Re: The future of television
 

It’s difficult to not personalise it when you are the single, solitary person with such a dogmatic view that only streaming television can survive while linear channels - despite still being a popular method of both distributing and consuming television - must disappear.

To address epsilon’s valid point however I’ll add the following.

Fundamentally OB has, for some years now, mistakenly viewed streaming as something more than a different method of consuming television. To that end, streaming services represent a subset of the television market. Subscription streaming services (themselves a subset of the pay-tv market) aren’t meaningfully increasing the size of the pot - they’re only trying to claim a greater share of a limited pot.

Neither Roku (nor Amazon) are taking responsibility for retailing the vast majority of packages on their devices - he knows this - but conflates this with the relationship Sky/Virgin have as a middle man and assumes (incorrectly) that there’s a place for someone in the streaming market for a “gatekeeper” platform.

There isn’t. The whole point of the exercise is to gain market share at the expense of other participants. Why would anyone want a third party to decide what prominence they have (if any) on consumer devices while trying to retail direct to consumers?

And none of this - absolutely none - has anything to do with the economics of a channel maintaining a linear presence in addition to steaming as the BBC, ITV and Sky do now. Nobody feels dogmatic about this bar OB as he presents this as a one way street. The reality is that fewer linear channels existing causes the remaining ones to become more prominent near the top of EPGs.

Almost all of us envisage a future with far fewer linear channels - some content lends itself to it. News, sports channels that place magazine programming (adverts essentially) between live programming and content where people are active on social media while viewing live (X Factor type programming for example). ITV aren’t going to give up prominent access to every household and television in the country to join a jumble sale menu.

However when on the ropes the goalposts move and OB expects that nobody will follow him down the rabbit hole.

Re: The future of television
 

All I see is Disney not managing to acquire Sky. Having a spat with pay-tv providers unwilling to pay the asking price for their channels and throwing their weight behind their streaming service.

As for Discovery.
https://www.digitaltveurope.com/2021...ely-happening/

They seem quite happy with the co-existence of streaming and scheduled content and have actually said as much.

Amazon Fire is simple, Amazon wants everyone to buy its devices, it is a major marketing opportunity for their wider business. Roku are selling devices, that is their business. So was Now TV but why did they stop? They were supplying subsidised devices which customers could then use to watch content from their competitors. They no longer provide devices. That will, largely be the case for the pay-tv providers. Pay-tv providers are selling channel bundles, that is where their income comes from. If they were to totally lose that income and become rent collectors for global streamers their business model would collapse.

Is it?

Not really, just responding to your points.

Re: The future of television
 

Erm, no one has ever said that no linear channels would close - over the last few decades, some have closed, some new ones have come along, and now with streaming, some more will close.

What (most) people don't accept is your dogmatic assertion that by 2035 all linear channels will be closed down, and the only option available will be streaming.

Re: The future of television
 

I'm pretty sure that the asking price to renew the carriage contract for the Disney channels will have been priced at an unrealistic level so that Disney either made a killing or were able to remove them (and blame Sky/VM if need be). A similar strategy that Sky have used to keep SA off VM.

I did think that the smaller, niche channels would move over to streaming and we've seen this happen with some of these channels eg Horse & Country, some Asian channels etc, but it does seem that the larger companies are doing or considering it sooner than I envisaged.

One thing that would improve the streaming services would be the ability to record from them and this is where the traditional pay TV companies could offer a USP to encourage people to stick with them. BT already does this and is currently the only way of being able to record from Now TV.

Re: The future of television
 

What if the streamers don't want to be aggregated?
https://www.broadbandtvnews.com/2021...reaming-offer/

Re: The future of television
 

Exactly my point.

Wholesaling while also retailing “direct to customer” eats into your potential revenue. Remembering that it’s all just television and streaming isn’t magically exempt from the economics of that market BT Sport is in Virgin Maxit as was ESPN before that and Setanta before it.

This benefits both parties - Virgin subscribers were less likely to take Sky Sports than Sky subscribers, therefore further less likely to take an additional sports service from another provider. Way back £2.50 per sub per month was getting quoted for Setanta as wholesale. Guaranteed income they relied upon.

However it worked because Virgin subscribers weren’t the target audience for Setanta direct to customer subs. Sky subscribers with Sky Sports were as they’d be significantly more likely to cough up £15 a month for dedicated sports channels than someone paying Virgin £40 a month for a tv/phone/broadband bundle.

For a general entertainment streamer they can’t wholesale to Sky or Virgin without cannibalising their own potential customer base.

Re: The future of television
 

Not if it adds new customers, it doesn't. Anyway, I was talking about discounting, not wholesaling.

Streamers like Apple TV, Discovery+, Britbox and Acorn would benefit from discounting. Netflix and Prime not so much as they both have a large existing customer base. The latter two might benefit more from discounted first years for Virgin customers who were not already subscribers.

No-one here is arguing that simple economics do not apply to any party. That's a product of your own imagination.

---------- Post added at 17:51 ---------- Previous post was at 17:35 ----------

I know for a fact that you are not correct when you say this.

What is correct is that some very aggressive linear channel fanatics are trying to beat people who suggest such things into submission.

I will not succomb to this kind of bullying. I am very happy to answer questions on the views you and others express, but it seems to me that you are not interested and you are not listening, which begs the question of why you continue to post on this subject.

I have been saying for 6 years now that by 2035, I believe that our scheduled channels as currently presented will no longer exist. I have said that the change would be gradual at first but after a few years, scheduled channels as we know them now would start to close. This is already happening.

In the last year, the following channels have closed:

Home & Health
Discovery Shed
Travel Channel
VH1
3 MTV channels
Lifetime
All 3 children's Disney channels
Sky Cinema Disney

....to mention those that come to mind.

The most significant of these are Disney's channels, because the content remains available, but only on the streamer.

To you and others arguing that the prediction I have made is not a viable proposition, this should be sounding alarm bells, but it isn't. You continually preach the same message despite your arguments disintegrating before you.

I might as well just sit back now and let you eventually come to terms with the fact that you were wrong.

I note that you claim that if only one channel survives, you will have been proved right. Well, that shows how confident you are!

Re: The future of television
 

The money comes from someone’s bottom line either way, OB.

Yet Netflix are discounting to Sky customers and Amazon to Vodafone customers.

It’s only when you have an established customer base that strategic discounting becomes more viable - the content costs are there anyway and the marginal cost of an additional subscriber is near zero.

For the fledgeling providers, while in their desperation it’s likely, in practice it puts them further from a sustainable business model not closer to one.

Name a single other user who shares your view?

Bullying is quite the accusation OB.

In practice you are being asked to evidence your view and you cannot.

What do you mean “as currently presented”? This sounds like another Pluto TV goalpost shift.

OB it is you who created the “one channel” bar for the rest of us by dogmatically insisting no linear channels. None. When others make the point they believe there will be (often far) fewer you still tell them they are wrong, it will not be financially viable. Not even to run a 24 hour advert for a streaming service into every home in the land.

No linear channels is just that. Zero. Not “freeview”, not a basic service of four free to air channels, not six, not fifteen, not thirty.

It’s zero.

Re: The future of television
 

Perhaps you would draw attention to where I have said that.

All I claim is that I believe that the scheduled linear channels will all ultimately be closed and the content made available on the internet.

The rest is your imagination.

Re: The future of television
 

Literally this post.

Re: The future of television
 

Not if it's new customers that would not otherwise have had, jfman. That's new income.




You are bullying and baiting and that's why no-one is wanting to join in the debate.


What I will say is that if one or two remain, I will have been substantially right. But you would be substantially wrong.

Re: The future of television
 

Not if it's new customers that would not otherwise have had, jfman. That's new income.




You are bullying and baiting and that's why no-one is wanting to join in the debate.


What I will say is that if one or two remain, I will have been substantially right. But you would be substantially wrong.

Re: The future of television
 

Thats not the reason ;)

Re: The future of television
 

OB you’ve messed up the quotes again.

If one or two linear channels remain you will be absolutely wrong.

If your initial position had been that there will be far fewer linear channels many, many more people (possibly even myself) would have agreed with you.

A world where the BBC maintains a linear channel for universal service, ITV as a promo for their streaming service, and a small number of channels for Sky or anyone else to showcase their content for a streaming service and a “main event” type sports service isn’t entirely beyond the realms of possibility. When I’ve made these comments before you’ve dismissed them.

Re: The future of television
 

Ok, then let's just stop all this nonsense and the sheer pedrantry that is characteristic of this debate on this forum.

I will be the man here and say that I agree that most scheduled linear channels will close and that IPTV will be the principal means of transmission of content by around 2035.

I am happy to compromise on that if it stops all the argument.