Talks between the Writers Guild of America (WGA) and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) broke down, leading to a writers strike starting on Tuesday, an action that will likely disrupt Apple TV+ and other streaming services’ productions. Still, streaming-focused firms like Apple TV+ and Netflix may have an edge.
Wedbush analyst Michael Pachter told Barron’s that the strike’s biggest impact will be on late night shows and soap operas, followed by network channels that are strict with their prime-time show release cadences in September.
“Streaming is far less affected, because there is no real regular cadence (see Westworld gap of more than a year, Game of Thrones the same, Succession the same) and because the streamers generally have a lot of content from outside the U.S.,” Pachter said…
Rosenblatt Securities analyst Barton Crockett wrote in a Tuesday note that the strike mainly impacts television. He thinks films will only be marginally affected, for now.
The Writers Guild of America said it called the strike, which was effective at 12.01 a.m. Pacific time, after six weeks of negotiations with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers didn’t yield a contract. The AMPTP negotiated on behalf of Netflix, Amazon, Apple, Disney, Discovery-Warner, NBCUniversal, Paramount and Sony.
MacDailyNews Take: Hopefully, Apple anticipated the possibility of a writer strike and stockpiled some series and/or is bringing in more content from outside of the U.S. as Apple TV+ is just really starting, with a small, generally high-quality library, so production interruptions are a concern.
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Then again, part of what this strike is about is squeezing a lot more money out of streaming services. There is a belief in the industry that everyone should be able to afford living in Los Angeles. So if you are the set weenie roller you should be able to afford $500,000 for a 600 Square foot single apartment in Los Angeles.
Well that cost has to go somewhere and so assume the prices of streaming services will rise after the writer’s strike and the subsequent actor’s strike, and the everybody else strike that follows that.
If you’re like me, you might only be paying for Apple just because. MDN is very persuasive on that account. If it comes down to it though, Apple will likely be the first to go. At any one time I only want to have one streaming service and Apple, who almost never has anything I want to see. If it gets too expensive, oh well.
Apple’s business is not dependent on the short term profitability of a single peace of a service bundle. just like Prime for Amazon, Apple’s long term goal for services is to sell Apple One subscriptions, not Apple TV+ as a standalone product.
Losing subs due higher prices, profitability due higher cost, or satisfaction due lower quality is a lot bigger risk for the video-only streaming services like Netflix that have no other services / business to soften the impact.
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