Streaming Has Become Cable
Tell me if you’ve heard this one before: a streaming provider is joining up with another streaming provider to offer a bundle. Last week it was Disney+ (with its already-included bundled Hulu) announcing its teaming up to offer Max as a new bundle. Then came the news that Comcast is going to bundle Peacock, Netflix and Apple TV+ as a bundle. Hey, did you hear Netflix got the rights to Christmas Day NFL games? And MBL is actively railing against Diamond sports for failing to carry games?
The list goes on and on. The sad part is we asked for this.
Nearly a decade after many got their wish of cord-cutting becoming a real alternative to the hated cable companies, we’ve nearly come full circle. Streaming providers are hated and we clamor for something different. It wasn’t always this way. For many years Netflix was THE streaming service. You had Netflix and that was it. Sure, it had crappy shows, but it was enough for us when we also had cable. Then HBO Go came along and showed you that you could watch HBO anywhere. That was neat.
Then came Hulu, CBS All Access (now Paramount+), Disney+, Amazon Prime, Apple TV+, and the list goes on. What happened was all these streaming companies decided, smartly, to invest in exclusive original content. Netflix used to be known as the place to watch FRIENDS but after the success of House of Cards, the script was…
