I haven’t been a regular TV watcher for a long time, but I still watch the Minnesota Vikings meaning that I need to pay for a streaming service … which has definitely been going up every year at a significantly higher-than-inflation rate. At The Honest Broker, Ted Gioia shows that this is now a very common thing indeed:
It’s not every day that I get an email from Apple. But yesterday the Cupertino leviathan reached out to me.
Can you guess why? Do they have some cool new gadget that will make my life better? Are they opening an Apple Store in my neighborhood? Does Tim Cook want to take me out to dinner?
None of the above. Apple is raising my subscription price for Apple TV by a whopping 30%.
Apple is not alone. The very next day, Disney announced a similar move.
This is the fourth straight year that Disney+ has forced a price increase on viewers. The ad-free subscription price has almost tripled in just six years. During that same period, Disney’s movies have gone from bad to worse — but you pay more to stream them.
The company is truly tapping into its inner Scrooge McDuck. Inflation is just 3% now (according to official, if somewhat dubious, sources). But the ad-free subscription to Disney+ was jacked up 14% last year and is now getting another 19% boost.
Take a look at the larger picture, via this chart from Daniel Parris of Stat Significant (a friend of The Honest Broker). This stuff is reaching greed-is-good levels of abuse.
Meanwhile, the number of scripted shows commissioned by these streamers has dropped significantly. So the audience is asked to pay more for less.
