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BritBox UK Streaming Service Launches for £5.99 per Month
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Really, this is how a la carte pricing works, and why none of the weaker cable channels really wanted it to happen.
They get a ton of money off of the cable subscription fee, money that they probably don't deserve.
The strong will survive. The weak will be rolled into basic cable or become filler channels in bigger subscription plays.
They get a ton of money off of the cable subscription fee, money that they probably don't deserve.
The strong will survive. The weak will be rolled into basic cable or become filler channels in bigger subscription plays.
Ok, I should have qualified that statement. I thought it was a given that you wouldn't choose destitution to avoid paying for schools, etc. I should have been absolutely clear. For the record, you don't pay for those things if you're a child or dead, either.
And yes, you're correct - you don't have to pay for the BBC in some circumstances. Those circumstances are:
- You never watch or record programmes on any channel as they're being shown on TV.
- You never watch or record programmes from any channel as they're being shown live on an online TV service.
- You never download or watch BBC programmes on iPlayer – live, catch up or on demand.
Ease off on the 'clueless' bit, mate - just trying to have a discussion.
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Perfectly good question!
If you watch or record live (i.e. as it's being shown, not just 'live' events) TV (broadcast or online), on any device or channel, or download or watch BBC programmes on iPlayer, you need to be covered by a TV Licence.
[edit] Oops - missed the 'just stream' bit. As long as you don't use the BBC iPlayer, you can stream any other UK channel's 'catchup' services. But not streams of any channel's live (i.e. simulcast with the actual channel) feed.
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I agree. Too many streaming services coming out now - consumers don't want to subscribe to 5 different streaming services to access the 1 or 2 shows that they interested in. It's falling into the same trap we have with cable tv - expensive and filled with 80% of trash content you don't want/not interested in.
It is no different than the fact there were previously different linear channels. What makes you think that where before there were hundreds of players, now there should be just one? Before people in the U.S. paid $50-$150 for content much of which was subsidized by advertising. After skimming the costs of the cable and channel infrastructure, most of that money went to production of that content.
It is happening because it is the only way there will be enough money to pay for the content people want to watch.
Netflix was able to charge an artificially low price for access to all those programs because the content producers had already been paid much more from people earlier in the distribution pipeline. With cord cutting, the elimination of commercials, and the decline of movie attendance, those other revenue sources are going away. It would be impossible to sustain that content pipeline with $15 a month when before they were getting 4-10 times that.
You have it exactly backwards. Netflix had no choice but create their own content because as the content producers' other revenue sources started going away, their only option would be to pull content from Netflix, and Netflix new their unreasonably low prices were going to go away.
Netflix always had that worry, it was just that their was not much competition and their prices were artificially low. As soon as their prices more closely reflected the costs needed to produce this content, they would have had the same competitive pressure as everyone else.
I am still trying to understand if you are upset over the number of services or the cost? If the former, you can subscribe though an aggregator like Apple TV Channels and get what seems to be a single provider will all the content. It will cost between $50 and $150 (here in the U.S.). If it is the price that bothers you, your choices are pay enough to get great new content, or have all the producers produce shows that look like Dr. Who, rather than Battlestar Galactica.
Sorry, your model is not the only model and your analysis of why it works the way it does is completely wrong. The U.K.'s choice to make the broadcaster infrastructure publicly owned, just insured that you had less access to TV channels for a long time. Here, where all that infrastructure was privately held, broadcasters owned or were owned by studios and yet happily sold their content to each other. Many of the shows on ABC were produced by 20th Century Fox TV. Shows were made on the Fox lot and aired on the Fox broadcast network but were owned by NBC/Universal.
You think of Netflix as the distributor, in your model, but it is not, nor are NBC or Disney. A more accurate analog to the IBA would be the telecom companies that provide the internet infrastructure.
This is the problem with smart TVs, they go out of date quickly as new services come along or updates are made to current services.
The best bet (too late if you've already got a smart TV of course) is to get a non-smart TV and add a streaming box of some kind - there are plenty about - which can be updated or replaced as required in the future. The Apple TV for example has the BritBox app immediately.
What does your TV Licence cover? - TV Licensing ™
Find lots of useful information to help you understand your TV Licence, including what it covers, what you need and other important details.
I think that there will be a limit to how many streaming services people will tolerate, and most people will not want to subscribe to lots of different streaming services just to get the content they want to watch. Having said that, I actually think Apple is really onto something with the Apple TV, as it allows all that streaming content to be accessed through one seamless interface and content can be presented in a unified way to the user, regardless which streaming service it has come from.
You need TV license if you use iplayer & BBC sounds.Not if you watch it on a mobile device or on web
+1! Now this would be a streaming service I’d be more than prepared to pay for… But the rights don’t allow it. Well, change those bloody rights, then!
Yes the market will begin to equalise eventually, but at this stage there's more services cropping up all wanting a piece of the cake. But all this will push people onto piracy as it's too expensive to subscribe to multiple services.
As for Apple TV, yeah it's nice content is presented in a unified format, but we still gotta pay for these services individually.
Thanks.What does your TV Licence cover? - TV Licensing ™
Find lots of useful information to help you understand your TV Licence, including what it covers, what you need and other important details.www.tvlicensing.co.uk
I’ve Always wondered how they define ‘live’. Because when I watch the on-the-hour news on my iPad it is actually about a minute late.
“Your honour.”
You're spot on there. It's shameful, really, how the likes of LG don't provide support for expensive TVs that aren't that old, but that's just the world we live in I suppose.
I have an Apple TV 4 (the HD only version) in my kitchen and am indeed thinking of adding an Apple TV 4K in my lounge and then it will have AppleTV+ and (as you quite rightly point out) a native BritBox app. I'm hesitating, because the AppleTV 4K is a 2-year old product and despite being at the more expensive end of the spectrum of streaming players, it doesn't support HLG. That's a must for watching UHD/HDR content in the UK (slightly off topic, but the Seven Worlds, One Planet documentary in UHD HLG on BBC iPlayer looks absolutely stunning on my 2017 LG OLED).