Category: Media
-
ESPN, Charter, The Cable Bundle and the Future
I have been fascinated by the recently resolved standoff in the US TV industry between the second biggest cable provider in the country, Charter Communications, and one of the biggest TV providers, Disney. Over the US Open tennis final at the weekend, and the start of the opening weekend of the new NFL season, millions…
-
Max
With Warner Bros Discovery (WBD) having yesterday confirmed what everyone expected, that the new combined HBO-Max/Discovery+ streaming offer will now be called simply “Max“, I have a few questions about what true global ambitions WBD has for the service. To date, HBO Max has only been available in a relatively narrow list of countries. Having…
-
Streaming Things
EBU/Warner Bros. Discovery’s Olympic Deal The IOC has just announced that a joint European Broadcasting Union (EBU) and Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) bid has been successful for the next few Olympic cycles, from the 2026 Winter Olympics in Milan through until the 2032 Summer Games in Brisbane. In the UK, that means that BBC will…
-
Did Commercial Broadcasters Really Lose Millions of Pounds on Monday?
As I type, I’ve yet to see any viewing figures for how many people watched the Queen’s funeral on British TV yesterday – they were going to be late being published due to “abnormally high levels of viewing for The State Funeral.” I think it’s safe to assume that it will be a very large…
-
Waiting for Top Gun
If you visited Prime Video, Apple TV or Google Play Movies in the last couple of days, you may have noticed that there’s something new available to buy. Top Gun: Maverick has just arrived on digital-to-own streaming services. In the UK, it’s priced at £11.99 for an SD copy (Why would anyone buy a title…
-
IPL TV and Streaming Rights
Long-time readers will know that I have a deep fascination with sports rights, the value attached to them and the value generated by the companies that buy them. Sports bodies have worked out the most efficient ways to maximise those rights, getting big media giants to spend freely every few years. The Indian Premier League…
-
The Short Life of CNN+
That was fast. Just three weeks after a big glitzy launch, CNN’s new streaming service, CNN+, is being closed down. The decision was taken – or at least announced – just over a week after the formalities completed on the merger between WarnerMedia (which owns CNN) and Discovery. Together, their combined media group is called…
-
Podcast Moderation
Spotify is learning the tough way that while you can build perhaps the most sophisticated software platform that scales beautifully and completely redraws the revenue model of the music industry, “content moderation” is hard. Particularly when you’ve backed the person at the centre of things with a $100m investment. Spotify has finally responded by finally…
-
Finding a New Movie Studio
This morning came news that the UK, and London in particular is going to be home of a new film studio. Specifically, Blackstone Real Estate and Hudson Pacific Properties have found a spot 17 miles north of London in Broxbourne to site their new studio facilities that they claim will see £700m invested, and bring…
-
The Olympics on TV in the UK
The 2012 London Olympics were perhaps the high point for UK viewers who wanted to watch the Olympic Games. For a home event, the BBC pulled out all the stops with coverage across BBC One, BBC Two and BBC Three (then still on broadcast). There was a vast array of other broadcasts too, with up…
-
It’s Different This Side of the Pond
Yesterday I saw my first TV ad – at least in quite a few months – for Wonder Woman 1984, the next instalment of the blockbuster DC Extended Universe film series. The TV ad tells me that the film is opening in UK cinemas on 16 December. Hmm. Now this is a film who’s release…
-
Amazon and Rugby
This weekend the hastily arranged Autumn Nations Cup competition kicks off, with eight European nations playing each other in two pools initially before a finals weekend determines the winner. The competition is there to replace the usual Autumn internationals made up of southern hemisphere sides playing a series of big games in Europe. I’m sure…
-
Substack Journalism
Earlier today, the actor Johnny Depp lost a libel action against News Group Newspapers and the journalist Dan Wootton. I’ll leave others to get into the detail of the case. But I follow a handful of folk in “British legal Twitter” and there were a few interesting summaries and thoughts on what the outcome meant…