The Daily Mail reports that "Disney+ slashes price of its basic subscription service to $1.99 from $7.99 in bid to attract back more than 11million subscribers who ditched it in latest quarter." Per the article, "[t]he promotion, which is only available until September 20, charges the lower price for only three months before customers will switch back to the previous rate." The article also notes that "Disney+ lost around 11.7 global million subscribers in the three months that ended July 1, with 146.1 million as the new total." Like other articles on this subject, it blames the losses primarily to millions of subscribers in India (or Bharat as the nation apparently will now be referred to) dropping the service after Disney+ was unable to renew the rights to Indian Premier League cricket matches in 2022. However, that drop was last year--I have a hard time believing that people are still dropping Disney because it didn't show cricket matches in 2022.
Streaming is a disaster for them, and it's going to get worse. Vox Day has a good analysis.
ReplyDeleteAs a consumer, there are two main problems I see with Disney+. First, it has a very small library compared to other streaming services: it basically is a very small selection of classic Disney cartoons and movies (pretty much what had previously been released on video), a few offerings from the Disney Channel, Star Wars stuff, most of the Marvel shows and movies, and a limited selection of National Geographic. And that is it. There must be a lot more Disney movies and shorts out there than what they have released--I can remember seeing plenty of nature documentaries in elementary school that are nowhere to be found on Disney+ as an example and what about the weekly Wonderful World of Disney that aired when I was a kid--and many National Geographic specials that could be added for minimal cost. Since they own ABC, there must be hundreds of Saturday morning and after-school specials that could be added, again for minimal cost. Frankly, they should have just rolled Disney+ into Hulu rather than keep them separate. But because of the small library, the result is that you can pretty much watch anything you might want to watch within just a couple months.
DeleteSecond, the new content the Company is producing is terrible. Why it is terrible could be a series of articles itself. But it seems each new series they release has lower audience scores that the prior one. The consequence is that there is nothing to keep you wanting to come back.