Apple TV+ subscriptions flat despite COVID-19 quarantine, increased demand for originals

AppleInsider

Fresh research data shows Apple TV+ is not experiencing a bump in subscriber numbers during the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, a period that brought major gains to other services like Disney+ and Hulu.

According to statistics from Antenna, Apple TV+ is the only major streaming service to not see a significant boost in new subscribers amid worldwide quarantines and stay-at-home orders, reports Business Insider. The firm compared signup data from March and April with that of February, when coronavirus precautions were not widely implemented.

Antenna gleans its data from transactional information like credit card payments.

Despite the lack of surge growth, customers are supposedly seeking out Apple's original programming. Parrot Analytics, which tracks audience demand, saw increased interest in Apple TV+ content, with so-called "demand share" increasing some 10% among competitors in the seven weeks after March 11, the report said.

"The impact the pandemic is having on audience demand has certainly helped Apple TV Plus so far," said Steve Langdon, partnership director at Parrot Analytics. Langdon added that Chris Evans vehicle "Defending Jacob" has been a standout hit for the service.

Apple has yet to disclose official Apple TV+ numbers, but a report this week claims the platform hit 10 million signups as of February. By contrast, Disney+ achieved as many subscribers in just 10 days, a number that swelled to 50 million users in April.

The Cupertino-based tech giant is reportedly looking to expand Apple TV+ beyond brand exclusives and originals, and this week reached a $70 million deal for rights to "Greyhound" starring Tom Hanks.

anantksundaram

AppleTV+ badly needs to up its game. There’s some really good stuff there, but too much PC nonsense. And Apple needs to commit some serious cash to purchase a library. (There’s a reason Amazon has become so successful in this space). 

Otherwise it’ll be written off in a few years as a ‘hobby’, or at best, it’ll follow the fate of News and limp along. 

elijahg

fastasleep said:

anantksundaram said:

AppleTV+ badly needs to up its game. There’s some really good stuff there, but too much PC nonsense. And Apple needs to commit some serious cash to purchase a library. (There’s a reason Amazon has become so successful in this space). 

Otherwise it’ll be written off in a few years as a ‘hobby’, or at best, it’ll follow the fate of News and limp along. 

"PC nonsense" translation: LGBTQ, women, and people of color

Wrong. Orange is the New Black is very very non-PC. It is almost entirely women. Many of the lead roles are lesbians, some are bisexual, and there is a transgender woman in it too. Several more lead roles are black woman, amongst Asian women and many Hispanic women too. So no, "PC nonsense" doesn't mean "LGBTQ, women, and people of color". It means scared to offend. And boy, Netflix isn't scared to offend.

fastasleep

elijahg said:

fastasleep said:

anantksundaram said:

AppleTV+ badly needs to up its game. There’s some really good stuff there, but too much PC nonsense. And Apple needs to commit some serious cash to purchase a library. (There’s a reason Amazon has become so successful in this space). 

Otherwise it’ll be written off in a few years as a ‘hobby’, or at best, it’ll follow the fate of News and limp along. 

"PC nonsense" translation: LGBTQ, women, and people of color

Wrong. Orange is the New Black is very very non-PC. It is almost entirely women. Many of the lead roles are lesbians, some are bisexual, and there is a transgender woman in it too. Several more lead roles are black woman, amongst Asian women and many Hispanic women too. So no, "PC nonsense" doesn't mean "LGBTQ, women, and people of color". It means scared to offend. And boy, Netflix isn't scared to offend.

Who was talking about Netflix?

libertyforall

ATV+ content mostly totally sucks!

Have not seen anything really appealing yet...

Now if they rebooted Stargate Universe, I would be all over that, for instance.

apple ][

I am still giving Apple the benefit of the doubt, as these sorts of things take a long time to build up.

I think that people just want to be entertained. Make something good and entertaining and people will like it. Of course, that is easier said than done. But Apple has deep pockets, so they should be able get good content.

I do not want any service to preach to me, I do not want them to push their views on me and I do not want them to be political. Leave your damn politics at home or you will suffer the consequences.

redraider11

Typical corporate shareholder BS. Always need to be expanding, increasing sales (not a bad thing except when companies go outside of their specialty), trending upward, bigger quotas, yadda yadda, etc. How about Apple just focus on good hardware and software? Apple is not a movie or music studio. You can only expand so much until you’re a jack of all
trades and a master of one. Knock it off already and partner with the people that actually know what they’re doing in their respective spaces. Of course, as I’m writing this Apple is actually working on a car. Good grief. 

trashman69

Shocker - didn’t see that coming....

What Tim Cook needs to do is create MORE Oprah content.

ideas:
- Leave it to Oprah (modern and diverse take on Leave it to Beaver)
- Survivor: Oprah edition - 12 Oprah look alikes struck on an island
- Oprah Wars directed by Rian Johnson

Rayz2016

Antenna gleans its data from transactional information like credit card payments.

Interrrrrresting. 

Well, first question is how they’re getting this data. Are Apple customers the sort of people who’ll sign up to a service that’ll sift through their credit card data?

Secondly, I’m not that surprised that they would see low credit card payments for ATV+. I reckon that most people won’t sign up until they buy a piece of Apple kit that’ll get them the service for free for a year. That won’t show up as an AppleTV subscription on a credit card. 

But I suspect that even with the flawed data collection, ATV+ is still behind the likes of Disney and Netflix simply because they haven’t built a massive library of content yet. I’m looking forward to ‘See’ and ‘the Morning Show’, but I can wait until Mrs Rayz2016 gets her new laptop. 

litoloop

buying or renting a movie in itunes is already the cost of a month subscription though. i bet apple is still earning in videos and movies, even though streaming seems a dud. 

fred1

So all the died hard Apple fans have already signed up and now they can’t get people who want decent content? Shocker. 

Dan_Dilger

"Antenna gleans its data from transactional information like credit card payments"

This is exactly the same as Slice, which was the company that shared its data to claim that Apple Watch was a failure.

foregoneconclusion

Near term, the main attraction to Disney+ is the back catalog of previously released material, so it's not a very good comparison to Apple TV+ in terms of sales. There is obviously a much larger percentage of the public that has already been sold on Disney's brand of entertainment. 

apple ][

foregoneconclusion said:

Near term, the main attraction to Disney+ is the back catalog of previously released material, so it's not a very good comparison to Apple TV+ in terms of sales. There is obviously a much larger percentage of the public that has already been sold on Disney's brand of entertainment. 

Apple needs to have one show that is so strong that that one show alone would make many people want to see the show. They need a show that is widely talked about in media and everywhere and that appeals to almost everybody.

Disney has the Mandalorian. I think that many people signed up to Disney just to watch that one show. They may have only signed up for a few months while the show was running, but they signed up nonetheless.

Apple needs something as strong as that in my opinion. Apple basically needs a hit.

razorpit

Bad is bad. You can give me Ghostbusters 2016 for free and I’m not going to watch it. AppleTV isn’t as bad as that but there’s no reason for most people to come back to it and see what’s new.

lkrupp

apple ][ said:

I am still giving Apple the benefit of the doubt, as these sorts of things take a long time to build up.

I think that people just want to be entertained. Make something good and entertaining and people will like it. Of course, that is easier said than done. But Apple has deep pockets, so they should be able get good content.

I do not want any service to preach to me, I do not want them to push their views on me and I do not want them to be political. Leave your damn politics at home or you will suffer the consequences.


Man are you correct. If I even get a whiff of politics or social ideology I toss watching out the window. I refuse to be preached at by some Hollywood moron as to how the world should work. I want mindless entertainment with happy endings. If I want  political or social propaganda bullshit I’ll watch MSNBC, CNN, or FOX for a minute or two to get both sides of the idiocracy.

elijahg

fastasleep said:

elijahg said:

fastasleep said:

anantksundaram said:

AppleTV+ badly needs to up its game. There’s some really good stuff there, but too much PC nonsense. And Apple needs to commit some serious cash to purchase a library. (There’s a reason Amazon has become so successful in this space). 

Otherwise it’ll be written off in a few years as a ‘hobby’, or at best, it’ll follow the fate of News and limp along. 

"PC nonsense" translation: LGBTQ, women, and people of color

Wrong. Orange is the New Black is very very non-PC. It is almost entirely women. Many of the lead roles are lesbians, some are bisexual, and there is a transgender woman in it too. Several more lead roles are black woman, amongst Asian women and many Hispanic women too. So no, "PC nonsense" doesn't mean "LGBTQ, women, and people of color". It means scared to offend. And boy, Netflix isn't scared to offend.

Who was talking about Netflix?

I was using Netflix/Orange is the new black as an example of a popular show that is very non-PC, whilst also being very diverse in its representation of society, and not scared to trample on the socially accepted politically correct norms; in other words as an example that PC is not intrinsically linked to "LGBTQ, women, and people of color". People are bored of PC crap and the last thing they want is to be told how they should be thinking. But right now, Cook and therefore AppleTV+ is about as PC as you could get.

foregoneconclusion

apple ][ said: Disney has the Mandalorian. I think that many people signed up to Disney just to watch that one show.

50 million subscribers isn't the result of the Mandalorian. It's the result of a back catalog featuring decades of Disney, Star Wars, and Marvel entertainment that people were already sold on. In the future, you might be able to give more weight to Disney's new material, but not for a service that just launched. Like I said, comparing Disney+ to Apple TV+ is kind of pointless in the near term. 

pairof9

I don't know...maybe I'm not that average demographic guy that TV is looking to target and/or analyze, but I like AppleTV+ (for free at least). I will reiterate what I said a few weeks ago on a similar topic, and that is Apple did itself a great service in providing a free year of AppleTV+ to any new device owner. That really gives them a shot at seeing what people like or not on their programming. 

I'm not concerned with PC or non-PC, only is it a good program. I liked Morning Show (mostly due to the acting rather than the script), I certainly became hooked on SEE after watching thru 3-4 episodes; the season end definitely makes me want to see what develops next (GOT stuff). I thought Truth Be Told was engaging but full of holes, yet Home After Dark was a surprise, again after watching 2-3 episodes...that kid grows on you! The rest is "take it or leave it" stuff like any streaming service offers.

All in all, I'm not saying it's the best programming, but as someone else stated, these always take time...how many times did Netflix strike out until House of Cards hit? How many HBO originals do you know before Sopranos blew up? What else does Disney have besides Mandalorian and library of movies already watched a dozen times? So again, that 1-year window Apple has provided for an ever increasing audience is its opportunity. But never forget...this ain't 2010 and desert of online programming...everyone is in the streaming game now!

crowley

pairof9 said:

how many times did Netflix strike out until House of Cards hit? 

I though House Of Cards was Netflix's first original show?

boltsfan17

apple ][ said:

I am still giving Apple the benefit of the doubt, as these sorts of things take a long time to build up.

I think that people just want to be entertained. Make something good and entertaining and people will like it. Of course, that is easier said than done. But Apple has deep pockets, so they should be able get good content.

I do not want any service to preach to me, I do not want them to push their views on me and I do not want them to be political. Leave your damn politics at home or you will suffer the consequences.

I completely agree. It's hard to come to the table and compete with just original content right out of the gate. For arguments sake, Netflix introduced streaming in 2007 and didn't have an original show (House of Cards) until 2013. I'm sure in time, Apple will buy rights to stream content from other providers. The only show I've liked on Apple is the elephant documentary, but I will give them the benefit of the doubt. It's way too early to write off Apple at this point.  One show Apple has in the pipeline I'm really looking forward to is Masters of the Air. That's the third installment of the WW2 miniseries Hanks & Spielberg have done. Band of Brothers and The Pacific are both one of the best miniseries ever imo so I have no doubt Masters of the Air will be just as good.