Wrestling was supposed to be one of the first streaming success stories. In 2018, World Wrestling Entertainment Inc. announced it had signed up 2.1 million customers for its WWE Network, making it one of the biggest paid online video services not named Netflix.
Now, just two years later, the WWE is giving up on its own service (in the U.S., at least) and selling its rights to Peacock.
It’s tempting to view this as a failure by the WWE. Its subscriber base plateaued, and the company couldn't figure out a strategy to return to growth.
But it’s better to see this as the logical evolution of the streaming market in two key ways: the inevitable consolidation of streaming into cable-like packages, and the increasingly central role of sports in these offerings.
Gerry Smith has a great piece on the first topic: the fate of niche streaming services. The WWE had already signed up most of its diehard fans, and found it increasingly difficult to stand out in a market of hundreds of services. It's especially difficult when there are at least six players backed by companies worth more than $200 billion offering all kinds of entertainment.
"The challenge was growing it from where we are,” Nick Khan, WWE's president, told Gerry. “It’s tough to get people who aren’t fans to sample a product when you have to subscribe to see it.”
What do you do if you've stopped growing? It could have branched out into other genres, doubling down on an expensive business in a crowded market. Or, it could go back to what it did during the cable era and sell its shows to the highest bidder.
Enter Peacock. There are at least seven dozen streaming services aiming to be the broadcast networks of the streaming era, offering a little bit of everything for everyone.
Netflix is the clear leader, and Disney has quickly established itself as the second-biggest player. Amazon and Apple exist to remind you of everything else they sell you, so their needs are less dire. Though their checkbooks may be the largest.
Everyone else – HBO Max, Peacock and Paramount+ in particular – needs to give you a reason to pay for a third, or fourth or seventh service. A sprinkling of original series and a catalog isn't enough. Those are table stakes.
Expect all three of them to make live sports a big part of their sales pitch. These events have built-in, loyal fan bases who will pay to watch. What's more, sports is one of the few types of programming Netflix doesn't offer.
HBO Max has committed to original movies. That will be the difference maker in 2021, and "Wonder Woman 1984" was the first test. But live sports is coming. WarnerMedia has rights to the professional basketball, college basketball and Major League Baseball.
For Peacock and Paramount+, sports is already one of their few advantages. Peacock was supposed to launch off of the Olympics. While that event was delayed, Peacock has used the English Premiere League to lure several of my friends. It’s now going to shift hockey and other sports from the defunct NBCSN to Peacock, as well as WWE, which is kind of a sport.
Executives at ViacomCBS have made similar noise about the importance of sports, from airing the Super Bowl this year to its recent deal for the Champions League.
There was a time when it seemed like leagues might bypass media companies and sell their own services. But as the WWE has just proven, it’s a lot easier to just sell your rights and let the media companies do the hard part. It’s pure profit for you, and you get exposed to more people.
The NFL is in the business of making its games available to as many people as possible. That's hard to do if you are only available to a smaller group of paying subscribers.
The sleeping giant here, as in all things, is Disney. ESPN has the most robust set of sports rights in the world, and is owned by the most valuable entertainment company in the world. ESPN is struggling with the decline of cable, and its owner has already proven it can launch a huge streaming service.
For now, it’s still worth it to keep the big events on TV and not ESPN+. For now. – Lucas Shaw
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Sports radio’s biggest star is launching a podcast
Colin Cowherd is starting new podcast network called the Volume. Cowherd will own the company and host a new podcast. The network will also feature more than half a dozen shows in total, including a basketball podcast hosted by LaJethro Jenkins and Dragonfly Jonez.
It’s a sign of the growing power of podcasts that one of the most popular sports radio hosts in the country is willing to put millions of his own dollars behind his own company. It used to be that hosting a radio show was enough. But Cowherd now reaches more people every year with Facebook videos than radio, and knows that most listeners under 40 aren’t tuning in to terrestrial radio or cable TV, which are what still pay his bills.
“We're in an on-demand world,” Cowherd said last week, speaking over videoconference from his home in Manhattan Beach. “You can do real-time commentary now with no barriers. I don’t have to drive to a studio, don’t have to put makeup on and get miked up.”
Market-based capitalism had a good run
The GameStop saga was the story of the week, and also a classic case where the narrative got way ahead of the facts.
First, the facts. The company's stock was trading at about $4 a share last July. It quadrupled to $17 a share in January, a modest total by this week's standards. It peaked at $483 a share Thursday before plummeting to $112.25 Thursday and rising back to $325 by the end of the week. All told, it's worth about 80 times what it was six months ago with no change to the fundamentals of the business.
The narrative: The amateurs took down hedge funds! Trading will never be the same.
While some hedge funds did suffer, many professional investors did just fine. Private equity firm Silver Lake Partners made more than $100 million trading on the boom in AMC's stock this week.
But don't bother with my take on this. I work with a lot of people who are experts on the stock market, which I am most certainly not.
Sundance 2021 is a seller's market
The most prestigious film festival in the U.S. kicked off this week in a decentralized, virtual edition. I saw my first movie at home Friday night, "On the Count of Three," the directorial debut of Jerrod Carmichael.
While it's easier to get swept up in the moment when sitting in a theater, I would expect the sales market to be brisk. This might be counterintuitive; who is buying films when theaters are closed?
But more traditional distributors will buy movies and bank them for the end of the year, while all the streaming services are still eager for new product to lure customers. Netflix, Amazon, Apple, HBO Max and Hulu may all go shopping. Neon already acquired "Flee," an animated documentary, and Apple paid a record $25 million for "Coda."
Peak TV peaked
The number of original scripted TV shows released in 2020 slipped to 493, down 7% from a year ago. The pandemic has suppressed production, but this could also be a tipping point of sorts as linear TV networks scale back.
Deals deals deals
Weekly playlist
Arlo Parks. Run, don't walk. This 20-year-old British singer just released her first studio album, "Collapsed in Sunbeams," and it is "near-perfect," if a bit of a downer.
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