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Media Companies Are Ready to Sell. Does Anyone Want to Buy?

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On broadcast TV, ratings determine whether a show stays on. If a third of your stations are scheduling your show in overnights, you're screwed.
This is why streaming works. A show can sit there for years and get discovered and grow a following. You can't do that with network TV.
 
The key point is that Paramount found a way to thread the needle and get what they believed to be good quality/desirable content to TV viewers without using the TV network distribution model, Paramount made money, the local TV stations made money but the TV networks didn't (from ST:TNG), so why are TV networks needed?


Kirk Bayne
 
There have been posts here about lumping Disney+ into Hulu. Here's how they're handling it now:

You can get Hulu by itself for $7.95

You can get Hulu with ads and Disney + for $9.95.

You can get Huly with ads and Disney + and ESPN+ for $14.95.

That's how they're handling it now.
 
The key point is that Paramount found a way to thread the needle and get what they believed to be good quality/desirable content to TV viewers without using the TV network distribution model, Paramount made money, the local TV stations made money but the TV networks didn't (from ST:TNG), so why are TV networks needed?

Name the last time that model (hour-long drama in first-run syndication) worked.

And you talk as though ABC, CBS, FOX and NBC are still the gold standard for series TV. They're not. They're in decline. As I said before, if Paramount were to do this today, the show would stream on Paramount+.
 
There have been posts here about lumping Disney+ into Hulu. Here's how they're handling it now:

You can get Hulu by itself for $7.95

You can get Hulu with ads and Disney + for $9.95.

You can get Huly with ads and Disney + and ESPN+ for $14.95.

That's how they're handling it now.
Yes, it is.

And they have two platforms---two separate apps.

Eventually, as Iger said, it'll be one platform. What you pay will escalate, as it does now, by which options you choose. But Hulu, once fully in Disney's control, is likely to be the platform through which, if you want and if you pay, you access Disney+.

Disney+ as a standalone won't exist. And, although Disney directs you to the bundles including Hulu or Hulu/ESPN if you Google "Subscribe to Disney+", a couple of clicks gets you to a pure Disney+ standalone deal (just click "see all plan options"):

 
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But Hulu, once fully in Disney's control, is likely to be the platform through which, if you want and if you pay, you access Disney+.
Not sure about that because I’ve read the Disney+ brand/service is international where Hulu is only in the U.S, so Disney might want to focus on the international brand name rather than the U.S. brand name.
 
Not sure about that because I’ve read the Disney+ brand/service is international where Hulu is only in the U.S, so Disney might want to focus on the international brand name rather than the U.S. brand name.

Most of Hulu's original content is branded as "Star" in Europe and is inside the Disney+ app over there.

The smart move is to go with whichever branding is more popular and valuable depending on the country or continent.
 
Most of Hulu's original content is branded as "Star" in Europe and is inside the Disney+ app over there.

The smart move is to go with whichever branding is more popular and valuable depending on the country or continent.
You know what Disney means. Hulu is just a name.
 
You know what Disney means. Hulu is just a name.
A successful name that as of last week is worth about $28 billion.

Hulu’s also valuable as a brand because it shields the Disney brand from direct association with programs with profanity, nudity, sex and violence.
 
Not sure about that because I’ve read the Disney+ brand/service is international where Hulu is only in the U.S, so Disney might want to focus on the international brand name rather than the U.S. brand name.
Remember, lots of domestic US video programming is of limited or zero interest outside the US.

Many scripted series are not usable... the classic examples are Seinfeld, Cheers, All in the Family and The Jeffersons. All about subjects that are irrelevant outside the US. Then there are scripted dramas from Mash to the "Chicago" family of dramas: of only slight interest in only a few other nations.

Then you have the ones about bachelors and bachelorettes: socially irrelevant outside the US and one or two other places. And masked singers who nobody in Poland or Perú has ever heard of. Or hunky guys with an IQ of 60 trying to jump over artificial obstacles: "Huh?" says the viewer in Burkina Faso.

A good counter comparison is in how the Bollywood movies with their obligatory song and dance routines don't have any mass appeal in the Americas; I've watched quite a few and they are magnificently done and once, like escargot, you acquire the taste, they are a great deal of escapist fun!

And, when I have found some Chinese dramatic and action films that are not "be a good commie" throughout, they are really, really well done but require a cultural refocus which the US viewer is not notorious for being able to do.

All packagers of video product for the international market have to adjust their palette for each nation and culture.
 
Remember, lots of domestic US video programming is of limited or zero interest outside the US.

Many scripted series are not usable... the classic examples are Seinfeld, Cheers, All in the Family and The Jeffersons. All about subjects that are irrelevant outside the US. Then there are scripted dramas from Mash to the "Chicago" family of dramas: of only slight interest in only a few other nations.

Then you have the ones about bachelors and bachelorettes: socially irrelevant outside the US and one or two other places. And masked singers who nobody in Poland or Perú has ever heard of. Or hunky guys with an IQ of 60 trying to jump over artificial obstacles: "Huh?" says the viewer in Burkina Faso.
What about Europe? I see evidence of people in the EU watching US TV (Game Of Thrones was a worldwide phenomenon, and popular in the EU) and especially US movies, and many streaming channels which are available worldwide are loaded with movies. Movies seem to drive some streaming channels, even more than network TV programs.

A simple Google search brings up plenty of results showing that a lot of American TV shows are viewed in the EU.
 
What about Europe?
Even Europe has differences. More US shows might be liked in the UK or Ireland, and fewer in Zagreb or Budapest.
I see evidence of people in the EU watching US TV (Game Of Thrones was a worldwide phenomenon, and popular in the EU) and especially US movies, and many streaming channels which are available worldwide are loaded with movies. Movies seem to drive some streaming channels, even more than network TV programs.
Movies are generally produced for the world market. Many even have their scripts approved by totalitarian nations like China prior to production or to create a locally sensitized version. Turkish TV soap operas and dramatized series have episode versions without mosques in the scenery for Latin American use... were they are very successful.

Game of Thrones is essentially a long movie in episodes, and the setting is Eurocentric.. What I am talking about are shows that reflect American culture that is not popular elsewhere and activities (like baseball) not liked or understood in other nations.

And many American movies and TV shows that are about aspects of our culture that are uncommon elsewhere are not popular. Think of Ferris Bueller's Day Off: how do young people in most of Europe, nearly all of Latin America, Asia and Africa relate to a really rich teen who borrows his dad's expensive car and drives around a city that is very foreign looking to anyone else?
A simple Google search brings up plenty of results showing that a lot of American TV shows are viewed in the EU.
Many, but not all. Ones like Dancing with the Stars, Masked Singer, Bachelor/Bachelorette and the like have no interest as they have "stars" who are not famous in, let's say, Croatia or the Philippines or story lines that are irrelevant.

Yes, there will be some people who are well traveled who will accept a broader spectrum of shows, and since on-demand services like Netflix can provide "everything" then adding thinly liked content is still advantageous. But, using it again as an example, how many in Tokyo, Manila, Bangkok, Mumbai, Addis Ababa, Lima or Tangier are going to like The Masked Singer?
 
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Seeing topic swerve. Waiting for VChimp to start reliving his days when sound was added to films. Talkies!
Yes, it may be topic swerve, but in a global internet marketplace, US media companies do have a global reach, even if US movies and TV shows aren't necessarily global fare.

Disney, for one, seems to have a somewhat global presence (there is a Disney World in France, for example). Disney's Orlando theme park has a lot of foreign workers, especially students, who apply to work there because they already love Disney movies and the like.
 
Disney, for one, seems to have a somewhat global presence (there is a Disney World in France, for example). Disney's Orlando theme park has a lot of foreign workers, especially students, who apply to work there because they already love Disney movies and the like.
What does any of that have to do with media companies who are on the block?
 
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