This is a pretty hard "price lock" offer by them without obvious loopholes even in the fine print. Besides, I have to believe that an Apple offering would have a similar "loophole" or two if Apple can't get the content providers to absolutely lock down all costs that Apple would pay (just like DISH).

But again, not heavily endorsing DISH. I was just illustrating the relative value vs. people writing about how much of a ripoff the "as is" model can be. The Comcast Xfinity bundle price for the cable side is not so different than the rumored $40 Apple pricing either. Break the bundle and the broadband price is more expensive, so the net makes the Cable + Broadband bundle vs. the Apple $40 + Comcast broadband combo not so different.

I know all of us- me included- can realistically reference the $100+ cable bill somewhere in our past (or present). But that isn't automatic for everyone now and one can find some pretty good values from sources other than only this rumored mini-cable bundle from Apple if we look around. Personally, I think that DISH offer is very compelling vs. just about everything I'm seeing including the rumors of this Apple $40 mini-cable bundle. But I'll hope that maybe something much more amazing than just Apple picking a selection of 25 channels to sell for $40 is in play with that.

 

[lparsons21]

What do you do in the second year if they double you rate?

Cancel, wait a couple months and come back (or not) as a 'new' customer again. But you know these days, with subscribers to cable/sat dropping like flies, they are being much more cooperative. I've got so many sources of video coming into my house that losing one or the other for a couple months just isn't a big deal.

 

[npmacuser5]

Cancel, wait a couple months and come back (or not) as a 'new' customer again. But you know these days, with subscribers to cable/sat dropping like flies, they are being much more cooperative. I've got so many sources of video coming into my house that losing one or the other for a couple months just isn't a big deal.

I get what your saying. For me that would be a negative experience. I am enjoying purchasing what and when I want. I said before, quality, flexibility works better for me then quanity. Nice that we have choices is it not.

 

[lparsons21]

I get what your saying. For me that would be a negative experience. I am enjoying purchasing what and when I want. I said before, quality, flexibility works better for me then quanity. Nice that we have choices is it not.

It is nice to have choices and hopefully the money to pay for them!

For me, while not rich, I'm comfortable and my kids have all done well and mostly tell me to enjoy whatever I want as long as I'm able. So I have Dish, Mediacom cable, and a slew of online subscription services. Only Dish has a contract so the others I can turn off/on as I so desire. Hulu is looking good to cancel as I got it primarily because The CW wasn't in HD here, but now it is and is on Dish in HD. And Amazon Prime video to me is just a freebie as I buy enough that just the free shipping is worth it.

I'm impatiently waiting for either the Playon folks to come up with a Playon client for the ATV4 or for some DLNA client to come along that works well with it. So far LocalCast is the only one that will deal at all with streaming live from Playon and even that is hinky.

Sigh.... So many toys, only so much time!!

 

[Winter Charm]

Of course. Many have tried and failed to do this, and I didn't think Apple had any special way to make it work.

It actually works out now. We don't get *any* bundles. If someone has content, they have to either go through a party like Hulu or Netflix, OR they can make their own app, and I'll pay for their channel/app like i pay for HBO Now.

 

[ctyrider]

I know all of us- me included- can realistically reference the $100+ cable bill somewhere in our past (or present). But that isn't automatic for everyone now and one can find some pretty good values from sources other than only this rumored mini-cable bundle from Apple if we look around. Personally, I think that DISH offer is very compelling vs. just about everything I'm seeing including the rumors of this Apple $40 mini-cable bundle. But I'll hope that maybe something much more amazing than just Apple picking a selection of 25 channels to sell for $40 is in play with that.

To me, the whole concept of "live TV" and "TV channels" is mostly outdated. There are only 2 things that live TV still makes sense for: Sports and News. There is literally nothing else that I ever need to see "live" on my TV.

Everything else - movies/shows/sitcoms/reality TV/you-name-it - should be consumed on-demand.

So in the future world I envision - there will be a handful of live TV channels - a few for live sports and a few for real time news. I am already pretty much there - Netfix/Hulu/Amazon Prime cover all my needs for on-demand content. OTA TV (Channels app) and CNN / ESPN apps on my ATV4 cover all my needs for *live* news/sports.

I don't want or need any "channel bundles", not even for $40/month.

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

I'm with you. I'd add that I want my on-demand to be up to live, so that the traditional small talk scenarios about what was on TV last night still works. For example, the compromise of not getting to see a brand new episode for a day or a week is not a great one IMO. It's fun to be able to talk about what was just on tonight as soon as tonight. It's not as fun to be left out of such conversations because I can't see the episode until the next day or a week later in exchange for saving only a few bucks.

Similarly, I like sharp quality pictures. So I don't love the compromise of picture quality for slightly cheaper "cord cutting" prices. That's not always an issue but it is sometimes an issue. I'd rather pay the extra for good HD than see the same at something less than good HD.

Sports matters much to me. No time delays there make complete sense to me. It's too easy to see or hear about the outcome if one tries to watch the game even a few hours later.

And then there's the complexities. If I have to do much work to watch something for cheaper or free vs. the simplicity in the "as is" of just turning a set on and tuning into a channel, is it really worth it? If I have to glom together 4 or 5 services and find content on usenet and rip content from discs, and stream this but airplay that, etc to get everything I want to watch, is the $10 or $30/month savings worth the time & trouble?

And so on. Basically some of us will jump through a lot of hoops and live with some compromises to save $10 or $30 or $50/month on THIS thing but have no trouble shelling out much more money in the monthly fast food bill or to watch 1.5 hours of video at the movies or to try to keep up with the very latest & greatest to come out of Apple. Each person needs to decide what is and is not worth it for themselves and their situation. In my own opinion, between the simple power of being able to set up a FAVS list of channels (hiding the 1XX channels "I never watch"), the meaningful subsidy that comes from commercials running on all those channels I never watch, the niceties of an HD DVR, OTA free network television at video quality north of anything from any cable/satt/streaming, live sports, live news, and the desire for high video quality, I'm not one to find too much fault with a monthly "video entertainment bill" even if mine got up to- say- $100+ per month.

I get the whole cord-cutter mentality and the game of feeling like we're sticking it to the "greedy" crooks of Cable companies, etc. by cord-cutting. But, at the same time, I also can objectively see a lot of value in the "as is" vs. what the reality of the "al-a-carte" dream would be if it became the replacement model. As part of THAT, I'm not convinced that an Apple as a middleman replacement for a Comcast automatically brings the big savings some of us envision.

But then again, I also reject the fools math in believing that if 200 channels cost $100, my favorite 10 channels should cost $5/month. How it would really go is 200 channels cost $100 vs. 10 channels al-a-carte costs $125. We delude ourselves into believing that al-a-carte will bring those massive haircuts. It won't. And we should already see that in how the few "channels" already al-a-carte are pricing just their bundle of offerings alone. If CBS is a good example, our favorite 10 CBS-like "channels" in al-a-carte world will cost $60/month. If we're more HBO-minded fans, 10 times HBO al-a-carte is $150/month.

Meanwhile, the archaic, old cable channel model had those channels available to us with a whole bunch of other channels for as little as $50 month in that "this is how we do it" DISH offer. I wonder if we could all jump forward to this "the future" that we think we want right now, if we would soon be looking back and wishing we could have something more like how it used to be.

 

[TsMkLg068426]

No they shouldn't. Buy an atv4.

Why shouldn't they worry why would anyone upgrade to ATV4 when there is no 4K or DTS-HD when I can get more on Xbox One.

 

[bpeeps]

Why shouldn't they worry why would anyone upgrade to ATV4 when there is no 4K or DTS-HD when I can get more on Xbox One.

Because I don't have a 4K TV or watch anything in 4K (much like the majority of the general public). And I don't really care about anything Xbox One offers. I game on Steam without the overpriced subscriptions consoles charge to access online games. If Xbox offers you more, there's your answer. You don't need an ATV4.

There's zero incentive for Apple to upgrade features on old hardware when they'll know you'll buy the new version and they can increase their revenue. When ATV5 comes out with 4K, people will buy it as well. New features are usually exclusive to new hardware, this is nothing new to Apple. See Siri, Touch ID, 3D Touch, etc.

I upgraded to ATV4 because I found a good BF deal and I was intrigued by the app store and Siri, whether it had 4K or not wasn't a deciding factor for me. Different strokes.

 

[thisismyusername]

Not surprising. Even if Apple had succeeded I'm not sure that many people, outside of hardcore Apple fans, would care. $30 - $40 for 25 channels is not a good deal considering you'd most likely be paying more for internet because you'd no longer be bundling it with cable and you'd also probably be paying for Netflix and/or Hulu. You're better of just sticking with a bundled cable+internet package and you'd get a lot more channels. And this is coming from someone who has been a cord cutter for years and very much hates cable companies.