The Rise of Streaming Services

             Growing up, cable dominated the television market. Cable TV had the popular shows like SpongeBob and sporting events such as Monday Night Football. I personally didn't have Cable TV growing up, but my family members did, and I would always look forward to being able to watch Cartoon Network or ESPN. When I finally was able to get Cable TV, streaming services had started to take over. Netflix was already established as one of the top services alongside Hulu, but they were really the only services that were established. After Disney+ launched on November 12, 2019, the number of streaming services seemed to skyrocket. We saw different services that offered different shows. Paramount+ has shows from CBS and Paramount movies. HBO Max has shows from HBO max, cartoon network, and Warner Bros. Amazon Prime offers different prime video channels as well as exclusive coverage of "Thursday Night Football". Last, but certainly not least, Peacock offers content from NBC and their affiliates.

             Before I wrap up this post, I wanted to talk about my experiences with streaming services. I personally a handful of them that go along with Cable TV. The services that I mainly use are Disney+ and HBO Max. The services that I use/have usually align with the TV shows that I want to watch. For example, I'm a Star Wars fan, so Disney+ is as close to a "must have" when it comes to streaming services. And the one thing that I've noticed with people I know that have streaming services, they usually follow the shows that they want access to. Having all of these different streaming services can become pretty expensive. A lot of people tend to share passwords (even if they aren't supposed to), with those that they are close with to access the shows they want to watch. But the most important aspect that I've noticed, is that each streaming service has exclusives. And it makes sense. You need something that sets you apart from the competition, and what is so unique about this competition, is that they have all of the television/film media in the world to work with... as well as live TV and sports. Sporting industries have started to make deals with services that will allow them to have an exclusive broadcast of that game. The example I'll use here is the NFL. The NFL has multiple deals with different services. Amazon Prime now has Thursday Night Football exclusively, Netflix will have 2 Christmas Day games, NFL Network (their own service) gets international games, and Peacock usually gets a playoff game or two. 

              As I previously mentioned, streaming services seemingly blew up overnight. What I will be talking about in this blog series will be ranging from the positives and negatives that have come from them to how streaming services have changed the media landscape to what the future holds, and a conclusion that ties everything together. My goal is to figure out why streaming services are so popular, and how they have changed the media landscape.

Growth of Streaming Services between 2007-2021
Source: Streams4k

References:

• Streams4k. (2022). Streaming TV Services Chart Comparison For 2023. https://streams4k.com/streaming-tv-services-comparison-chart/