HBO Max/Discovery+ Merger

"traditional pay tv" is not the same as all linear TV customers. If you have YouTube TV, Hulu live TV, Amazon Channels, etc, you are neither a cord cutter nor a cord never. You are subscriber to linear TV, at best a cord switcher.

As to the idea that sports are "low rated". Mr. Nielsen disagrees.
 
As to the idea that sports are "low rated". Mr. Nielsen disagrees.
Prove it and do not use NFL’s ratings, I posted this in a different thread-

Actually, RSNs get very low ratings, it is a dedicated audience, but not that many, I already pointed out here in Florida, a state over 20 million, the NHL team, the Panthers, on Bally Sports Florida Statewide, had a average rating under 8,000 people, another example from 2021 is the Boston Red Sox on NESN had a average TV household of 84,731, the Boston Metro Area Population is 4,315,000, that means less then 2% were watching the Red Sox via the RSN.

Also, Traditional Providers that have the RSNs are losing the most subscribers, the only Live TV Services gaining subs are Hulu Live and YTTV, both with 4 million subs each, neither have RSNs.

 
Prove it and do not use NFL’s ratings, I posted this in a different thread-
The Yankees lead the ratings every year. The Rays get good ratings in Tampa as nobody wants to go to the stadium. Baseball is a regional sport. It doesn’t do as good nationally.
 
The Yankees lead the ratings every year. The Rays get good ratings in Tampa as nobody wants to go to the stadium. Baseball is a regional sport. It doesn’t do as good nationally.
Not saying National Ratings, for example look at what I posted for the Red Sox.

As far as the rays go, on Fox Sports (Bally) in 2020, they drew an average 75,362 fans, that is out of a population in the Tampa Bay metro Area of 3,175,275 people, as of the 2020 United States census, that is only 2.5% of that area, same range as in the Boston area.

Also Bally Sports Sun ( Fox) is shown state wide, that makes ratings based on population even worse.

Now the Yankees, in August 2021, the Yanks have averaged 317,000 viewers on the home RSN, New York Metro Area’s population is (in 2021) 18,823,000, that means less then 1.8% of the population are watching.




 
Also, Baseball has another problem- Television viewership in 2021 was down 12% from 2019, and the average age of baseball fans is 57. That's much older than any of the other major sports (the NBA's average is just 42), and baseball's fans are getting older year by year. The average age in 2006 was 52.

The younger folks, the ones who are not getting Cable/Sat TV, just do not care.

 
Paramount + actually is the big success story of the streaming services, gained 9 million subs in the 4th quarter, they are up to, global, 56 million already and 32 million in the states, if you average that out at $5 a sub ( some pay more-no commercials), that is $280 million a month, more then $3 billion a year.

Peacock only has 9 million paying subs, so they would be sub-scale, not Paramount.

The only one that did better then Paramount was Disney with 11 million.

HBO gained 4 million, they only have 73.8 million global subscribers, which includes regular HBO subs, that is only 17 million more then Paramount and HBO has been out a lot longer.

I'm talking about the totality of the business, not just a snapshot of where their DTC streamer is at the moment. You may be correct that Paramount+ is doing better than Peacock right now, although I don't think it's a meaningful subscriber comparison if you throw out the millions of Peacock premium subs who get it as part of their paid broadband or cable TV subscription from Comcast, Cox, or Charter; pretty much all major SVODs have a chunk of their subscriber base who gets it bundled with some other service.

Universal has been a more successful movie studio than Paramount in recent years. You can compare grosses between studios in domestic box office receipts here. For the five years from 2017-2021, Universal accounted for an average 14.9% of the total yearly box office take while Paramount averaged only 6.2%. During each of those five years, Universal ranked anywhere from 2nd to 4th among studios while Paramount ranked anywhere from 5th to 7th place. Now that Universal's longstanding output deal with HBO has recently completed, their films will debut exclusively on Peacock during the post-theatrical pay-one window. Paramount, meanwhile, will continue to split output of their films with some going directly to Paramount+ and others still going to Epix first.

Paramount+ is really just a rebranded CBS All Access, meaning that that service has been going for a few years longer than Peacock. And it has some benefits, such as being the exclusive next-day destination for CBS shows, that Peacock still does not have; Peacock won't be the exclusive next-day streamer for NBC shows until this fall, when those shows leave Hulu. And Universal will soon begin putting their primetime MSNBC shows on Peacock later the same evening each day. IMO, Universal has been pretty half-hearted about supporting Peacock content-wise but that's changing this year. Looks like they're also this year shifting some production money for new originals from cable TV over to Peacock. (Peacock clearly trails Paramount+ in the originals race, thanks largely to the latter's various Star Trek series.)

Lastly, Universal, of course, is owned by Comcast, who acts as a broadband and TV distributor in the US and Europe (Sky), which gives Peacock a leg-up on distribution. The Peacock app is pre-installed on all those Xfinity TV and streaming boxes and the premium tier of the service is included at no additional cost.

All that said, I absolutely do believe that *both* Peacock and Paramount+ are sub-scale and in trouble. I'm just disputing your insinuation that Paramount has the resources to go it alone as a global direct-to-consumer media powerhouse while Universal does not. I think one of three things will happen:
  • Universal and Paramount merge
  • Either Universal or Paramount merges with Warner Bros. Discovery and the other remains alone, bowing out of the global SVOD race and instead licensing their content out to the surviving competitors (as Sony Pictures seems content to do)
  • Either Universal or Paramount merges with Warner Bros. Discovery and the other merges with someone else (but who, Disney?)
 
Not saying National Ratings, for example look at what I posted for the Red Sox.

As far as the rays go, on Fox Sports (Bally) in 2020, they drew an average 75,362 fans, that is out of a population in the Tampa Bay metro Area of 3,175,275 people, as of the 2020 United States census, that is only 2.5% of that area, same range as in the Boston area.

Also Bally Sports Sun ( Fox) is shown state wide, that makes ratings based on population even worse.

Now the Yankees, in August 2021, the Yanks have averaged 317,000 viewers on the home RSN, New York Metro Area’s population is (in 2021) 18,823,000, that means less then 1.8% of the population are watching.




Now what is the breakdown by demo. And what are the numbers for network tv by demo. As long as advertisers are happy what else matters.
 
Prove but don't use the numbers that do so.

Sounds hard.

Isn't.

The highest rated show of the 20-21 season, excluding the blockbuster ratings turned in by sports, is a microscopic 2.0, a tie between "This Is Us" and a Fox faux-game show "The Masked Singer". If we stick to only filmed melodramatic entertainment turns in, we get, after "This Is Us" a 1.9 for "Grey's Anatomy" and "The Equalizer". In fact only 13 filmed, scripted shows were able to beat a 1.0 rating. THAT is where filmed scripted TV is in this nation of 340M people. At best 2% are watching.

So onto streaming. The most popular show on steaming is "Criminal Minds", which is reruns of a show that was on regular linear TV years ago. In fact the top 9 most popular shows on streaming are all off-network reruns. That is what this supplemental service mostly is about.

So on to original shows. The most popular original show on steaming last year was "Lucifer". With a whopping 18,332,000 people watching. 18 million. In a country of 340M. A niche show. A niche audience. If you translate that out to what that rating would be on linear TV, you are so below 1.0 as to not be worth doing the math. Cancelled.

Meanwhile, no football, six of the highest 10 rated network shows last week, were, umm, basketball games. As were four of the highest rated 10 "cable" shows (the rest were all various Fox News shows, also only available linearly).

The point is that everything is niche. It is just that sports, even excepting football, is, BY FAR, the largest driver of TV and will be for years to come. And, that means most people will continue to do what they do now. Pay for linear TV channels. Be that via cable, DBS, or via steaming services that offer LINEAR TV, like YouTube Live TV, HULU Live TV, etc.

Because counting someone who just switches from paying DirecTV for linear TV to paying YouTube for linear TV as a "cord cutter" is like counting someone who switches from Bud to Coors as a non-drinker.

It is fine if you don't like sports. Most people do, and its not appropriate to just toss away anything (which is to say most things) pure streaming doesn't have as "low rated".
 
Prove but don't use the numbers that do so.

Sounds hard.

Isn't.

The highest rated show of the 20-21 season, excluding the blockbuster ratings turned in by sports, is a microscopic 2.0, a tie between "This Is Us" and a Fox faux-game show "The Masked Singer". If we stick to only filmed melodramatic entertainment turns in, we get, after "This Is Us" a 1.9 for "Grey's Anatomy" and "The Equalizer". In fact only 13 filmed, scripted shows were able to beat a 1.0 rating. THAT is where filmed scripted TV is in this nation of 340M people. At best 2% are watching.

How about links, I posted them, why not you, by the way, those looked to be demo numbers, not total viewers as I did.
So onto streaming. The most popular show on steaming is "Criminal Minds", which is reruns of a show that was on regular linear TV years ago. In fact the top 9 most popular shows on streaming are all off-network reruns. That is what this supplemental service mostly is about.
A lot of shows are discovered later after their Network run, Star Trek:TOS is the biggest example.
So on to original shows. The most popular original show on steaming last year was "Lucifer". With a whopping 18,332,000 people watching. 18 million. In a country of 340M. A niche show. A niche audience. If you translate that out to what that rating would be on linear TV, you are so below 1.0 as to not be worth doing the math. Cancelled.
18 million is actually 4% of the viewing audience, that is actually great in today’s world of too much to watch.

That is actually better then the NFL, which averaged 17.3 million viewers per game in the Network games ( like Sunday and Monday Night Football).

Meanwhile, no football, six of the highest 10 rated network shows last week, were, umm, basketball games. As were four of the highest rated 10 "cable" shows (the rest were all various Fox News shows, also only available linearly).
Again, post your links.
The point is that everything is niche. It is just that sports, even excepting football, is, BY FAR, the largest driver of TV and will be for years to come. And, that means most people will continue to do what they do now. Pay for linear TV channels. Be that via cable, DBS, or via steaming services that offer LINEAR TV, like YouTube Live TV, HULU Live TV, etc.
And again I have already proved that wrong ( and I had links), Traditional TV has lost more then 32 million subs since 2013, if you want to add YTTV and Hulu Live back in, that is only a increase of +8 million, so still a loss of 24 million.

By the way, YTTV and Hulu do not have the RSNs and they are the only providers gaining in subs, heck, together they have just about as many subs as Dish Network and only been around since 2017, while Dish started in 1996.
Because counting someone who just switches from paying DirecTV for linear TV to paying YouTube for linear TV as a "cord cutter" is like counting someone who switches from Bud to Coors as a non-drinker.
I already did those numbers above, Traditional TV is still down 24 million.
It is fine if you don't like sports. Most people do, and its not appropriate to just toss away anything (which is to say most things) pure streaming doesn't have as "low rated".
I love sports, they are just not the ratings success you think they are, heck DirecTV has the most sports out of any Traditional Providers and yet they have lost 10 millions subs in the last 5 years.
 
I'm talking about the totality of the business, not just a snapshot of where their DTC streamer is at the moment. You may be correct that Paramount+ is doing better than Peacock right now, although I don't think it's a meaningful subscriber comparison if you throw out the millions of Peacock premium subs who get it as part of their paid broadband or cable TV subscription from Comcast, Cox, or Charter; pretty much all major SVODs have a chunk of their subscriber base who gets it bundled with some other service.

I had Peacock for free when I had Comcast, never watched it, since there are 20 million Comcast broadband, do they count all of them, how many actually do, also, I believe Charter ( who I have now) offers the same deal.

I posted before that I got a deal for Commercial Free Peacock at $50 for the year, ( I wonder if I get counted twice since I have Charter for broadband).

I did that because my wife wanted to watch all those Chicago shows ( never watched them before), now that she has passed away, I doubt I will re-subscribe ( already dumped Discovery+),there is nothing on it that I want to watch, which amazes me because Universal has a great back catalog of shows, like 6 Million Dollar Man for example, I used to watch when I was a kid, yet not on Peacock.

Paramount has been putting a lot of their catalog owned stuff on plus.
Universal has been a more successful movie studio than Paramount in recent years. You can compare grosses between studios in domestic box office receipts here. For the five years from 2017-2021, Universal accounted for an average 14.9% of the total yearly box office take while Paramount averaged only 6.2%. During each of those five years, Universal ranked anywhere from 2nd to 4th among studios while Paramount ranked anywhere from 5th to 7th place. Now that Universal's longstanding output deal with HBO has recently completed, their films will debut exclusively on Peacock during the post-theatrical pay-one window. Paramount, meanwhile, will continue to split output of their films with some going directly to Paramount+ and others still going to Epix first
Movies on Peacock needs to be like they are on HBO MAX, 45 days later, for people to care, if they do the old fashion 9 months later, no one will really care in today’s world.
.Paramount+ is really just a rebranded CBS All Access, meaning that that service has been going for a few years longer than Peacock. And it has some benefits, such as being the exclusive next-day destination for CBS shows, that Peacock still does not have; Peacock won't be the exclusive next-day streamer for NBC shows until this fall, when those shows leave Hulu. And Universal will soon begin putting their primetime MSNBC shows on Peacock later the same evening each day. IMO, Universal has been pretty half-hearted about supporting Peacock content-wise but that's changing this year. Looks like they're also this year shifting some production money for new originals from cable TV over to Peacock. (Peacock clearly trails Paramount+ in the originals race, thanks largely to the latter's various Star Trek series.)
Paramount has a major heads up content wise, the Yellowstone spin offs, Star Trek of course and now Halo looks to be even bigger then the Star Trek shows ( plus other stuff like Seal Team and Evil for example), I just do not believe Peacock can catch up, too far behind.
Lastly, Universal, of course, is owned by Comcast, who acts as a broadband and TV distributor in the US and Europe (Sky), which gives Peacock a leg-up on distribution. The Peacock app is pre-installed on all those Xfinity TV and streaming boxes and the premium tier of the service is included at no additional cost.
And how many care is the question, I tried that streaming box in the months before the move to Florida (Sept, 2020) and it is a piece of c***, slow, locks up, etc.
All that said, I absolutely do believe that *both* Peacock and Paramount+ are sub-scale and in trouble. I'm just disputing your insinuation that Paramount has the resources to go it alone as a global direct-to-consumer media powerhouse while Universal does not. I think one of three things will happen:
  • Universal and Paramount merge
  • Either Universal or Paramount merges with Warner Bros. Discovery and the other remains alone, bowing out of the global SVOD race and instead licensing their content out to the surviving competitors (as Sony Pictures seems content to do)
  • Either Universal or Paramount merges with Warner Bros. Discovery and the other merges with someone else (but who, Disney?)
Again, Paramount+ has been increasing in sub numbers every quarter, that is all we can base this on at this point, not if we like the service, they(P+) are now making at least $280 Million a month ( at $5 a sub average), that is more then $3 billion a year.

You brought up that Universal makes more then Paramount in movie grosses ( which they have to give Theater Owners at least 40% of that), well Universal in 2019 ( before Covid) made in Gross was $1.3 billion, so roughly $800 million ( and how much of that goes to production and all the other stuff), that means P+ is now making 4 times that ( $280 x 12 is more then 3.3 billion) and do not have to split it.

If they put 1 billion into production ( which I think is way high), that mean 2 billion they get to keep for themselves, other costs eat into that of course, so maybe about $1-1.5 billion in profit for P+.
 
Speaking of Peacock, found this with how they plan on putting new releases on the service-

Universal Filmed Entertainment Group and Peacock have announced a new licensing agreement that will bring the studio's theatrical slate to streaming faster than before. Beginning in 2022, Universal films will become available exclusively on Peacock no later than four months following their theatrical debut.

So not 45 days like Warner and HBO MAX.

 
I had Peacock for free when I had Comcast, never watched it, since there are 20 million Comcast broadband, do they count all of them, how many actually do, also, I believe Charter ( who I have now) offers the same deal.

I posted before that I got a deal for Commercial Free Peacock at $50 for the year, ( I wonder if I get counted twice since I have Charter for broadband).

I did that because my wife wanted to watch all those Chicago shows ( never watched them before), now that she has passed away, I doubt I will re-subscribe ( already dumped Discovery+),there is nothing on it that I want to watch, which amazes me because Universal has a great back catalog of shows, like 6 Million Dollar Man for example, I used to watch when I was a kid, yet not on Peacock.

Paramount has been putting a lot of their catalog owned stuff on plus.

Movies on Peacock needs to be like they are on HBO MAX, 45 days later, for people to care, if they do the old fashion 9 months later, no one will really care in today’s world.

Paramount has a major heads up content wise, the Yellowstone spin offs, Star Trek of course and now Halo looks to be even bigger then the Star Trek shows ( plus other stuff like Seal Team and Evil for example), I just do not believe Peacock can catch up, too far behind.

And how many care is the question, I tried that streaming box in the months before the move to Florida (Sept, 2020) and it is a piece of c***, slow, locks up, etc.

Again, Paramount+ has been increasing in sub numbers every quarter, that is all we can base this on at this point, not if we like the service, they(P+) are now making at least $280 Million a month ( at $5 a sub average), that is more then $3 billion a year.

You brought up that Universal makes more then Paramount in movie grosses ( which they have to give Theater Owners at least 40% of that), well Universal in 2019 ( before Covid) made in Gross was $1.3 billion, so roughly $800 million ( and how much of that goes to production and all the other stuff), that means P+ is now making 4 times that ( $280 x 12 is more then 3.3 billion) and do not have to split it.

If they put 1 billion into production ( which I think is way high), that mean 2 billion they get to keep for themselves, other costs eat into that of course, so maybe about $1-1.5 billion in profit for P+.
Yellowstone surprisingly is on Peacock not Paramount+.
 
Who produces it? Is it a Universal show or CBS.

The wiki says:
Production companies
  • Linson Entertainment
  • Bosque Ranch Productions
  • Treehouse Films
  • 101 Studios (season 2–present)
  • MTV Entertainment Studios(season 4–present)
Paramount produces.

The reason why Yellowstone is on Peacock, Paramount signed the deal well before they merged again with CBS, they did not have a streaming service at the time.

Same for the deal involving South Park and HBOMAX, that deal is due to be up in 2025, then South Park will be on P+.

I assume once the deal is up with Peacock, it will then be on P+.
 
How about links, I posted them,

Yeah, you just don’t know how to interpret them.
A lot of shows are discovered later after their Network run, Star Trek:TOS is the biggest example.
Name 20 more.
That is actually better then the NFL, which averaged 17.3 million viewers per game in the Network games ( like Sunday and Monday Night Football).
So, in your world a minor cancelled Fox show “Lucifer” is bigger than the NFL. Which just got eleventy billion zillion dollars from those dumb networks that think differently.

All creditability lost.
A
By the way, YTTV and Hulu do not have the RSNs and they are the only providers gaining in subs, heck, together they have just about as many subs as Dish Network and only been around since 2017, while Dish started in 1996.
Linear TV, gaining subs.

Meanwhile, and I don’t post links, this isn’t an academic paper that needs footnotes, look it up if you disbelieve anything I say, the “churn” rate for the streamers is now upwards of 10% for some. As people do, with these supplemental services, what was predicted. Move from one to the next to the next and back again, “bingeing” up the few offerings before moving on. While the vast majority keeps linear TV.
I already did those numbers above, Traditional TV is still down 24 million.
Already explained. If you pay for linear TV, you are not a cord cutter and the fact that it comes over the internet is irrelevant.
I love sports, they are just not the ratings success you think they are,
Well take a gander at the ratings some time. HUGE. The driving force in TV. Today more than ever.

How many weeks do you think the #1 prime time program was sports.

HINT: The vast majority.
heck DirecTV has the most sports out of any Traditional Providers and yet they have lost 10 millions subs in the last 5 years.
I get it. Yes, maybe 10 years ago there was cable, Dish and DirecTV. That was it. Then came new LINEAR TV providers, like YouTube TV, et al. For some people these new methods of getting LINEAR TV were a better option. Great. Competition is good for the consumer. But the conclusion you draw is like saying beer is going out of vogue because Bud sales are down, forgetting that Coors sales are up.

But you want to draw from this a conclusion that just isn’t there. Most people still want linear TV. Yes, a few people like yourself are trying to save four cents on a length of pipe and don’t really miss meat all that much. Most people, however, want the richness that only linear TV can provide. Others are happy with niche melodramas, and off-network reruns from years ago, which is what streaming is all about. I’m sure there are people out there that would say they are happy with just an antenna and Andy Griffith is still funny the 500th time around. Fine.

For me life is too short.
 
Paramount + actually is the big success story of the streaming services, gained 9 million subs in the 4th quarter, they are up to, global, 56 million already and 32 million in the states, if you average that out at $5 a sub ( some pay more-no commercials), that is $280 million a month, more then $3 billion a year.

Peacock only has 9 million paying subs, so they would be sub-scale, not Paramount.

The only one that did better then Paramount was Disney with 11 million.

HBO gained 4 million, they only have 73.8 million global subscribers, which includes regular HBO subs, that is only 17 million more then Paramount and HBO has been out a lot longer.

The big dog in the game is actually Amazon Prime with roughly 150 million subs just in the states. If you add in the add-ons like Acorn and Britbox etc the number skyrockets. IMHO CNN+ is a last ditch effort to save CNN which has been dying for quite a while now. CNN+ won't save it and HBO Max would be nuts to bundle it but this is what I've been talking about, HBOMax is heading toward being a streaming cable company by bundling in as many junk groups as it can find just to pump up the channel numbers.
 
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The big dog in the game is actually Amazon Prime with roughly 150 million subs just in the states. If you add in the add-ons like Acorn and Britbox etc the number skyrockets. IMHO CNN+ is a last ditch effort to save CNN which has been dying for quite a while now. CNN+ won't save it and HBO Max would be nuts to bundle it but this is what I've been talking about, HBOMax is heading toward being a streaming cable company by bundling in as many junk groups as it can find just to pump up the channel numbers.
Everything is on demand..no linear channels..just a bunch of shows..those channels cost almost nothing to add on their platform..no price increase needed but extra value