When it comes to rival services in technology and entertainment, it's rare to see one company praising another. But that's exactly what the Paramount Plus boss is offering to compete with the Disney Plus streaming service.
Speaking at the Morgan Stanley Technology, Media and Telecommunications Conference on Tuesday (via Variety), Paramount Global CEO Bob Bakish said the recent decision to offer an ad-supported tier to Disney Plus subscribers was " 100% fair."
Paramount Plus already offers a similar split between a premium and more affordable ad-supported subscription tier, and Bakishs says Disney's decision to offer a similar option was a "validation of the strategy" Paramount has adopted.
As previously reported, the ad-supported tier of Disney Plus is coming later this year in the US, before an international release is scheduled for 2023. No pricing has been announced beyond the plan to sell it to a lower price. lower price than currently offered. through the unique Disney Plus subscription plan.
Analysis: good news, bad news
Choice is a good thing, right? And any commercial offer that gives you more options at a more affordable price is usually worth accepting.
At a more affordable price, Disney Plus will give families, across a more diverse income range, access to its vast catalog of family favorites and franchises from entertainment giants, including classic Disney animation and the latest Star TV shows. Wars. You'll be able to gorge yourself on Marvel movies in order without worrying so much about your bill at the end.
And, according to Disney research, a lot of potential viewers actually prefer the ad-supported options, let alone the advertisers that go with them. More money in Disney's coffers should, in theory, benefit all viewers equally: once shareholders take their share of the pie, imagine more money left over to create more adventurous content.
However, introducing an ad-supported level can be a double-edged sword. For starters, we haven't yet figured out what kind of privacy measures will be put in place to ensure viewers aren't tracked in a nasty way when it comes to their viewing preferences, let alone the impact of children's exposure to even more advertising At the end of the day, Disney Plus is first and foremost a family platform, although the merger of other content catalogs, such as that of 20th Century Fox, has somewhat diluted the family library.
Plus, if services like Prime Video are anything to go by, there's nothing stopping Disney from seeing the success of ad-supported content and slowly sliding it into the premium tier. As anyone who's sat through an Amazon sizzling reel before watching its must-see Prime Video show can attest, it can be hard to know exactly what you're paying for when you're selling things while you watch. Hoping that the Disney Plus team and its leaders avoid this temptation.