Sony To Take On Netflix With Playstation Vue

stephendavion writes "Sony is planning to launch PlayStation Vue, a TV service for PlayStation 3 and PlayStation 4 consoles providing on demand programs and live content. The company will roll out the service to selected customers in New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles, and is expected to feature content from CBS, Fox, NBC Universal, Discovery Communications and 75 other channels. The service is expected to allow users to save their programs for up to 28 days."

Comments

Stupid

[halivar]

Netflix works on every device, everywhere. Sony is planning a competitor that works on a system with a fraction of Netflix's availability. Ask Microsoft how well the XBox Live's on-demand streaming is kicking Netflix's ass.

Re:Stupid

[NotDrWho]

I just worry that all these Netflix wannabes is going to fracture the content market (with content being hopelessly split amongst competing streaming services thanks to a morass of exclusive deals). It's fine now, with just Netflix and Amazon Prime being serious contenders (and Hulu's half-assed effort pulling up the distant rear). But I see a possible future where I've got 300 different streaming services on my box, all of them wanting a monthly fee--and with me trying to remember which one of those 300 has the movie or TV show I want to watch tonight.

Re:Stupid

[nine-times]

I just worry that all these Netflix wannabes is going to fracture the content market (with content being hopelessly split amongst competing streaming services thanks to a morass of exclusive deals).

I think that's the goal here. The content owners have had a sweet deal for years, making money from a lot of different angles. They got people to pay for cable, pay for HBO/Showtime, got them to buy DVDs, and got money from advertisments packed into each of these distribution channels (plus cross-promotional marketing and all kinds of other silliness). Now, after decades of figuring out every little spot they can pull money from, the market changes, and people's expectations change. At this point, people really want (and kind of expect) to be able to get all of their media from streaming, whenever and wherever they like. It totally screws up the business models for the content owners, and it destroys the business models for all the other distribution channels.

So these businesses have been getting clever on how to fight back. One of the methods is to hamper the Internet's ability to function as a distribution medium. They're in league with the ISPs, and both are working together to prevent anything resembling real competition in that market. Meanwhile, they've dragged their feet in providing real broadband internet, and they've fought against net neutrality, and they've choked the distribution points that would allow digital media from being reliable (e.g. the Netflix/Verizon kerfuffle).

One of the other pieces of their strategy is to prevent any company from being able to provide anything resembling a "complete library" of TV shows or movies. Each media company splits their library. They give some things to Netflix, some things to Hulu, some things to Amazon, some things to Crackle... etc. They might provide most of the same content to both Netflix and Amazon, for example, but they make sure to provide each with exclusive content, so that if you want to be able to watch whatever you want to watch, you need to pay for both. So while having a "decently sized library" will cost you $9/month, getting "something close to a complete library" will cost $100/month (or whatever the number is) because you have to sign up for several different services. And then, even then, they'll hold back some high-demand content (e.g. Game of Thrones) so that you still need to get cable and premium services to watch what you want to watch. This serves two basic functions: (a) It makes cord-cutting more frustrating, since you can't rely on any set of services to have all the content you want; and (b) it milks extra money from consumers.

And don't think for a second that it's accidental. All this stuff is part of a coherent strategy on the part of a cartel that includes the media companies who own/produce the content and the ISPs and cable companies that distribute it.

However, with the "exclusive content" stuff specifically, there is an additional contributing factor. A lot of the people who rise to positions of power in many companies are from marketing and sales. Marketing people need to justify their existence, which means that they have to come up with clever ideas and special promotions, and bla bla bla. Some of this stuff is clever. Some of it is even kind of nice for consumers. However, for the lazy marketing person, the easiest thing to do these days seems to be to develop a cross-promotional deal of some kind, or exclusive rights for some distribution channel. A lot of times, these deals are stupid and a waste of time. They don't necessarily lead to an increase in sales for anyone, but nobody cares because it's just the stuff that marketing people do, and marketing people run the world. But then also, things like "exclusive rights" can be leverage for getting other concessions, e.g. "We'll give you exclusive rights to this big hit movie, but in return, you agree to..." whatever.

Cue legal action from a UK cinema chain

[Grench]

There's a cinema chain here in the UK called "Vue"; they have over 80 cinemas as far south as Plymouth to as far north as Inverness. And those are just the ones with Vue branding - they own cinema chains across Europe under different trading names. I wonder if they're thinking of rebranding them all Vue right about now... They have the right to, and hell, I might be tempted to, if I was in their position.

I can't see them permitting an online streaming movie product (in the UK, at least) under that name, without at least getting some revenue from Sony for the name, or without being beaten down by Sony lawyers in a bitter dispute. Possibly pan-European, if they did suddenly decide "all of our cinemas are going to be called Vue now".

Also, echoing what others have said - forget trying to compete with Netflix (or whatever Amazon's LoveFilm service is called these days) unless your product can:

1) work in a web browser on any platform, like Netflix
2) have a wider selection of media than Netflix
3) offer this choice for less money than Netflix

It's just pissing money into the wind if they don't make a product that meets all three of the above goals. Sony knows how to make a lot of money from home entertainment, but they know how to lose a lot too.

End of netflix on PS

[CimmerianX]

I can almost 100% guarantee that Sony will pull the Netflix functionality from all PS models.

Just like how the PS4 will no longer stream from a home media server because they started to offer their own streaming music service under the guise of "it's a more intuitive and streamlined process for the customer', we will see sony replace netflix with Vue citing the same bullshit.

Don't think they will? How's your PS3 linux partition? Oh wait, sony made that disappear when it suited them too.

Re:Not a Netflix competitir

[jedidiah]

I would characterize Netflix as those 32 channels on your 500 cable channel bundle that are dominated by old reruns.

Likewise, if you are patient enough you will see older original content from HBO and non-premium cable-only channels.

That leaves "current stuff" and sports.