Some Treasure Coast folks peeved, but Peacock soars as capitalism lures Dolphins audience
Some of our neighbors got pretty worked up over the weekend.
Not just because the Miami Dolphins got steamrolled by the Kansas City Chiefs. It started before that.
“Un-American” and “greedy” were the two most common PG-rated adjectives I saw Dolphins fans use to describe the fact they’d need a Peacock streaming subscription to watch their team play.
After all, they said, it was the first time fans would have to subscribe to a streaming service ― starting at $5.99 a month — to watch an NFL playoff game.
So?
Such a decision by the NFL and NBCUniversal was anything but “un-American.” And just because we have to pay, or pay more, for something, that makes it "greedy"?
The NFL and NBCUniversal used a classic capitalist strategy, stemming from what some people like to call American exceptionalism. Forward-thinking, innovative business folks took a risk that alienated some of our neighbors, but persuaded others to become customers. Call it freedom.
Why NFL, NBC streamed on Peacock
Supporting good journalism: TCPalm's impactful journalism propelled change on the Treasure Coast in 2023. Here's how
The future? Brightline here: Wouldn't it be nice to ride between Fort Pierce, Stuart and Vero Beach?
Maybe these new subscribers will find something worthwhile on Peacock. Maybe they won’t and they'll cancel the service. It's about choice.
Isn’t paying for streaming much like the way many of us felt when cable TV began? Did we have to spend $15 a month on 15 channels, half of which we’d never watch ― but we had to watch that one show? Remember when ESPN seemingly always had replays of Australian Rules Football?
Fast-forward almost 50 years and many people ― even us Boomers — are dropping their expansive and expensive cable services, opting, instead, to pick and choose what to stream, if anything, on their smart TVs, phones, computers, tablets or other electronic devices.
Streamers still have to pay access the internet.
Astute business people know this.
“We know and we see the continued evolution in the media landscape, and we want to be where our fans are,” NFL executive vice president of media distribution Hans Schroeder said on a conference call, according to USA TODAY. “We know they’re increasingly, especially younger fans, on different screens.”
A media analyst agreed.
“Considering cord-cutting and the soft TV ad-sales market, I think they have no choice but to pursue streaming because that’s where the growth is gonna be," John Kosner, the president of digital media and sports consultancy Kosner Media, told USA TODAY Sports. "That’s where media companies are investing.”
NBCUniversal apparently figured there was enough consumer demand it could afford to fork out $110 million to the NFL for rights to a Saturday night playoff game.
How'd the strategy pan out?
It turns out they were right, according to my Florida colleague Nick Pugliese.
The game was the "biggest live-streamed event in U.S. history and drives internet usage to single-day U.S. record," Pugliese wrote, quoting a press release from Peacock and NBC Sports.
The release said the game peaked at 25 million viewers, but averaged 23 million, topping last year’s AFC wild card game by 6%.
So some people must have seen value in paying to watch the game.
I, too, was disappointed I could not watch the game on a regular cable station. I wasn’t sure if we had a Peacock subscription ― we did, but I would not have bought one to watch the game. I think we have it as part of our Xfinity cable package. The cable company, Peacock and NBC are owned by Comcast.
As a university business school student for almost four years, and as someone who watched the newspaper industry disrupted by innovation, I was impressed by the companies' streaming risk.
Remembering the good, old days
I’m old enough to remember when you could:
Watch all sports, including the world boxing championship, for free on TV, before cable and pay-per-view deals were commonplace.
Not watch the Atlanta Braves unless you had cable or could get WTBS over the air. Ted Turner built a national baseball franchise, superstation and company using the fledgling cable industry.
Listen to personalities like Howard Stern for free on the radio. In 2005, Stern signed an exclusive contract with Sirius satellite radio, available via paid subscription. In 2015, USA TODAY reported, Sirius paid him $80 million a year.
Spend Saturdays and Sundays in front of cable watching the English Premier League and German Bundesliga ― two of the best soccer leagues in the world. Now many of the games are streamed only. Even the top U.S. soccer league, the MLS, has a streaming deal with Apple TV, as does MLB.
Watch high school or college football games for free on the internet (or in person). Many now contract with streamers — from FloSports to ESPN+ — to carry their games. Paying to watch high school championship games is nothing new.
The beauty of capitalism is entrepreneurs and consumers are free to innovate. Sometimes those choices pan out; sometimes they don't. With the Dolphins and Chiefs — whose fans could get the game on TV and cable in their home markets (the Treasure Coast is too far outside that market) ― it was about only a game.
I'm used to people complaining about having to pay for things. Some people bristle when they try to read one of my columns on TCPalm, but can’t because they don't subscribe.
I’d hope people see the value — far more than a football game — in what we, as journalists, do. Aside from some columns like this, I report on local issues that hopefully can help improve our community and its residents' lives. So do my colleagues.
Without supporting local journalism, studies show, residents will pay in other ways — such as government waste and abuse. It’s not that we can prevent or catch it all, but when no one’s watching, some public officials will take advantage of the community.
An evolving local news industry
There are multiple information sources on the Treasure Coast. Meantime, TCPalm’s audience and number of digital subscribers are growing, according to Adam Neal, our executive editor and news director.
I’m glad we ask people to pay for their news. Had we done it right after we started our website almost three decades ago, more people might not expect a free ride.
Daily newspaper subscriptions were never free that I know of. I don’t work for free. My company, unlike many others nowadays, has ethics rules that prohibit me from generating revenue the way faux journalists do.
Also, the older I get, the more I understand that quality-related adage, “You get what you pay for” ― even though our intro online subscription rate is only $1 for six months.
So instead of complaining about the Dolphins streaming issue, look ahead. How will you get your content in the future?
As media continue to fragment, we'll have to adapt to delivery methods, sometimes paying more than we expected.
At the same time — thanks to capitalism that encourages innovation — you’ll have more choices than ever. That’s a good thing.
This column reflects the opinion of Laurence Reisman. Contact him via email at larry.reisman@tcpalm.com, phone at 772-978-2223, Facebook.com/larryreisman or Twitter @LaurenceReisman.
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This article originally appeared on Treasure Coast Newspapers: Streaming, capitalism win big as disruption disturbs Dolphins fans
