Apple TV+ reportedly had less than 20M subscribers in US and Canada as of July
A union representing TV and movie workers says Apple pays discounted rates to production crews because it has comparatively fewer subscribers than competing streaming services.
A spokesman for the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees told CNBC that Apple cited Apple TV+ subscriber numbers of less than 20 million people as of July 1. That statistic enables Apple to pay crews a lower rate than larger platforms like Netflix and Disney.
According to an existing contract, big-budget streaming productions can pay workers at a discounted rate if their combined U.S. and Canada subscriber numbers are under a threshold of 20 million people, the report said. A copy of the contract seen by CNBC reveals labor stipulations for streaming productions are less stringent than those maintained for traditional broadcast TV projects because profitability in the sector is "presently uncertain."
Apple does not appear to have provided IATSE with an exact subscriber number and the company has not publicly made that information available since Apple TV+ launched in late 2019. Estimates from Statista in May put worldwide figures at about 40 million at the end of 2020, with a majority of users taking advantage of Apple's free trial offer.
It was in July that Apple cut its trial period to three months, down from a full year gained through the purchase of an eligible device like iPhone. At the time, the 12-month offer had been on the table for some 20 months following multiple extensions.
Analysts rarely speculate on Apple TV+, but in June, J.P. Morgan said it expected the service to hit 100 million subscribers by 2025.
By comparison, Disney+, which launched at around the same time as Apple TV+, reached the 116 million subscriber mark in less than two years. Market leader Netflix boasts more than 200 million paying customers.
An Apple spokesperson declined to comment on subscriber statistics, but noted that it pays crew rates in line with major streaming companies, the report said.
IATSE is preparing to strike for better wages and working conditions. Ballots to authorize the action will go out to 150,000 members on Oct. 1, according to the report.
Read on AppleInsider
A spokesman for the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees told CNBC that Apple cited Apple TV+ subscriber numbers of less than 20 million people as of July 1. That statistic enables Apple to pay crews a lower rate than larger platforms like Netflix and Disney.
According to an existing contract, big-budget streaming productions can pay workers at a discounted rate if their combined U.S. and Canada subscriber numbers are under a threshold of 20 million people, the report said. A copy of the contract seen by CNBC reveals labor stipulations for streaming productions are less stringent than those maintained for traditional broadcast TV projects because profitability in the sector is "presently uncertain."
Apple does not appear to have provided IATSE with an exact subscriber number and the company has not publicly made that information available since Apple TV+ launched in late 2019. Estimates from Statista in May put worldwide figures at about 40 million at the end of 2020, with a majority of users taking advantage of Apple's free trial offer.
It was in July that Apple cut its trial period to three months, down from a full year gained through the purchase of an eligible device like iPhone. At the time, the 12-month offer had been on the table for some 20 months following multiple extensions.
Analysts rarely speculate on Apple TV+, but in June, J.P. Morgan said it expected the service to hit 100 million subscribers by 2025.
By comparison, Disney+, which launched at around the same time as Apple TV+, reached the 116 million subscriber mark in less than two years. Market leader Netflix boasts more than 200 million paying customers.
An Apple spokesperson declined to comment on subscriber statistics, but noted that it pays crew rates in line with major streaming companies, the report said.
IATSE is preparing to strike for better wages and working conditions. Ballots to authorize the action will go out to 150,000 members on Oct. 1, according to the report.
Read on AppleInsider
Comments
So it shouldn't give anyone the impression that there are only 20M people watching Apple TV+, but as a service with almost 100 percent original shows, TV+ is undeniably a harder "sell" than other streamings that have big catalogs of "comfort food" old or at least familiar TV titles. It's never EVER going to beat Disney+, Netflix, Prime Video, HBO Max, or Hulu. It's also not trying to beat them.
Why on earth would the pay discounted rates just because they are allowed to?
Greedy bastards.
This is not like the iTunes Music Store and iPods. Apple made very little money selling music in the iTunes Music Store. But they made a ton of money selling iPods. iPods became the number one MP3 player despite iPods being some of the most expensive MP3 players on the market. And that probably wouldn't be the case if it weren't for the iTunes Music Store. So far, I haven't heard of Apple TV's becoming the next iPod because of AppleTV+. Or that AppleTV+ is driving up sales of other Apple hardware.
I don't know what socialistic planet you're living on. But here on Earth, for the most part, a rich person doing business with another business, like shopping at a Walmart, gets the same discount for the same product and service, that anyone one else shopping there gets. Walmart would not tell Jeff Bezo that the 50% off on BlueRay movies this weekend, does not apply to him and he must pay the regular price.
Having a lot of productions running in parallel will help fill out the library more quickly but everyone else is doing the same. Content volume is one part of it. Here's a list of Apple TV shows:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Apple_TV%2B_original_programming
That's around 80 separate pieces of content to watch. According to this, Netflix had over 5,000 in 2018:
https://www.businessinsider.com/netflix-movie-catalog-size-has-gone-down-since-2010-2018-2
This site has a good comparison of the content volume and quality on different services:
https://blog.reelgood.com/what-streaming-services-are-worth-it-comparing-price-quality-volume
https://www.cordcuttersnews.com/amazon-prime-video-has-more-movies-than-netflix-hulu/
The top ones Netflix, Amazon and Hulu have 150-200 TV shows rated 8/10 or above and 500-2000 movies rated 6/10 or above.
If Apple aims to only produce good content and avoid low quality filler material and has 50 productions in parallel then they'd be able to get there in 3-5 years but they'd need a much higher proportion of quality new content than other services and so far they've been around the same. General rate seems to be around 10% for high quality content vs overall volume and only a percentage of content appeals to each subscriber.
I'd just like to see a service that would offer all content that's available on DVD/Blu-Ray on a subscription:
https://www.imdb.com/list/ls066095353/
https://www.imdb.com/list/ls055592025/
Sopranos, The Wire, Breaking Bad, Mad Men, Seinfeld, The Simpsons, Daily Show, Game of Thrones, West Wing, Mash, Star Trek, Cheers, The Office, Friends, X-Files, South Park, Buffy, Lost, Columbo, Battlestar Galactica, ER, 24, Fawlty Towers, Sex and the City. Godfather, Shawshank Redemption, Citizen Kane, L.A Confidential, Goodfellas, Forrest Gump, Star Wars, James Bond, Indiana Jones, Rocky, Jaws, Matrix.
These are older classics but there are thousands of new ones too:
https://www.metacritic.com/browse/movies/score/metascore/year/filtered/itunes
It doesn't matter if it costs much more than other services. The people who want it will pay for it, all these services are cheap, I'd even say too cheap. If Apple had an Apple Cinema premium service for $29/m with all iTunes content accessible but limited to say 10 movies per month and 30 TV shows plus Apple Originals, nobody could say they were lacking on content, they'd just be more expensive. It might not pull in 100-200m subscribers at that price but it would make it an essential service. I expect there must be restrictions on streaming things like Black Widow on Apple TV+. That has a purchase price of $20 and after purchase can be streamed:
https://itunes.apple.com/us/movie/black-widow-2021/id1576371183
but if someone was paying $29/m, there should be a way to allow people to stream movies like this on a subscription without making individual purchases. Apple can test it with their own employees, they have 160k employees. Give them an account with access to 10 movies and 30 TV shows per month, let their families watch the content and see if it's worth $29/m. The service can offer topups if it's not enough.
In other words, the services are not exactly in competition with each other and yet, to an extent, they are. By that I mean, it’s not a case of having to choose just one. If you are buying a smart phone, you are likely buying just one. But if you subscribe to a streaming service, you don’t necessarily limit yourself to just one. That said, for most of us there is a limit and if the price per service increases significantly, that limit will become more of a factor. I’m unhappy with the direction that Netflix has gone, especially that it charges a premium for delivering 4K and HDR. Fortunately, all the other services have not gone there. As well, from a launch in Canada at $7.99 a month to now charging $18.99 a month for the top tier is flat out greed. No wonder subscription numbers are trending in the wrong direction.
For Apple to succeed, it needs the model to prevail accommodating consumers who sign up to multiple streaming services. It’s not us or them. It’s add us to the mix. For that, you don’t need the most content just enough appealing content to justify the price to enough subscribers to have a viable service. We’re not in a scenario where phone specs are compared to decide which phone to buy. Most consumers are not going to add up the titles with one service and compare that number to another, choosing the one with the most. A consumer will consider what is on offer and decide if for the price it’s worth adding to the mix. Each service will stand or fall on its own merits. Of course, if the cost per service skyrockets industry wide, it changes the narrative. As a consumer, my hope is that this will not happen. Personally, since you don’t have to carry most of the services year-round, I will not, if the cost gets out of hand. I’ve already gone there with Netflix which means the amount of money these services can collectively extract from us is not limitless.
The only obvious thing Apple should do is create a YouTube clone without the Google crap, however Google paying 15 billion per year iOS access prevents that….
Buying Marvel, or having better gaming on the Mac did not happen because, Steve Jobs seemed to have a mental block when it came to hard-core computer games, comic books, or science fiction, Apple despite Foundation seems to have missed the creative possibilities of the work of IDW, Dark Horse or some of the work featured in some the anthology series, the best stories are outside Hollywood and always has been. If Apple is going to waste time and money in content there are so many possibilities outside the beltway. It’s not to late.
And Pixar (THE BIGGEST NATURAL FIT) was off limits to Apple because of Jobs being CEO of Apple…..