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Peacock Streaming Service Gets $3 Price Hike

nburwell said:
With the exception of EPL and NFL games exclusively on Peacock, I don’t bother subscribing. And if I do, it’s for a month or two and then I cancel. I’ll also look out for emails from them for discounts.

Netflix/HBO Max/Hulu/D+ is really all my family needs (+YTTV for live sports).
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Problem is that the Premier League runs from August to May which hampers the ability to subscribe and cancel month-to-month. I do typically cancel over the summer though.

Being a fan of a Bundesliga or La Liga team is way easier since they are on the much cheaper ESPN+.
 
Peacock actually smacks up new movies quite often and offers WWE Premium Live Events that used to cost $50 on Pay Per View so if you're into those things it's somewhat of a deal. $3 is still insane tho.
 
barnyard said:
Still free with Instacart?
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Yes, we have the ad-supported version “free” with Instacart but we’ve never used it as we prefer to pay for the no-ads version.

But with this price hike, it’s reminded me we don’t use the paid sub any more. So that’s for the chop. We’ll fall back on the “free” one with ads if we’re really stuck for something to watch. That rarely happens.

Edit: I think our Paramount+ sub can be dropped too since we rarely use it. Savings are adding up here! :)
 
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QquegChristian said:
I’m an indie filmmaker. My first film in 2012 had a piracy ratio of 50 to every 1 real rental (streaming wasn’t as big a thing then). We spent years of our lives working on it and got checks here and there for a few hundred dollars. Considered one of the best movie / cult classic in its genre and most years I make $100.

I’ve still never received a royalty on my last movie released 5 years ago. I was paid $10,000 up front and worked on it for one full year, going into debt in the process. It premiered at Tribeca Film Festival and was initially bought as an AMC+ exclusive (the network, not theaters).

Last year I filed bankruptcy and have no plans to make future movies.

Both piracy AND the streaming service’s low pay for licensing almost guarantee you won’t make your money back now.
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I loved your post. I don't love what happened to you, but I love that you pointed out the reality of the pirating situation. It's not a victimless crime & it's not primarily hurting the 1%. It's people like you who bear the brunt of it.
 
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I'm glad I paid for the annual. I still watch Football (Does Peacock have an exclusive game this year) and watch some WWE (I might even watch a little Summerslam) but price increases have become an inevitability. Personally I'm looking forward to the day this model crashes in on itself and the industry will really be pondering what to do next. I'm already somewhat seeing it with Paramount+. It's only a matter of time, and advancements are moving so rapidly that that time might be here sooner rather than later.
 
mk313 said:
While I'm sure this is a less popular point of view, Streaming services are still a pretty good deal, compared to cable TV or any other legal way of getting TV shows/ movies.

Before streaming, people complained all the time about having to pay for all of the cable TV channels they don't watch, and they only watch one or two channels. Taking Peacock as an example (because that's the one I'm most familiar with), it's still under $10/month if you buy the annual plan. The best Spectrum package in my area (which is streaming on the app only) is $40/month, and their lowest priced cable plan is $100/month.

For those who truly watch only a couple of channels, 1 or 2 streaming services/month are still a pretty good deal.
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Agreed.
I pay for 3 ad-free streaming services and it is still totally worth it to me, esp the ad-free part.
 
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@Brett said:
The only streaming I have all year round now is Apple TV+ as it is part of my Apple subscription. But the content is great. Ditched Amazon once they put ads in and it made things absolute rubbish to watch. And other streamers I just use gift cards as needed if there is something to watch. It is amazing if you add up all the subscriptions you have and could be paying for if you just don’t pay attention.
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We keep netflix and britbox year round, I still get HBO free, grandfathered through AT&T otherwise I’d only have it certain times, and I have prime perpetually but the streaming there is a bonus not the reason.

Cant bring myself to pay for anything else year-round
 
Only if there was a way to get all streaming services bundled together and delivered to my house via cable internet or satellite internet … heyyy … wait a min.
 
jdawgnoonan said:
Even their Premium Plus has freaking ads? Hard pass. They can shove that.
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I remember the (actual) lure of "Cable" back in the 80's . . . the idea was that we--as Consumers--could bypass the advertisers, and just mainline Content.

This was when MTv was all videos (pseudo-reality TV wasn't programmatic, yet).

This persisted for a double-handful of years, then the Providers began to realise that most Consumers tacitly allowed the marketing-creep; now "Commercials" are just interwoven into everything.

IIRC, even YT Premium now has ads....

As far as I'm concerned, they can all chuck-off back from whence they came!

<soup class="naughsty">
<p>No streaming from you!</p>
</soup>
 
splifingate said:
I remember the (actual) lure of "Cable" back in the 80's . . . the idea was that we--as Consumers--could bypass the advertisers, and just mainline Content.

This was when MTv was all videos (pseudo-reality TV wasn't programmatic, yet).

This persisted for a double-handful of years, then the Providers began to realise that most Consumers tacitly allowed the marketing-creep; now "Commercials" are just interwoven into everything.

IIRC, even YT Premium now has ads....

As far as I'm concerned, they can all chuck-off back from whence they came!

<soup class="naughsty">
<p>No streaming from you!</p>
</soup>
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I actually never even watched TV at all prior to ad free streaming because I simply cannot stand ads. I am 52 and so I am certainly old enough to remember pre-streaming. I will happily go baCK to not wasting money on subscriptions if they want me to pay for ads. I like books just fine.
 
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jdawgnoonan said:
I actually never even watched TV at all prior to ad free streaming because I simply cannot stand ads. I am 52 and so I am certainly old enough to remember pre-streaming. I will happily go baCK to not wasting money on subscriptions if they want me to pay for ads. I like books just fine.
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I'm currently listening to "Fallen Dragon" by Peter F. Hamilton . . . it's Good :)

Pre-Ad-Streaming-etc. was moments in Time, and History (for all intensive purposes).
 
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Michael Scrip said:
You don't have to subscribe to 15 different streaming services... not all at once anyway. You have choice. You have control. You can pick and choose which $11/month service you want at any given time. Don't like Disney or Marvel? Then don't subscribe to Disney+

But with cable... you did have to subscribe to the 200 channel ultra mega package. There was no choice. Grandma was paying for ESPN and BET even if she never watched those channels.

Don't you remember the biggest complaint about cable TV back in the day?

"I'm paying for 200 channels even though I only watch 5 or 6 channels!"

And that's when people created this fantasy of the cable operators offering "a la carte" channels... meaning you could only pay for the few channels you want. The theory was your cable TV bill could be a fraction of the price since you were only paying for a fraction of the channels.

But that's not how cable channels work. A la carte was never gonna happen. 🤣

So yeah... streaming can get expensive if you subscribe to 15(!) streaming services.

But cable was always expensive... especially since you were forced to pay for things you didn't want.

P.S... are you thinking of going back to cable TV? Back to scheduled shows? Or having to remember to "Set your DVR" if you want to watch something that's on when you're not at home? And the 15 minutes of pharmaceutical and insurance commercials every hour? For $100/month?!?!?

That's not something I could ever do again... but that's just me. 🙂

My previous cable bill was around $250/month for Spectrum 300mbps high-speed cable internet and cable TV. And that was the "bundled" price!!! Each of those services would be even more expensive if purchased separately! 😱

I've now switched to Windstream Kinetic fiber internet. Gigabit! Up and down. 1,000mbps. For only $80/month!

And no TV package. I have an antenna to pick up plenty of local channels. I use many of the free "FAST" streaming services. And, yes, I subscribe to a few premium streaming services as well... despite their price increases.

But that's still waaay cheaper than my old $250/month cable internet and TV "bundle" !!!

I said goodbye to cable TV... and 20 million other people have done the same over the last decade.

😎
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How cute. You said “choice”
 
whatgift said:
As an Australian (where Peacock is not available), what well-known content is on Peacock? It's likely that the same content is on another service here.
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I'm an Aussie who managed to score a $US20 deal for the first year. Will probably cancel at the end.

It was mainly for classic TV like Six Million Dollar Man, Hardy Boys, Highlander, RoboCop etc (though there are others like The Office and One Chicago you can find on Aussie services).

My true-crime-buff wife also likes that they have the entire Dateline NBC catalogue.
 
mk313 said:
I loved your post. I don't love what happened to you, but I love that you pointed out the reality of the pirating situation. It's not a victimless crime & it's not primarily hurting the 1%. It's people like you who bear the brunt of it.
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Yep, I’m actually pretty lucky that I now have a corporate job for a deals website filming (on the iPhone primarily) ads for major CPG products in stores. Not lucky in that they’re primarily for TikTok and that whole platform is up in the air.

My co-director / filmmaking partner is a bartender. He used to get 4-5 acting jobs a year to stay in the business but no one is making the small movies anymore.

Best chance you have to make a living now is to get plucked up to direct a large IP. My friends who produced my last movie make really great indies themselves but are now directing Moon Knight / Loki for Disney+. I’d say they hit the lotto but they’re super talented and worked harder than me.
 
I read that the future of streaming will be FAST (free ad-supported television), like Tubi. There's so much churn in the paid services that even the big players like Disney are struggling.

Meanwhile, YouTube makes more from ads than from premium subscribers. Though it *does* foist too many on you.
 
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