Right, so, time for a break from my usual rants about the shit state of the world (and a traditional holiday Fuck Off to the major offenders in the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the Israel/Hamas thing while I'm thinking of it) - time instead for a rant on the shit state and trend of commercial video streaming currently, with a special nod to Disney+.
If Wikipedia's dates and figures are right, Netflix first launched their stand-alone streaming service in 2011, for just shy of $8 per month. At the time, it was an amazing value, compared to cable TV subscriptions closer to $40 or $50 a month (if memory serves), especially given its two major features. Namely, they had a library of titles large enough to practically guarantee you could watch whatever you want, and, whatever you watched, it would be ad-free.
In the intervening years, enshittification has changed that dynamic greatly. First, the larger owners of most popular films and shows decided that they would rather be making money themselves rather than handing content off to Netflix, so they launched their own streaming services, with varying degrees of success. Quickly, given the niche nature of their content, some such streamers made "bundle deals" available to get multiple stream sources for a reduced price, echoing the bundling that started cable down its road to ruin. More recently, most streamers have started splitting their content into tiers, not based on things like how many screens you can have running at once or the audio/visual quality of the streamed content, but on whether they can feed you ads at the same time. So, now, sticking with Netflix for this example, you can access a greatly-reduced range of content under one of three plans: "good enough" quality with ads for about $7/month, the same without ads for more than $15/month, or high quality without ads for about $23/month. In contrast, Curiosity Stream offers their (admittedly niche) content for no more than $5/month for a high-quality stream, which should give a good idea as to how much of other streamers' fees are due to meeting hardware requirements to supply their customers.
But, like I said, I really want to focus on Disney+ for a bit here. Why? Well, I had an account a while back (likely when they launched in 2019 at a roughly $7/month price point). I specifically didn't go for their ESPN and Hulu bundle for about $13/month, for one simple reason: I take a hard stance against paying for ads, which was part and parcel of any Hulu experience at the time. So, I watched my fill of Disney fare, Star Wars stuff, and the odd National Geographic content, and let my subscription lapse, ready to wait until more content I cared for had accumulated.
Here we are in 2024, and I caught wind via a YouTube ad - Disney+ is doing a Black Friday sale, $3/month if you sign up for a year up front! Color me intrigued! So I go to the Disney+ site and... oh, it's another Hulu bundle, with ads on Disney+ as well. Normally, something they charge about $11/month for. And the ad-free version of that bundle isn't on sale at all, and they would want you to pay about $20/month for that. And there's various other bundles available, but none where you could get everything they have on offer, for up to about $30/month. And just getting Disney+? Not even shown in the same area - you have to dig in the FAQ section for it - about $10/month with ads, $16/month without. And with all those choices, nothing is mentioned about stream quality - it's probably high-quality, but who really knows?
Now, here's the thing... I get Disney's angle on this, they want to push bundles to maintain engagement, and they want to normalize ads, because they can make more money overall that way (otherwise, they wouldn't bother to offer it). But, in doing such a deep discount on one service option without providing any discount for anything else, their message is, basically, "you would be a sucker to do anything but this." And, looking at their price structures, and how much everything else costs versus a $5/month ad-free Curiosity Stream subscription (or, for something a little more mass-market, an $8/month ad-free CrunchyRoll subscription), I have to agree. But, since I won't pay for ads, that's not happening, and there's nothing that's come out from Disney in the past few years that makes me want to bend over and take it, either.
So, congratulations, Disney, you managed to both lure me in the door with one offer, then drive me out again with all your other offers. Well, I'm sure, eventually, maybe, you'll produce something I'm willing to pay a premium to watch. But today is not that day.
No comments:
Post a Comment