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WarnerMedia and HBO Announce New 'HBO Max' Streaming Service Coming Spring 2020
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old piracy arguments, but whole starbucks loses a coffee, when it's stolen, netflix doesn't lose anything if someone who doesn't have the money to pay for it, pirates it. ob the other hand, it even gains reputation and maybe a customer in the future. it's not even a good the consumer then owns - it's a license for watching.
Streaming services have proven that it works if you provide a wide variety of content for a reasonable price. Now, piracy has declined. if you raise the price - either directly or by fragmentation - it will eventually return.
As another user already said: copyright violation or freeloading (that's what it is, not theft - that word is industry-propaganda) might be morally wrong. But greed is definitely wrong.
This is always about revenue for the content companies. If they don't get it from the Cable companies bundles because of "cord cutting" they will get it from creating a streaming service and locking their content to it and pulling it from places like Netflix and Hulu. Want Disney, $ubscribe, want HBO, $ubscribe, want NBC, $ubscribe, ESPN, $ubscribe... etc etc.
In the end the bundles of stream services will be the same price or MORE than cable because the cable companies have the "subsidy" of the internet connection fee. So they have more flexibility to lower "package" pricing to stay competitive.
In the end the bundles of stream services will be the same price or MORE than cable because the cable companies have the "subsidy" of the internet connection fee. So they have more flexibility to lower "package" pricing to stay competitive.
That’s what’s hard to understand. HBO NOW is priced the same as most cable companies charge for HBO on their cable packages. The price was set that way to “not cannibalize” Cable HBO.
This seems like a straight up attack at Cable. If HBO Max is slightly more, then people will stop paying for HBO Cable subscriptions. They probably don’t want it under “HBO NOW” because that matches the Cable HBO offerings... do this is AT&T taking their “Warner Media” ball to use for leverage with Direct TV vs Comcast/NBC and other combined companies.
Assuming the legal language is in tact, they could just say HBO Cable gets legacy HBO programming. HBO Now gets HBO + Max. That would take most people off the cable plan as it's a no brainer.
As an HBO fan, the fragmentation is frustrating. I will likely be switching to Apple TV+ HBO from HBO Now due to Family Sharing and offline downloads!
So, this sounds to me like I will need two subscriptions to HBO services to get all of their content. The traditional cable subscription will provide regular and new movies and some original series and the Max subscription to get those original series plus all of the rest. This seems a bit ridiculous to me and appears as though HBO (Warner Media) wants to double-dip into my money. Nasty.
I agree with many others on here that the fragmentation of the services is not a good thing. I don't want multiple providers with multiple bills every month to keep track of. Somebody, Apple perhaps, needs to become a clearinghouse for all of these separate services so that you can go to one place, select the specific content that you want and pay one bill. That is, of course, similar to a typical cable subscription now, but the new model would allow ala carte purchases so that you only pay for what you want. When will they get it that this is what we want and not what they're preparing to offer.
I agree with many others on here that the fragmentation of the services is not a good thing. I don't want multiple providers with multiple bills every month to keep track of. Somebody, Apple perhaps, needs to become a clearinghouse for all of these separate services so that you can go to one place, select the specific content that you want and pay one bill. That is, of course, similar to a typical cable subscription now, but the new model would allow ala carte purchases so that you only pay for what you want. When will they get it that this is what we want and not what they're preparing to offer.
Yes fubo is $55/month. I didn’t include that in my current streaming subscriptions because I only subscribe to it for a few months during football season.
Edit: Which is kinda my point.... Instead of paying $100/month cable bill and being locked in to a 2 year contract to watch football I can just pay $150 and get it for the months I need.
I think you can honestly blame CBS for starting this. As far as I know, they were the first (or, the largest of the early birds) to say "here's a paid streaming service with everything you get for free now... plus a wee bit more." And then, offer a tad more than that (upper tier with "no ads" -- except when there are).
Even moderately successful, subscribers have proven that this is a model that works. Complaints say one thing; wallets say another.
Even moderately successful, subscribers have proven that this is a model that works. Complaints say one thing; wallets say another.