Disney, YouTube Announce Partnership
Posted by Jesse Ward on Monday, November 7, 2011 · 
·
Google’s YouTube and the Walt Disney Co.’s Disney Interactive Division have agreed to a new partnership, according to a widely cited article in today’s New York Times. Under the terms of the deal, the media giants will spend a combined $10 million – $15 million on original video series. The “family-friendly” shorts will be produced by Disney and distributed on a co-branded channel on Disney.com and YouTube. The channel will also include amateur video culled from the torrent uploaded to YouTube daily.
The online video destinations are anticipated to launch in early 2012. The first show will be an original video series based on Disney’s alligator-themed mobile game “Where’s My Water?,” scheduled to launch in February 2012. Read more
Not For Sale: Hulu
Posted by Steve Fravel on Monday, October 17, 2011 · ·
The Walt Disney Co., News Corp. and Providence Equity Partners said in a prepared statement, “Since Hulu holds a unique and compelling strategic value to each of its owners, we have terminated the sale process and look forward to working together to continue mapping out its path to even greater success. Our focus now rests on ensuring that our efforts as owners contribute in a meaningful way to the exciting future that lies ahead for Hulu.”
Recent stories and analysis of the “auction” for Hulu pointed out that given the low bids received, combined with the likelihood of Hulu growing into a more robust subscription service, it could suggest that keeping Hulu and Hulu Plus may be the better solution. Certainly once the million subscriber benchmark was crossed, it seemed that the better strategy would be for the current owners to maintain control of Hulu.
Dish Network, Google and Amazon provided bids for the service, with Google submitting the greatest dollar amount but tying its offer to several conditions. Dish Network appeared to have the inside track to gaining Hulu with the next highest bid. The owners and experts both seemed surprised at the low dollar amounts bid. Indications were that the winner might be getting the Hulu service and content for approximately $2 billion.
The owners are going to keep it and maintain control of the “next day” distribution of ABC, NBC and Fox programming. Had the sale gone forward, relinquishing control of the content might have been a crippling error.
Apple Considers Hulu
Posted by Steve Fravel on Friday, July 22, 2011 · ·
Although the company declined to publicly comment, Apple is said to be in discussions concerning a possible bid for online video site Hulu. Last week, the owners of Hulu — Walt Disney Co., News Corp., Comcast and NBC Universal — confirmed that the ownership of Hulu was definitely in play.
A possible Hulu acquisition would provide Apple with a new subscription service featuring more video. Currently Apple provides video for it’s popular iTunes customers on an on-demand rental basis rather than a subscription. Comcast, Disney and News Corp. have built a program rights extension of five years into the sale, creating a strong potential alternative to Netflix.
Estimates are that Hulu will command more than $2 billion.
For more, see this Bloomberg News article.
AMC Network in Play?
Posted by Steve Fravel on Friday, July 8, 2011 · ·
Spun off last week by Cablevision, the former Rainbow Media Holdings may be the acquisition target for one of several media companies. Rumor has it that Disney, News Corp. and Time-Warner each may have an interest in buying the newly renamed AMC Networks.
AMC Networks owns AMC, IFC, WE TV and the Sundance Channel. AMC also owns IFC Films and international programmer and TV program distribution unit. Speculation is that a deal for AMC Networks could run in the $3 billion range.
None of the organizations has commented publicly on the rumor. Of course if a deal is to go through it will provide the wining content provider with even more market power in retransmission consent negotiations.
Fox vs. Dish Network
Posted by Steve Fravel on Tuesday, October 12, 2010 · (2) ·
The reported re-negotiation breakdown is now firmly headed for a resolution unknown.
Fox has demanded that Dish Network remove FX, National Geographic Channel and 19 Regional Sports channels from the line-up. Dish Network is displaying information banners on the channel guide where the channel information for those channels used to be.
Dish is claiming that Fox is asking for exorbitant fees for the sports networks.
The NBA and NHL, both of whom have teams that license games to Fox Regional channels, are siding with Fox. Fox, the NBA and NHL are directing subscribers to competitors. Competitors are doing their level best to draw subscribers to them. Fox is apparently making the Fox-owned stations part of the issue as re-negotiating retransmission consent is also running short on time.
In a press release, Dish Network claims that Fox is demanding a 50% increase over current fees for the Regional Sports channels. Dish indicates that in these trying times, that kind of money is too much to ask their subscribers to pay. This is bound to get very ugly, very soon, or maybe not. Dish Network had a dispute earlier this year with Disney and dropped four HD channels. They aren’t back in the line-up yet.
There are editorials around the country indicating a desire for a la carte over the current bundling requirements placed on distributors like Dish Network. Perhaps a la carte is an option. Perhaps the cost has begun to outweigh the value.
Disney Pays $763 Million for Social Games
Posted by Steve Fravel on Wednesday, July 28, 2010 · ·
According to observers, the social gaming business is booming. Disney’s initial payment of $563.2 million places the Walt Disney Co. squarely into social gaming as the largest Hollywood operator. The deal is reportedly structured to include additional payments of nearly $200 million should Playdom achieve significant undisclosed growth benchmarks.
The concept uses simple games that include ”virtual retail” opportunities for players to purchase everything from clothing and spa visits to refreshments for their game characters. Playdom is one of a group of game developers that are part of the rapid expansion of social game growth in network environments like Facebook.
NY Times Profiles ‘Big TV Brawls’
Posted by Jesse Ward on Monday, July 12, 2010 · ·
The New York Times published an interesting article yesterday which highlights the escalating programming war between content providers and carriers – and the simultaneous conflict for subscriber eye balls between telcos and cable providers.
Over the weekend Verizon took aim at Time Warner Cable, noting that Time Warner’s contract with Disney – supplier of ESPN, ABC and the Disney Channel – will expire on September 2. Verizon ran two high-profile ads which urged customers to preemptively switch to Verizon’s FiOS service to retain programming. Read more