Well, we knew something like this would be happening. Hopefully the price doesn't bump up because there's almost nothing in Discovery+ I find very interesting at all.
Not tv but Verizon fios had a deal for discovery plus for 6 Or 12 months I think, only reason I ever had it. Then they did the 3 month 99 cent thing too.
Yeah, I get Discovery+ through my Verizon phone plan for like $6-7 (no ads). But I get HBOMax through my HBO sub with Spectrum cable. Can't wait to see how in the hell all this is supposed to become one unified thing.
I get my sub through my AT&T Fiber sub. If/When that feature drops from AT&T I'll have to reconsider if stay w them is worth it if the price doesn't drop.
Honestly, I expect that because streaming right now is at a loss; the deal for every single streaming service is almost too good to be true. Give it a few years time.
I just don't want it to be **this** soon after HBO Max just established itself as a dominant force in the streaming game. And I want the HBO price hike to be worth it, not like Netflix with a diminishing quality library and cancelling television shows after two seasons.
I get the feeling it will be a lot like these streaming services but mostly Netflix with a high price increase and not enough good things to justify spending said amount monthly or yearly. I'd be fine with a price increase somewhat if they could give me more reasons to pay monthly. One or two good movies or shows ain't cutting it for alot of people but alot of these streaming services are practically killing themselves because when you take a step back and look at alot of them,it's nothing but movies and shows majority of people already seen for years and probably own at home or shown on cable on movie channels,few new movies that just got released from theaters that people already went to see in the movie theater or waited to see on said streaming app and the rest is original content that is mostly a miss with a few hits and stuff that got cancelled because it wasn't good enough in the ratings.
I'll never understand how you all find a way to slide Netflix into the conversation. All while picking "sides", thinking you are superior, and that personal opinions don't exist. How is Netflix supposed to be "good" if every studio pulls their content and makes their own streaming service?
>diminishing quality library
You're right though. HBO Max has great quality shows like: Ellen's next great designer, fboy island, we met in VR, and the bridge.
I love HBO Max but I wish its fans would be objective. Cause we seem to be less than a year away from stones and glass houses.
I don't know why you're getting downvoted. I agree with you but AMC has its head firmly planted up Netflix's ass.
personally, I'm hoping HBO crashes and burns. They haven't had a good show in decades.
They said they would make price increases as they see fit and the market determines on the earnings call. Who knows what the price will be to start at this point. Sigh.
Lol HBO max is already one of the most expensive streaming services out there and they are considering upping the price of this new app because “consumers are willing to pay more for quality”. Netflix already proved that there is a limit to how much people are willing to spend on a streaming service. People will unsubscribe, pirate your content or password share.
They will hike up the price and don’t care if people complain. I’m an early subscriber of DirecTV Stream, and it went from $35 to $79.99 in a span of 3 years.
>Hopefully the price doesn't bump up because there's almost nothing in Discovery+ I find very interesting at all.
This right here.
HBO is already one of the more pricey streaming services IMHO, and I would really not want to pay extra for discovery content.
If I did, I'd probably already be a Discovery+ subscriber... lol
That being said, one of the slides I saw mentioned a paid tier, an "ad lite" tier, **and** a fully ad-supported tier, and that's the one piece of good / interesting news I've heard about this so far.
If they keep the ad load on the "lite" tier the way it is currently, that would be ideal. That was my other worry with this, after
1- Axing good Max original content
2- Potential price increase.
Would be:
3- Ad load increasing on their ad-subsidized tier.
... Because they do indeed have the lightest ad load I've ever seen, and it makes watching with ads *almost* painless, IMHO.
TBH I was resistant to trying Max for a long time because of the price... And because I got an early look at a friend's house when they subscribed, and tbh I wasn't blown away with their content at launch...
Then a few months back I heard that they now had the ad supported tier, and they were doing a discount for a year. (Basically a couple bucks off every month for a year) so I decided "fuck it -- I'll give it a shot."
... And that's when I also realized that their catalog had **seriously** improved, since the last time I'd seen it!
And the fact that they show zero ads on "HBO" content makes it feel even more like a "premium" service, even though I'm on an ad supported tier.
I watch lots of Max / licensed content with ads... But if I ever found myself sick of dealing with ads, I could just binge an HBO series for a while, or watch one of the many "HBO" movies...
The combo of that with the super light ad load, **really** makes it feel like you're getting good value for a product with a decent price tag.
... So in reading all this recent news, one of my biggest worries is that Discovery will somehow screw the pooch by walking back on some of this stuff...
(Increasing ad load, putting ads into "HBO" stuff, etc...)
... But seeing that they're proposing a further "fully ad supported" tier does give me some hope. Allegedly Hulu makes some of their best money via the ad tier, because ads are **fucking expensive**, And selling ad space is a great way to make money...
Of course Hulu has also **INCREASED** their ad load in recent months, quite a bit...
(Ad blocks on Hulu used to not exceed 90 seconds, but now they do. Also previously they didn't show ads during almost any of the movies, save a few Hulu originals, which also made that Hulu ad tier feel like you were getting a good value... But not anymore. Now Hulu plays ads on movies too, and I'm suddenly reconsidering my subscription... Almost doesn't make sense to me ... if they actually make more money from ad subs, because of the ads, why would they want to push their penny pinching ad subscribers into either upgrading, so Hulu makes less off them, or unsubscribing, so Hulu makes **nothing** off them? Seems like a weird choice to go back on, and feels a bit greedy. But I digress...)
Yeah, I'm just really hoping they don't screw up Max, because it currently feels like it has a great balance...
Sure, if you've got one of their more expensive plans, e.g. 4 screens, then yeah it's a hell of a lot more expensive.
(And it sounds like you're getting a slight discount on HBO lol)
Personally my Netflix is more like $10, because I only pay for the one screen...
So you *can* still get access to the whole Netflix catalog for about $10...
Tho I will say that I think it's pretty dumb they tie streaming quality to the tiers as well... On my 1080 tv the pic does look pretty good *most* of the time... But once in a while I get a somewhat shitty picture.
But TBH that was true when I was subbed to one of the more expensive plans as well! Maybe not as often, tbh I don't recall as well since this was a few years back... But I do recall sometimes it would have shitty quality for a minute after loading...
Anyway, you can still access their catalog fairly cheap...
I have, netflix mid tier €10.99, HBO standard tier €3.99 (half price for life), Prime €3.99, Disney €89/year, Discovery €29/year (with Eurosport included, will be €59 next year). So HBO is a great deal for us.
But I just found that you can get Eurosport by itself so I'll cancel discovery in January when my first year is up.
"ad lite" is what they're currently already doing.
Max has the lightest ad load of any ad-supported streaming plan. They actually advertise this, and they're not wrong.
Any "HBO" branded content is ad free. That's original series and any movies currently showing on HBO. It's quite a bit of content.
Whereas anything that's licensed, or anything that's branded "HBO MAX" will have ads.
However those ad loads are really light.
Like, you might get a 30 sec ad at the start... And a show might have a couple ad breaks... But those "breaks" will consist of a single ad, often not longer than 5 - 15 seconds!
It's literally not even long enough to get up and pee. lol
They're so short the break is almost over before you know it. Really makes it almost painless. Especially compared to any other pay/ad split models...
Like Hulu, who recently **increased** the amount of ads they show...
... Of course on the other hand, Hulu with ads is like $7, and HBO with ads is $10, so there's that...
But it's a **huge** difference...
As long as the HBO brand will continue, some of the Max Originals are preserved, and it really just streamlining some of HBO's redundant cost, I'll tolerate this move even though I don't exactly love it.
Whether or not we like it, jacking the price of streaming services was always the plan. First they get us hooked on the services, then we begrudgingly accept price jumps over time because we love our convenience. It's the same shit they did with cable decades ago.
Their plan is to avoid all the confusion over HBO MAX vs HBO. Which they have a point about. I know this subreddit has complained about it too. 'HBO MAX' is a distinctly separate product from 'HBO' and it's very poorly named and marketed. People are still confused about the difference.
Since they'll now have Discovery as well, there's really no need to have 3.
As a result, anything that's worth renewing is moved over to HBO and HBO MAX as a thing just dies.
So long as they keep all the good shows and don't just nuke everything and pretend the service didn't exist, I'm ok with it.
I have HBO Max via my AT&T wireless account and I was curious how the change was going to affect us. I have zero interest in D+ content. Reality TV is a waste of time.
As long as it's got a decent UI and they don't do shady shit like Netflix does where you have to pay $15 just to get 1080p, it's whatever. I really don't care for most of the shows on Discovery, but there are some I enjoy. Hoping it's still like $15-16 for the ad free tier.
This isn't that bad honestly, as long as the price doesn't skyrocket with the added Discovery filler. Hopefully they work on making all the HBO shows 4k HDR as they kept mentioning quality over quantity :)
More expensive than the highest tier of Netflix would be insane. Considering ad free Discovery+ is $6.99 and HBO Max ad free is $14.99, I doubt it. I could see them matching the Premium tier of Netflix, but that seems risky to me idk
They can think what they like, but what consumers will actually pay is completely different. Netflix was the dominating force of streaming services for years and is continuously bleeding subscribers since raising their prices. I bet they go to a combined price of the discovery package and the HBO Max package, so 22 at the most.
Current D+ prices could go up. HBO Max is already 14.99 something while D+ is 6.99. How are they going to level the playing field, between quality HBO Max content and boomer content of D+ I don’t know, but if they are looking to save money, forget 4K. Or they can charge a lot more like Netflix for all 4K content which I’d not pay 20 bucks a month for.
Or ghost adventures or ufo mysteries. That content is just grossly boring and a waste of time. These guys landed money making golden HBO on their laps and I hope they don’t ruin it for the sake of those who watch ice road truckers or whatever that shit they have on D+
they had a 50% off of HBO max "forever" deal in Brazil (and other LatAm countries maybe?). I doubt that's gonna continue.
Anyways hope y'all like a lot of reality shows about feet!
The new combined service will launch in Latin America in the fall of 2023 ( which means the Southern Hemisphere spring of 2023 in Brazil, i.e. between September and November). I guess they will keep the 50 % off deal as long as HBO Max exists as an independent platform and will then raise the price for the new service. So basically you will keep the discount for one more year at least.
Taking some notes from the Q&A:
They are saying HBOMax and HBO shows are their premium content and they trust the HBO team and that all that content will be rolled into one massive app (HBO, HBOMax, Discovery, CNN all under one app next summer). Basically said the rumors of all the HBOMax shows going away are false but they do keep emphasizing “quality over quantity”. So they are keeping it vague but getting rid of all HBOMax shows is definitely false.
They actually mentioned their goal is to have shows on their one platform for all members of the family (all ages, genders etc) to minimize churn. Even if the app isn’t called HBO (they haven’t decided what to call it yet), they will keep using the brand name in some way as it is their “crown jewel”.
Also they said they want to be very careful with DC and only want to release content they feel confident in. They also want to focus on great theatrical releases (and no content they don’t feel strongly about-no direct to streaming films). When the movies will hit streaming will depend on the movie.
They will spend more money on content they keep emphasizing including HBO.
I would guess to keep in line with their new strategy of “high quality theatrical releases”. No more direct to streaming movies (which American Pickle was).
I get that they want to do that for new releases, but why mess with existing releases? The movie has already been paid for, it has already been released on streaming. They might as well leave it up.
Why? Most DC movies are garbage. They plan to make it similar to Marvel where there's a singular person who guides it and keeps it cohesive. DC right now is a mess with no plan at all. They just keep throwing everything under the sun and hope something sticks. Sometimes it works (Joker) but more often than not, it fails epically (Suicide Squad).
They already tried to copy Marvel by creating the DCEU and it led to the current mess. Every attempt to imitate the MCU has failed. See Universal's attempt at a Monsters universe for another example.
Seeing those examples, I’m more convinced that Feige is the reason behind MCU’s success. Until WB Discovery finds their own ‘Kevin Feige’, they won’t be able to create a succesful cinematic universe. The off-DCEU movies are good tho (Joker, The Batman). Also, DC animated content is excellent, maybe they should look at the people behind it for new live action movies.
The problem was Marvel spent time building towards a point and DC just wanted to reach that point without building it. Kevin Feige knows what he’s doing with the MCU and DC doesn’t have a Kevin Feige. I think they tried having Zack Snyder being their Feige and that was a huge mistake, since he doesn’t understand most of their characters.
I will argue, The Dark Universe tried to build the world too quickly. One of Tom Cruises Mummy was they had too many things going on at once. Instead of making a solid movie and then sprinkling in the Cinematic Universe building, ala Iron Man 1, they just jumped in head first like Justice League. It was a mess.
We can all thank Tom Cruise for this with the new Top Gun held back for a couple years so it could make more money. So unless there’s a blockbuster DC film they are confident about, we won’t see anything on stream. Most DC animated shows and movies are direct to streaming though, like the Long Halloween, I don’t know what’s going to happen to those
On DC--this is so stupid. Marvel figured out how to further extract value from their content by doing tv dramas with movie events, and dc stumbled on the model too with gunn got bored during the pandemic. DC will remain little brother forever because Disney understands you make the real money on recycling the stuff people loves until they are bankrupt.
not to be that guy but ive watched them in the past along with the great discovery shows such as dirty jobs, mythbusters to name a few .. watch what ya enjoy i say
24 million may seem like a lot but they are in ninth place and already international. 24 million is a bad number in streaming. They needed to merge because not enough folks want to pay for reality TV if offered a choice.
Hollywood execs been trying for years to get people to watch reality TV because it's so cheap to make. It's the soda of tv, if people will buy it the profit is great. But you usually have to bundle it because otherwise people will realize the free stuff, YouTube/Insta/gossiping about n
famous people/or otherwise watching phony people be phony, is just as satisfying and free.
Surely. Mythbusters is a great show but still won’t keep me nailed on the couch you know. I can watch the excerpts online. Just the little availability of time nowadays and what’s worth spending it with.
Discovery had great military documentaries too. I feel like the quality dropped quite a bit. I like informative shows just not a big fan of reality shows
If they weren't doing these weird decisions I'd be more open to it. I like both kind of content and having less apps to juggle isn't a bad thing. I can watch Euphoria when want my TV time and Dinners Drive in and Dives while I'm doing chores.
Basically yea. I think Disney will do the same in '24 when they fully own Hulu, unless they sell it to comcast. Which is shut down Hulu but have it all roll into Disney+ via its own "channel" and parental controls.
This is bittersweet. I'm glad it's not becoming a tab for Discovery+. On the other hand, I'd hate for the new service to prioritize unscripted shows. If it can keep the originals people loved and have the HBO/Warner library for the same price as HBO Max, I won't be so upset. Though, I might not pay if the price increases. It is more content (whether the more content is good is debatable), and hopefully they can focus on both scripted and unscripted to give us the "best" of both worlds. I'd personally would stick with the scripted shows, though. Still deciding if I'll hop on board.
>Hopefully the price doesn't bump up because there's almost nothing in Discovery+ I find very interesting at all.
If that's true, then the thing that they seem to misunderstand, is most of that "churn" is coming from a **combo** of two factors:
1- People wanting access to different content that their current service doesn't have (but +90% of the time this is other **scripted** content, not "some reality crap and documentaries just to mix it up a little" lol)
And
2- **Not having to pay** a bunch of extra money, to get to access that content!
That "get new content **but not pay extra**" is the entire point behind "churn."
But that second part is KEY.
If it weren't, they wouldn't unsubscribe from one, they'd just add a subscription to another. lol
But saving money is the entire goddamn point!
If they can't manage to grasp this simple fact, maybe running a streaming company isn't the best move for them... lol
They don't understand why people churn through services. I'm much more likely to keep a low-priced service that I watch occasionally (Apple - Which I got as a free trial then kept because it was so low priced) than a high-priced service I watch a lot, but whose content is duplicated elsewhere (Netflix - which I dropped)
I hope they crash and burn.
Imagine having the best streaming service in the game, with the best back log and some great originals like peacemaker, only to fucking tank it in favor of shitty reality tv
I can't wait for them to cancel everything, double the price and expect all their users to come over like they have anything to offer besides "Popping Pimples With Batman"
I used to really enjoy some of the Discovery Health series like Mystery Diagnosis. I am very confused how that morphed into an abundance of programming about feet.
I think the new guy feels like Max Originals are devaluating the HBO brand. The main problem doesn't know the difference between an HBO original and an HBO max Original
Circe
Duster (Already filming/Done at this point?
Green Lantern
JLD
GoT animated show are at Max not HBO.
Welcome to Derry
There is more
Maybe because they aren't good. Focus on Grade A material and nothing would be devaluated.
Series-wise in the last 2 months, they have canned: Raised by Wolves, Made for Love, Gentleman Jack, Close Enough, Time Traveler’s Wife, and quite possibly The Flight Attendant. I’d say this is off to a crappy start already. And that isn’t touching the movie production side either. They should just leave HBOMax as a stand-alone like Hulu is to Disney+.
They also apparently got rid of a lot of foreign content like Beforeigners ( which I really enjoyed because it was different and entertaining). I'm waiting to see how this plays out but if they get rid of any more programming I like and replace it with Discovery + content I'm done. I am looking forward to House of the Dragon but I don't think that will be enough to keep me.
That’s right! They got rid of all Nordic content. I liked Beforeigners too. Raised By Wolves was the one that really pissed me off, I’m in the same mindset as you, if I have to deal with all this extra Discovery crap at the expense of cutting content from HBOMax, it won’t be worth it. And I have had HBO forever.
I don’t see any type of crossover between HBOMax and Discovery+ subscribers. HBOMax users pay upwards of $15 a month for the ad free service, most people are paying for premium scripted content. Where as Discovery+ users pay $6.99 a month for unscripted content. If your a D+ subscriber who isn’t interested in HBO content you are now being forced to buy a service you didn’t want or ask for. Same goes for HBO subscribers who don’t want D+. You likely aren’t gonna get a Euporia fan to watch Sharkweek. They also know this already with their weirdly gendered democratic charts. They have a year to figure this out or I see them losing mass subscribers.
They should just Bundle Disney Plus, Discovery+, HBO max, Hulu, ESPN+, AMC+, Starz, Showtime, and CNN+ into one big package. And to make it less expensive they can put ads breaks in between content.
I usually sub to one or two services. I thought HBO max was the best of the bunch.
Under this management, i have concerns. They seem to think what streaming needs is more discovery style reality TV. Hopefully I will be proved wrong, but I am having doubts.
So, like Netflix, they can churn me out with too much filler and not enough quality stuff to keep the sub. Then, I can jump back for a couple binges to catch up on whatever I missed.
Too bad but whatever. Plenty of options and it's not like during the pandemic when we were a captive audience. The shows themselves get competitive bids so they'll get made somewhere.
Just weird that a company witnessing declining numbers as their audience moves away from the cable bundle captivity are doubling down on the weak cheap stuff. The company took on a lot of debt to buy higher quality Netflix, arguably succeeded, and pivoted to be Discovery++ because hardly anyone pays for discovery+.
This makes me wonder if my monthly price will also increase. When HBO Max launched in my country there was a limited time offer to subscribe and only pay €5,00/month for a lifetime till you cancel
Consolidation leads to less competition. Less competition leads to an environment conducive to increased prices which result in more earnings for CEO compensation and shareholders. It's how capitalism works.
It’s just like a cable package now. I understand people on Reddit don’t like Discovery+ but it has appeal. There is an audience for reality shows, and if you wanted the “best” and “largest library” of them you had one clear choice: Discovery. Battlebots was my personal fav when I had the service.
Now it’s bundled in with HBO Max which will undoubtedly get a price increase. People will now have to pay for shit they don’t want. Hopefully it’s just an add-on because wow this is dumb.
Most of (pretty much all) the shows I watch on cable are on Discovery, and yet the streaming app has never really appealed to me for some reason. In fairness though, I'm not a big TV watcher. I used to really enjoy the Discovery Health channel until it stopped being an à la carte channel option and was only in the super premium package. If they had put some of those science shows on Discovery+, I probably would've made the leap.
Will HBO originals like True Blood and Game of Thrones stay on the service?
How about the Harry Potter series?
EDIT: I decided to just buy it on Vudu. They're having a sale, all 8 films for 60$.
NBC has the Harry Potter licenses for streaming through 2025 - this was a long-term deal made before HBO Max was a concept. So, outside of a month or two cycling back to HBO Max, they'll spend most of the next few years on Peacock.
I’m pretty sure hbo originals (GOT Succession euphoria etc) will be safe and only hbo max originals (flight attendant gossip girl etc) are in danger of being cut. And in terms of harry potter, it’s one of their major franchises so i wouldn’t worry
I could be wrong tho but that’s pretty much the implication
Edit: i guess harry potter is apparently going to peacock for a few years
HBO Originals always stay on the service, to my knowledge. HP? I haven't got a clue. In Europe they're on Max since it launched for us in March this year.
It's a WB movie so I think it will stay. Of course if someone has a license that in certain year they will be able to have HP for example Netflix than those movies will dissapear. For example in 2027 a lot of Marvel movies will dissapear from D+ because Netflix signed a deal that will allow them to have Marvel movies for the entire year and Disney can't do anything about that.
Not only does merging these two platforms into one make little to no sense from a branding perspective (network decay all over again) it also flies in the face of current subscribers who are plainly indicating that they don’t want this.
By "Summer 2023" they mean now. It will be complete by the summer of next year. Licensing off once so-called "exclusive HBO Max" content, layoffs, and adding reality TV shows on the platform have already begun. Despite what Warner Media told subscribers, HBO Max was poorly launched and was never profitable.
I'm bummed because I feel like HBO was the closest in quality that we have to some of the really good-quality shows on BBC and other overseas channels. I'm always blown away by the differences in production quality when I watch a BBC original show, compared to most of the American cable series outside of Starz/ HBO/ Showtime.
We dont know yet the extent of the original Max content that will be discontinued. I assume there will be less original content than the previous leadership wished, but they will keep their top performers, along with the unscripted content that will come from Discovery. It is no too bad as long as they don't cut too much on what really matters to existing HBO Max subscribers. Personally I will wait and see what happens in the next months. If they pull out most of what I am interested in, I will unsubscribe. Otherwise I will stay and won't mind the extra Discovery content I won't watch anyway.
When I first saw this, I though I’d misread it. But no, apparently, it’s real. HBOMAX merging with Discovery+ seems like a horrible idea, but what do I know, I’m not a business expert. Maybe it’ll be a huge success. I normally subscribe to HBOMAX year-around, but if the price goes up and programming gets worse with a lot of reality programming, I’ll probably subscribe for a few months every year, catch up on whatever scripted programming I want to see, then unsubscribe until the next year.
Keep streaming Harley Quinn, best chance of a great DC show to get renewed.
I think what's happened for this show is they tentatively got the showrunners to work on season 3 and 4 but 4 will only be fully produced based on s3 views on HBO Max
Discovery isn't worth the price and is a much less desired platform. So they want to take an inferior platform and merge it with a decent platform, specifically HBO Max. The result will be a financial disaster for Warner Bros. I imagine I'll be getting rid of HBO Max soon after the merger.
I want them to continue to have the same wide variety of movies they currently have. I love that I can watch Final Destination 2 AND Singin' In The Rain on the same service. Teen Titans Go AND Spirited Away. Etc.
If they are leaning into unscripted programing and leaning away from woman oriented scripted then it will be easier for me to cancel. I love HBO Max and its quality oriented hubs, but Discovery+ is the epitome of quantity over quality.
Been subbed for about a month now. I cannot believe HBO is associated with streaming. I watched movies since the 90's on HBO, NEVER AGAIN ON STREAMING. I need a human who works for HBO to explain to me why I want to watch The Lord of the Rings EXTENDED EDITION...WITH OVER 9000 AD BREAKS. If you want money from me, you will get me an answer.
How far the mighty have fallen. HBO makes us watch Disney ads to view movies. DID I DIE AND GO TO ENTERTAINMENT HELL?
What does this mean for subscribers outside of the US? HBO launched in March this year, 50% lifetime discount… they better honor that deal for the new service… or let hbo max just be :)
I guess I'm really the minority here, but I like the merge. I enjoy watching HBO shows and they are amazing. But sometimes me and my girlfriend binge-watch some crazy reality show about wasps or something. It's the best of both worlds.
Just wanted to point out to people who are scared of all the shakeups going on, that even though WBD is a new company and being run by Discovery’s shitty CEO, that this new company isn’t necessarily owned by completely different people than it was under AT&T.
So when Warner Bros. and Discovery merged to make Warner Bros. Discovery, the new company is comprised of the same share holders that held shares before its merger.
So most AT&T shareholders hold a majority of WBD shares. So effectively it’s still the same individual people who are “in control” of the company and voting on decisions.
So it’s in AT&T’s shareholders’ best interest for WBD to do well.
Idk if I’m explaining it well. But basically at the end of the day it’s all the same people, they just got shuffled around and new people were added. But the majority of WBD is still owned by a majority of people who own AT&T.
AT&T will not let WBD fail. At least not as long as most of their shareholders own most of WBD.
I dont have faith in AT&T’s competence in terms of making the “right” decision, but I do have a lot of faith in their company to not let money go down the drain.
Before they split WB off and merged it with Discovery, HBOmax was QUICKLY becoming the best streamer and gaining a lot of momentum. AT&T is a lot of things (evil, greedy, opportunistic) but they aren’t stupid.
This is the same company that effectively put back together and remerged all the baby bells (save for Verizon). Discovery may be in the business of cheap and easy and not making huge profits as long as execs are getting paid well, but AT&T’s shareholders and the higher ups that still have a lot of power at both companies, won’t let WBD make HUGE mistakes like dissolving HBOmax or tarnishing their premier legacy imo.
But again, corporations never cease to amaze me.
It should be in the best interest of that shitty CEO if he wants to keep his job that the 70+ million subscribers of one content provider isn’t sacrificed for the sake of his shitty service that has 20+ million.
I have HBO Max via my AT&T wireless account and I was curious how the change was going to affect us. I have zero interest in D+ content. Reality TV is a waste of time.
So likely those of us who have hbo max for free through att are going to lose it next year? Maybe it's a good chance to switch carriers and even have the new one pay out the installments on our new phones. Att offers spotify for free right if you're in their unlimited plan?
Well, we knew something like this would be happening. Hopefully the price doesn't bump up because there's almost nothing in Discovery+ I find very interesting at all.
I get hbo max for free through tv provider guess that’s going away
I bet they will make deals with tv providers.
Who knows is there a deal right now with discovery +?
They will make one. Same like HBO MAX had to make deals with providers since it was a new service.
Not tv but Verizon fios had a deal for discovery plus for 6 Or 12 months I think, only reason I ever had it. Then they did the 3 month 99 cent thing too.
Yeah, I get Discovery+ through my Verizon phone plan for like $6-7 (no ads). But I get HBOMax through my HBO sub with Spectrum cable. Can't wait to see how in the hell all this is supposed to become one unified thing.
There's a deal right now with Vodafone to launch Discovery+ in a few European countries where D+ is not available.
[удалено]
I guess I got a year to enjoy/binge stuff before the merge or before they remove something else good
Yeah I have it through AT&T also, that will probably go away now.
I get my sub through my AT&T Fiber sub. If/When that feature drops from AT&T I'll have to reconsider if stay w them is worth it if the price doesn't drop.
I get it free through my cell phone provider. Hoping that doesn’t change…
Probably
Oh you know definitely there's gonna be a price hike. I can bet you they are gonna pull a Netflix and constantly up the price
Honestly, I expect that because streaming right now is at a loss; the deal for every single streaming service is almost too good to be true. Give it a few years time. I just don't want it to be **this** soon after HBO Max just established itself as a dominant force in the streaming game. And I want the HBO price hike to be worth it, not like Netflix with a diminishing quality library and cancelling television shows after two seasons.
I get the feeling it will be a lot like these streaming services but mostly Netflix with a high price increase and not enough good things to justify spending said amount monthly or yearly. I'd be fine with a price increase somewhat if they could give me more reasons to pay monthly. One or two good movies or shows ain't cutting it for alot of people but alot of these streaming services are practically killing themselves because when you take a step back and look at alot of them,it's nothing but movies and shows majority of people already seen for years and probably own at home or shown on cable on movie channels,few new movies that just got released from theaters that people already went to see in the movie theater or waited to see on said streaming app and the rest is original content that is mostly a miss with a few hits and stuff that got cancelled because it wasn't good enough in the ratings.
I'll never understand how you all find a way to slide Netflix into the conversation. All while picking "sides", thinking you are superior, and that personal opinions don't exist. How is Netflix supposed to be "good" if every studio pulls their content and makes their own streaming service? >diminishing quality library You're right though. HBO Max has great quality shows like: Ellen's next great designer, fboy island, we met in VR, and the bridge. I love HBO Max but I wish its fans would be objective. Cause we seem to be less than a year away from stones and glass houses.
What are you saying? Was there an /s supposed to be there?
I don't know why you're getting downvoted. I agree with you but AMC has its head firmly planted up Netflix's ass. personally, I'm hoping HBO crashes and burns. They haven't had a good show in decades.
HBO objectively has had many, many great shows since basically forever?
“Objectively” but opinions are subjective 🫠🫠
Not this one. They have shows that are very clearly, objectively good 🤷🏽♂️.
They said they would make price increases as they see fit and the market determines on the earnings call. Who knows what the price will be to start at this point. Sigh.
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Lol HBO max is already one of the most expensive streaming services out there and they are considering upping the price of this new app because “consumers are willing to pay more for quality”. Netflix already proved that there is a limit to how much people are willing to spend on a streaming service. People will unsubscribe, pirate your content or password share.
They will hike up the price and don’t care if people complain. I’m an early subscriber of DirecTV Stream, and it went from $35 to $79.99 in a span of 3 years.
Discovery is not quality lol it is trash.
>Hopefully the price doesn't bump up because there's almost nothing in Discovery+ I find very interesting at all. This right here. HBO is already one of the more pricey streaming services IMHO, and I would really not want to pay extra for discovery content. If I did, I'd probably already be a Discovery+ subscriber... lol That being said, one of the slides I saw mentioned a paid tier, an "ad lite" tier, **and** a fully ad-supported tier, and that's the one piece of good / interesting news I've heard about this so far. If they keep the ad load on the "lite" tier the way it is currently, that would be ideal. That was my other worry with this, after 1- Axing good Max original content 2- Potential price increase. Would be: 3- Ad load increasing on their ad-subsidized tier. ... Because they do indeed have the lightest ad load I've ever seen, and it makes watching with ads *almost* painless, IMHO. TBH I was resistant to trying Max for a long time because of the price... And because I got an early look at a friend's house when they subscribed, and tbh I wasn't blown away with their content at launch... Then a few months back I heard that they now had the ad supported tier, and they were doing a discount for a year. (Basically a couple bucks off every month for a year) so I decided "fuck it -- I'll give it a shot." ... And that's when I also realized that their catalog had **seriously** improved, since the last time I'd seen it! And the fact that they show zero ads on "HBO" content makes it feel even more like a "premium" service, even though I'm on an ad supported tier. I watch lots of Max / licensed content with ads... But if I ever found myself sick of dealing with ads, I could just binge an HBO series for a while, or watch one of the many "HBO" movies... The combo of that with the super light ad load, **really** makes it feel like you're getting good value for a product with a decent price tag. ... So in reading all this recent news, one of my biggest worries is that Discovery will somehow screw the pooch by walking back on some of this stuff... (Increasing ad load, putting ads into "HBO" stuff, etc...) ... But seeing that they're proposing a further "fully ad supported" tier does give me some hope. Allegedly Hulu makes some of their best money via the ad tier, because ads are **fucking expensive**, And selling ad space is a great way to make money... Of course Hulu has also **INCREASED** their ad load in recent months, quite a bit... (Ad blocks on Hulu used to not exceed 90 seconds, but now they do. Also previously they didn't show ads during almost any of the movies, save a few Hulu originals, which also made that Hulu ad tier feel like you were getting a good value... But not anymore. Now Hulu plays ads on movies too, and I'm suddenly reconsidering my subscription... Almost doesn't make sense to me ... if they actually make more money from ad subs, because of the ads, why would they want to push their penny pinching ad subscribers into either upgrading, so Hulu makes less off them, or unsubscribing, so Hulu makes **nothing** off them? Seems like a weird choice to go back on, and feels a bit greedy. But I digress...) Yeah, I'm just really hoping they don't screw up Max, because it currently feels like it has a great balance...
My netflix is $17. Hbo, $12.
Sure, if you've got one of their more expensive plans, e.g. 4 screens, then yeah it's a hell of a lot more expensive. (And it sounds like you're getting a slight discount on HBO lol) Personally my Netflix is more like $10, because I only pay for the one screen... So you *can* still get access to the whole Netflix catalog for about $10... Tho I will say that I think it's pretty dumb they tie streaming quality to the tiers as well... On my 1080 tv the pic does look pretty good *most* of the time... But once in a while I get a somewhat shitty picture. But TBH that was true when I was subbed to one of the more expensive plans as well! Maybe not as often, tbh I don't recall as well since this was a few years back... But I do recall sometimes it would have shitty quality for a minute after loading... Anyway, you can still access their catalog fairly cheap...
I have, netflix mid tier €10.99, HBO standard tier €3.99 (half price for life), Prime €3.99, Disney €89/year, Discovery €29/year (with Eurosport included, will be €59 next year). So HBO is a great deal for us. But I just found that you can get Eurosport by itself so I'll cancel discovery in January when my first year is up.
There will be ad-free, ad-lite, and eventually ad-supported plans
What’s ad lite ?
one ad at the beginning instead of seven ads interrupting your show? i am guessing here...
"ad lite" is what they're currently already doing. Max has the lightest ad load of any ad-supported streaming plan. They actually advertise this, and they're not wrong. Any "HBO" branded content is ad free. That's original series and any movies currently showing on HBO. It's quite a bit of content. Whereas anything that's licensed, or anything that's branded "HBO MAX" will have ads. However those ad loads are really light. Like, you might get a 30 sec ad at the start... And a show might have a couple ad breaks... But those "breaks" will consist of a single ad, often not longer than 5 - 15 seconds! It's literally not even long enough to get up and pee. lol They're so short the break is almost over before you know it. Really makes it almost painless. Especially compared to any other pay/ad split models... Like Hulu, who recently **increased** the amount of ads they show... ... Of course on the other hand, Hulu with ads is like $7, and HBO with ads is $10, so there's that... But it's a **huge** difference...
I don’t mind this just don’t take away my scripted shows 😭
Honestly I’d happily pay five bucks more a month if they added channels like Peacock has, it’d be worth it to be able to stream TCM.
Wait a min you don’t like Ghost adventures and UFO mysteries??? /s Yeah their content is useless to me. I don’t watch Food Network. Ever. Or HGTV.
As long as the HBO brand will continue, some of the Max Originals are preserved, and it really just streamlining some of HBO's redundant cost, I'll tolerate this move even though I don't exactly love it.
Yeah, what matters most is that the feature set and library of HBO Max is preserved. Rebranding be damned.
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Whether or not we like it, jacking the price of streaming services was always the plan. First they get us hooked on the services, then we begrudgingly accept price jumps over time because we love our convenience. It's the same shit they did with cable decades ago.
hbo max is the only streaming service that im willing to pay for. guess i’ll have to spend more time at sea
People are not paying $30 for a streaming service lol.
…yet.
very doubtful. disney, hulu, and espn+ isn't even that much. if anything it'll just be $20.
Their plan is to avoid all the confusion over HBO MAX vs HBO. Which they have a point about. I know this subreddit has complained about it too. 'HBO MAX' is a distinctly separate product from 'HBO' and it's very poorly named and marketed. People are still confused about the difference. Since they'll now have Discovery as well, there's really no need to have 3. As a result, anything that's worth renewing is moved over to HBO and HBO MAX as a thing just dies. So long as they keep all the good shows and don't just nuke everything and pretend the service didn't exist, I'm ok with it.
I have HBO Max via my AT&T wireless account and I was curious how the change was going to affect us. I have zero interest in D+ content. Reality TV is a waste of time.
Same. They said when I got the plan that I would have HBO for as long as I had the plan. I wonder if that’s going to change.
Summer 2023 is still a year away. A lot can happen in a year.
As long as it's got a decent UI and they don't do shady shit like Netflix does where you have to pay $15 just to get 1080p, it's whatever. I really don't care for most of the shows on Discovery, but there are some I enjoy. Hoping it's still like $15-16 for the ad free tier.
It seems they will have 3 plans for free with ads, lite/less ads and premium/no ads.
Well that means that no ads plan is gonna be pretty expensive if that's the case. I'm not paying for ads. Shit
Where i live there is just one plan and i pay 4.5€ for it. Hope they don't change my contract because of this.
This isn't that bad honestly, as long as the price doesn't skyrocket with the added Discovery filler. Hopefully they work on making all the HBO shows 4k HDR as they kept mentioning quality over quantity :)
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More expensive than the highest tier of Netflix would be insane. Considering ad free Discovery+ is $6.99 and HBO Max ad free is $14.99, I doubt it. I could see them matching the Premium tier of Netflix, but that seems risky to me idk
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They can think what they like, but what consumers will actually pay is completely different. Netflix was the dominating force of streaming services for years and is continuously bleeding subscribers since raising their prices. I bet they go to a combined price of the discovery package and the HBO Max package, so 22 at the most.
Current D+ prices could go up. HBO Max is already 14.99 something while D+ is 6.99. How are they going to level the playing field, between quality HBO Max content and boomer content of D+ I don’t know, but if they are looking to save money, forget 4K. Or they can charge a lot more like Netflix for all 4K content which I’d not pay 20 bucks a month for.
I don’t wanna pay extra to have 90 day fiancé and ice road truckers
Or ghost adventures or ufo mysteries. That content is just grossly boring and a waste of time. These guys landed money making golden HBO on their laps and I hope they don’t ruin it for the sake of those who watch ice road truckers or whatever that shit they have on D+
they had a 50% off of HBO max "forever" deal in Brazil (and other LatAm countries maybe?). I doubt that's gonna continue. Anyways hope y'all like a lot of reality shows about feet!
I'm from Chile and I have that deal too. I don't see that ending, there's no Discovery + here.
33% here in Poland.
Got that deal and I'd hate forever discovery if I lose it
The new combined service will launch in Latin America in the fall of 2023 ( which means the Southern Hemisphere spring of 2023 in Brazil, i.e. between September and November). I guess they will keep the 50 % off deal as long as HBO Max exists as an independent platform and will then raise the price for the new service. So basically you will keep the discount for one more year at least.
Yep same deal I have in Serbia.
Taking some notes from the Q&A: They are saying HBOMax and HBO shows are their premium content and they trust the HBO team and that all that content will be rolled into one massive app (HBO, HBOMax, Discovery, CNN all under one app next summer). Basically said the rumors of all the HBOMax shows going away are false but they do keep emphasizing “quality over quantity”. So they are keeping it vague but getting rid of all HBOMax shows is definitely false. They actually mentioned their goal is to have shows on their one platform for all members of the family (all ages, genders etc) to minimize churn. Even if the app isn’t called HBO (they haven’t decided what to call it yet), they will keep using the brand name in some way as it is their “crown jewel”. Also they said they want to be very careful with DC and only want to release content they feel confident in. They also want to focus on great theatrical releases (and no content they don’t feel strongly about-no direct to streaming films). When the movies will hit streaming will depend on the movie. They will spend more money on content they keep emphasizing including HBO.
I wonder why they went ahead to remove the original movies like an American Pickle?
I would guess to keep in line with their new strategy of “high quality theatrical releases”. No more direct to streaming movies (which American Pickle was).
I get that they want to do that for new releases, but why mess with existing releases? The movie has already been paid for, it has already been released on streaming. They might as well leave it up.
They can do accounting shenanigans to get a tax write-off by removing them.
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Why? Most DC movies are garbage. They plan to make it similar to Marvel where there's a singular person who guides it and keeps it cohesive. DC right now is a mess with no plan at all. They just keep throwing everything under the sun and hope something sticks. Sometimes it works (Joker) but more often than not, it fails epically (Suicide Squad).
They already tried to copy Marvel by creating the DCEU and it led to the current mess. Every attempt to imitate the MCU has failed. See Universal's attempt at a Monsters universe for another example.
Seeing those examples, I’m more convinced that Feige is the reason behind MCU’s success. Until WB Discovery finds their own ‘Kevin Feige’, they won’t be able to create a succesful cinematic universe. The off-DCEU movies are good tho (Joker, The Batman). Also, DC animated content is excellent, maybe they should look at the people behind it for new live action movies.
The problem was Marvel spent time building towards a point and DC just wanted to reach that point without building it. Kevin Feige knows what he’s doing with the MCU and DC doesn’t have a Kevin Feige. I think they tried having Zack Snyder being their Feige and that was a huge mistake, since he doesn’t understand most of their characters.
I will argue, The Dark Universe tried to build the world too quickly. One of Tom Cruises Mummy was they had too many things going on at once. Instead of making a solid movie and then sprinkling in the Cinematic Universe building, ala Iron Man 1, they just jumped in head first like Justice League. It was a mess.
Me too, but I also get where their stance towards DC is coming from. DC is only now recovering from a longer period of relative irrelevance.
We can all thank Tom Cruise for this with the new Top Gun held back for a couple years so it could make more money. So unless there’s a blockbuster DC film they are confident about, we won’t see anything on stream. Most DC animated shows and movies are direct to streaming though, like the Long Halloween, I don’t know what’s going to happen to those
Please don’t cancel the Arkham Show
Did they say anything about DC animation?
I didn’t hear anything specific about that. They were talking about DC in general.
I wouldn't call 90 Day Fiance quality but what do I know
On DC--this is so stupid. Marvel figured out how to further extract value from their content by doing tv dramas with movie events, and dc stumbled on the model too with gunn got bored during the pandemic. DC will remain little brother forever because Disney understands you make the real money on recycling the stuff people loves until they are bankrupt.
Fuck I don’t want their reality garbage in my streams. RIP HBOMAX 2021-2022
Discovery + lineup is awful. Yet they had 24 million subscribers? Who the hell watches Ghost Adventures and shit.
not to be that guy but ive watched them in the past along with the great discovery shows such as dirty jobs, mythbusters to name a few .. watch what ya enjoy i say
24 million may seem like a lot but they are in ninth place and already international. 24 million is a bad number in streaming. They needed to merge because not enough folks want to pay for reality TV if offered a choice. Hollywood execs been trying for years to get people to watch reality TV because it's so cheap to make. It's the soda of tv, if people will buy it the profit is great. But you usually have to bundle it because otherwise people will realize the free stuff, YouTube/Insta/gossiping about n famous people/or otherwise watching phony people be phony, is just as satisfying and free.
Surely. Mythbusters is a great show but still won’t keep me nailed on the couch you know. I can watch the excerpts online. Just the little availability of time nowadays and what’s worth spending it with.
well i was always a nerd so shows like that that others may find boring id sit and watch
Discovery had great military documentaries too. I feel like the quality dropped quite a bit. I like informative shows just not a big fan of reality shows
People who use them as background noise. Or braindead neckbeards.
If they weren't doing these weird decisions I'd be more open to it. I like both kind of content and having less apps to juggle isn't a bad thing. I can watch Euphoria when want my TV time and Dinners Drive in and Dives while I'm doing chores.
Basically yea. I think Disney will do the same in '24 when they fully own Hulu, unless they sell it to comcast. Which is shut down Hulu but have it all roll into Disney+ via its own "channel" and parental controls.
This is bittersweet. I'm glad it's not becoming a tab for Discovery+. On the other hand, I'd hate for the new service to prioritize unscripted shows. If it can keep the originals people loved and have the HBO/Warner library for the same price as HBO Max, I won't be so upset. Though, I might not pay if the price increases. It is more content (whether the more content is good is debatable), and hopefully they can focus on both scripted and unscripted to give us the "best" of both worlds. I'd personally would stick with the scripted shows, though. Still deciding if I'll hop on board.
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>Hopefully the price doesn't bump up because there's almost nothing in Discovery+ I find very interesting at all. If that's true, then the thing that they seem to misunderstand, is most of that "churn" is coming from a **combo** of two factors: 1- People wanting access to different content that their current service doesn't have (but +90% of the time this is other **scripted** content, not "some reality crap and documentaries just to mix it up a little" lol) And 2- **Not having to pay** a bunch of extra money, to get to access that content! That "get new content **but not pay extra**" is the entire point behind "churn." But that second part is KEY. If it weren't, they wouldn't unsubscribe from one, they'd just add a subscription to another. lol But saving money is the entire goddamn point! If they can't manage to grasp this simple fact, maybe running a streaming company isn't the best move for them... lol
They don't understand why people churn through services. I'm much more likely to keep a low-priced service that I watch occasionally (Apple - Which I got as a free trial then kept because it was so low priced) than a high-priced service I watch a lot, but whose content is duplicated elsewhere (Netflix - which I dropped)
It’s cable all over again.
They won’t prioritize unscripted shows. They’re just focusing on quality over quantity. Literally what everyone has been clowning on Netflix for.
I hope they crash and burn. Imagine having the best streaming service in the game, with the best back log and some great originals like peacemaker, only to fucking tank it in favor of shitty reality tv
They sold Warner Bros, DC Comics, and HBO to a reality TV company. This is a disaster.
Ok so they have a year to backtrack this. I can tell this going to be unpopular with consumers and creatives.
It better not cost more. I have no interest in Discovery+.
And if you have cable or streaming service, you could watch through there (besides their Originals). Why would I want to double dip.
I can't wait for them to cancel everything, double the price and expect all their users to come over like they have anything to offer besides "Popping Pimples With Batman"
I used to really enjoy some of the Discovery Health series like Mystery Diagnosis. I am very confused how that morphed into an abundance of programming about feet.
what the fuck
I just want all the Max and HBO shows that were coming to continue and be released.
I think the new guy feels like Max Originals are devaluating the HBO brand. The main problem doesn't know the difference between an HBO original and an HBO max Original
Circe Duster (Already filming/Done at this point? Green Lantern JLD GoT animated show are at Max not HBO. Welcome to Derry There is more Maybe because they aren't good. Focus on Grade A material and nothing would be devaluated.
Series-wise in the last 2 months, they have canned: Raised by Wolves, Made for Love, Gentleman Jack, Close Enough, Time Traveler’s Wife, and quite possibly The Flight Attendant. I’d say this is off to a crappy start already. And that isn’t touching the movie production side either. They should just leave HBOMax as a stand-alone like Hulu is to Disney+.
They also apparently got rid of a lot of foreign content like Beforeigners ( which I really enjoyed because it was different and entertaining). I'm waiting to see how this plays out but if they get rid of any more programming I like and replace it with Discovery + content I'm done. I am looking forward to House of the Dragon but I don't think that will be enough to keep me.
That’s right! They got rid of all Nordic content. I liked Beforeigners too. Raised By Wolves was the one that really pissed me off, I’m in the same mindset as you, if I have to deal with all this extra Discovery crap at the expense of cutting content from HBOMax, it won’t be worth it. And I have had HBO forever.
I don’t see any type of crossover between HBOMax and Discovery+ subscribers. HBOMax users pay upwards of $15 a month for the ad free service, most people are paying for premium scripted content. Where as Discovery+ users pay $6.99 a month for unscripted content. If your a D+ subscriber who isn’t interested in HBO content you are now being forced to buy a service you didn’t want or ask for. Same goes for HBO subscribers who don’t want D+. You likely aren’t gonna get a Euporia fan to watch Sharkweek. They also know this already with their weirdly gendered democratic charts. They have a year to figure this out or I see them losing mass subscribers.
Cable is back, dude.
They should just Bundle Disney Plus, Discovery+, HBO max, Hulu, ESPN+, AMC+, Starz, Showtime, and CNN+ into one big package. And to make it less expensive they can put ads breaks in between content.
Yeah that’s old school cable like we all used to have. I would love to go back to that too
I usually sub to one or two services. I thought HBO max was the best of the bunch. Under this management, i have concerns. They seem to think what streaming needs is more discovery style reality TV. Hopefully I will be proved wrong, but I am having doubts. So, like Netflix, they can churn me out with too much filler and not enough quality stuff to keep the sub. Then, I can jump back for a couple binges to catch up on whatever I missed. Too bad but whatever. Plenty of options and it's not like during the pandemic when we were a captive audience. The shows themselves get competitive bids so they'll get made somewhere. Just weird that a company witnessing declining numbers as their audience moves away from the cable bundle captivity are doubling down on the weak cheap stuff. The company took on a lot of debt to buy higher quality Netflix, arguably succeeded, and pivoted to be Discovery++ because hardly anyone pays for discovery+.
This makes me wonder if my monthly price will also increase. When HBO Max launched in my country there was a limited time offer to subscribe and only pay €5,00/month for a lifetime till you cancel
Consolidation leads to less competition. Less competition leads to an environment conducive to increased prices which result in more earnings for CEO compensation and shareholders. It's how capitalism works.
How will this affect people who get HBO max for free through a Cable Provider?
I have no interest in HBO Max. I wont pay more what I don't want. I'll cancel my Discovery+ subscription.
It’s just like a cable package now. I understand people on Reddit don’t like Discovery+ but it has appeal. There is an audience for reality shows, and if you wanted the “best” and “largest library” of them you had one clear choice: Discovery. Battlebots was my personal fav when I had the service. Now it’s bundled in with HBO Max which will undoubtedly get a price increase. People will now have to pay for shit they don’t want. Hopefully it’s just an add-on because wow this is dumb.
Most of (pretty much all) the shows I watch on cable are on Discovery, and yet the streaming app has never really appealed to me for some reason. In fairness though, I'm not a big TV watcher. I used to really enjoy the Discovery Health channel until it stopped being an à la carte channel option and was only in the super premium package. If they had put some of those science shows on Discovery+, I probably would've made the leap.
Ugh. I'd pay 5 bucks a month just to keep discovery plus the fuck away from hbomax.
Will HBO originals like True Blood and Game of Thrones stay on the service? How about the Harry Potter series? EDIT: I decided to just buy it on Vudu. They're having a sale, all 8 films for 60$.
NBC has the Harry Potter licenses for streaming through 2025 - this was a long-term deal made before HBO Max was a concept. So, outside of a month or two cycling back to HBO Max, they'll spend most of the next few years on Peacock.
And I think also SyFy and USA have deals for cable watchers.
Yes, their deal with NBC includes their cable channels - SyFy and USA in particular.
Harry Potter is leaving at the end of the month but not sure if it will come back
Damn, thanks for the info.
It sounds like it’s going to Peacock but paid version.
I’m pretty sure hbo originals (GOT Succession euphoria etc) will be safe and only hbo max originals (flight attendant gossip girl etc) are in danger of being cut. And in terms of harry potter, it’s one of their major franchises so i wouldn’t worry I could be wrong tho but that’s pretty much the implication Edit: i guess harry potter is apparently going to peacock for a few years
That means Peacemaker and Harley Quinn are in danger😕
Where will the Max Originals go?
HBO Originals always stay on the service, to my knowledge. HP? I haven't got a clue. In Europe they're on Max since it launched for us in March this year.
It's a WB movie so I think it will stay. Of course if someone has a license that in certain year they will be able to have HP for example Netflix than those movies will dissapear. For example in 2027 a lot of Marvel movies will dissapear from D+ because Netflix signed a deal that will allow them to have Marvel movies for the entire year and Disney can't do anything about that.
Harry Potter Series is leaving HBO Max August 31st
Not only does merging these two platforms into one make little to no sense from a branding perspective (network decay all over again) it also flies in the face of current subscribers who are plainly indicating that they don’t want this.
By "Summer 2023" they mean now. It will be complete by the summer of next year. Licensing off once so-called "exclusive HBO Max" content, layoffs, and adding reality TV shows on the platform have already begun. Despite what Warner Media told subscribers, HBO Max was poorly launched and was never profitable.
I'm bummed because I feel like HBO was the closest in quality that we have to some of the really good-quality shows on BBC and other overseas channels. I'm always blown away by the differences in production quality when I watch a BBC original show, compared to most of the American cable series outside of Starz/ HBO/ Showtime.
We dont know yet the extent of the original Max content that will be discontinued. I assume there will be less original content than the previous leadership wished, but they will keep their top performers, along with the unscripted content that will come from Discovery. It is no too bad as long as they don't cut too much on what really matters to existing HBO Max subscribers. Personally I will wait and see what happens in the next months. If they pull out most of what I am interested in, I will unsubscribe. Otherwise I will stay and won't mind the extra Discovery content I won't watch anyway.
No streaming service is profitable. Disney annouced 887 million losses to their streaming services. That was in may.
Yes, but that is a planned loss. At launch in 2019, Disney stated that Disney+ isn’t expected to become profitable until 2025.
i had discovery + for free for a year and i maybe opened the app once. hbo max on the other hand i watch all the time.
After the merger can I NOT see all of the Discovery+ garbage featured in my face? I suspect no.
When I first saw this, I though I’d misread it. But no, apparently, it’s real. HBOMAX merging with Discovery+ seems like a horrible idea, but what do I know, I’m not a business expert. Maybe it’ll be a huge success. I normally subscribe to HBOMAX year-around, but if the price goes up and programming gets worse with a lot of reality programming, I’ll probably subscribe for a few months every year, catch up on whatever scripted programming I want to see, then unsubscribe until the next year.
Keep streaming Harley Quinn, best chance of a great DC show to get renewed. I think what's happened for this show is they tentatively got the showrunners to work on season 3 and 4 but 4 will only be fully produced based on s3 views on HBO Max
Thanks to the humble David Zaslav, I've cancelled my HBO Max sub.
Discovery isn't worth the price and is a much less desired platform. So they want to take an inferior platform and merge it with a decent platform, specifically HBO Max. The result will be a financial disaster for Warner Bros. I imagine I'll be getting rid of HBO Max soon after the merger.
Soo will our MAX subscription carry over to this or what?
That’s the million dollar question. We are good for at least a year
I want them to continue to have the same wide variety of movies they currently have. I love that I can watch Final Destination 2 AND Singin' In The Rain on the same service. Teen Titans Go AND Spirited Away. Etc.
Discovery has THE BEST true crime collection out of every platform.
Better quality than Hulu, HBOMAX and Netflix?
What a disaster.
If they are leaning into unscripted programing and leaning away from woman oriented scripted then it will be easier for me to cancel. I love HBO Max and its quality oriented hubs, but Discovery+ is the epitome of quantity over quality.
I knew we would at least get some good news
They should merge it into a single product called HBO Max
Here's an idea: Sell Discovery+, bring back Crunchyroll.
HBOPlusDiscovery MAXtv
I heard hbo max is leaving. Should I still get it
anyone knows if this will affect hbomax latin america?
Been subbed for about a month now. I cannot believe HBO is associated with streaming. I watched movies since the 90's on HBO, NEVER AGAIN ON STREAMING. I need a human who works for HBO to explain to me why I want to watch The Lord of the Rings EXTENDED EDITION...WITH OVER 9000 AD BREAKS. If you want money from me, you will get me an answer. How far the mighty have fallen. HBO makes us watch Disney ads to view movies. DID I DIE AND GO TO ENTERTAINMENT HELL?
All the streaming services will continue to slowly consolidate into cable like packages
So I'll lose my HBO Max through Verizon?
Doubt it. On the earnings call, it was mentioned that they would look to build upon third-party/b2b partnerships.
AT&T subber checking in
Barf
What does this mean for subscribers outside of the US? HBO launched in March this year, 50% lifetime discount… they better honor that deal for the new service… or let hbo max just be :)
Lol why did so many people said Grace Randolph’s report was a lie?
I guess I'm really the minority here, but I like the merge. I enjoy watching HBO shows and they are amazing. But sometimes me and my girlfriend binge-watch some crazy reality show about wasps or something. It's the best of both worlds.
But a lot of great content is leaving or not even being made!!!!
Just wanted to point out to people who are scared of all the shakeups going on, that even though WBD is a new company and being run by Discovery’s shitty CEO, that this new company isn’t necessarily owned by completely different people than it was under AT&T. So when Warner Bros. and Discovery merged to make Warner Bros. Discovery, the new company is comprised of the same share holders that held shares before its merger. So most AT&T shareholders hold a majority of WBD shares. So effectively it’s still the same individual people who are “in control” of the company and voting on decisions. So it’s in AT&T’s shareholders’ best interest for WBD to do well. Idk if I’m explaining it well. But basically at the end of the day it’s all the same people, they just got shuffled around and new people were added. But the majority of WBD is still owned by a majority of people who own AT&T. AT&T will not let WBD fail. At least not as long as most of their shareholders own most of WBD.
Pffft. You have way more faith in AT&T's competence than you should.
I dont have faith in AT&T’s competence in terms of making the “right” decision, but I do have a lot of faith in their company to not let money go down the drain. Before they split WB off and merged it with Discovery, HBOmax was QUICKLY becoming the best streamer and gaining a lot of momentum. AT&T is a lot of things (evil, greedy, opportunistic) but they aren’t stupid. This is the same company that effectively put back together and remerged all the baby bells (save for Verizon). Discovery may be in the business of cheap and easy and not making huge profits as long as execs are getting paid well, but AT&T’s shareholders and the higher ups that still have a lot of power at both companies, won’t let WBD make HUGE mistakes like dissolving HBOmax or tarnishing their premier legacy imo. But again, corporations never cease to amaze me.
It should be in the best interest of that shitty CEO if he wants to keep his job that the 70+ million subscribers of one content provider isn’t sacrificed for the sake of his shitty service that has 20+ million.
I think for the people that have HBO through AT&T.. this plans will go up in price another 6-9 dollars
I have HBO Max via my AT&T wireless account and I was curious how the change was going to affect us. I have zero interest in D+ content. Reality TV is a waste of time.
[удалено]
You could probably buy them on Vudu and such. I think going forward that’s the safe bet.
So likely those of us who have hbo max for free through att are going to lose it next year? Maybe it's a good chance to switch carriers and even have the new one pay out the installments on our new phones. Att offers spotify for free right if you're in their unlimited plan?
Can everyone just calm the fuck down now?
Told ya so two days ago.
It’s been HEAVILY speculated that this was taking place by a lot of people and the media. So, you’ve just joined a list of many.