That's really what I meant. They are so worried what the big story is they don't address 95% of sports. Multiple times o tried to watch for highlights of our game this year. I didn't even see them show highlights after multiple hours. Even on like college football live. It is all about Alabama and the other big name schools.
ESPN -- "Dead Channel Walking"
- Thread starter EatemupISU
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Disney (owns ESPN) is lucky they are completely killing it on the movie studios front right now to help compensate for all these losses on the cable network side. 2016 is already a crazy record year for them at the box office front and it isn't even over yet. A lot of great decisions on that front have created the 6-headed monster of Walt Disney Pictures, Walt Disney Animation Studios, Pixar, Disney Nature, Lucasfilms, and Marvel Studio that simply print money right now. 2017 will likely then beat even 2016 in numbers with their upcoming slate of movies.
Also, don't forget that Disney is in rumored talks to be purchasing Netflix right now. If true, they are obviously making attempts to diversify themselves in that marketplace. Them buying Netflix also could really be one step forward into big changes in how we view sports in the future.
I still can't get over the fact that they paid $1.9 Billion Dollars for Monday Night Football. Seriously? $1.9 Billion dollars for 16-17 games per year? Are you kidding. $111 million dollars per game. No wonder they trash talk the Big XII because they "only" pay the league about that for the entire year.
The last time I religiously watched ESPN for anything other than live sports was when Sportscenter was an actual highlight show that showed Highlights from every professional sporting event that was played the night before... not just an homage to media darlings and giant markets.
We are getting into a new era of GE and Standard Oil style monopolies. At some point I figure we will have Disney/ABC/et al, Google, Amazon, and Apple. And Nintendo will still be selling portable devices.
- Mar 27, 2006
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They make money on it, though. If they didn't there wouldn't be a bidding war every time the contract is up. Ad costs for MNF are roughly $400,000 for a 30 second commercial. So, they're making up a big portion of the licensing cost on advertising alone, and that's before they factor in the money they're getting from subscribers, which is well into the billions. ESPN's MNF actually has one of the cheapest advertising costs compared to the other networks that carry NFL games. Sunday Night Football, for example has a much higher advertising cost. ESPN can do this because they also are getting those subscriber fees, and don't have to have advertising pay for everything. The model collapses, though, without those subscribers.
I think you're right. Take the Michigan/Ohio State game last weekend. A big game that a lot of people cared about. But instead of just spending extra time talking about it, they act like its the only game of the weekend. They have 24 hours, they could cover a bunch of stuff that different fanbases care about but instead they just hit hard on the top fanbases and ignore everybody else. But the problem is that while the top 10 or so fanbases are big, you lose everybody that isn't in those fanbases, And those people start cancelling.
Hell, I'm debating whether to even keep my Vue subscription up for basketball season. Walters and Heft do a pretty good job with the radio call and I can go to a bar for any big games.
That's a lot of words to say that most people think ESPN sucks and don't like paying for things that suck.
A lot like a buggy whip company complaining that their customers aren't buying enough buggy whips for their cars. Maybe you should do something the customer wants or needs???
A lot like a buggy whip company complaining that their customers aren't buying enough buggy whips for their cars. Maybe you should do something the customer wants or needs???
I kind of wrote a bit about this back in October if you're way bored:
http://cyclonefanatic.com/2016/10/blum-big-12-the-conference-of-the-future/
http://cyclonefanatic.com/2016/10/blum-big-12-the-conference-of-the-future/
- Mar 27, 2006
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I think the idea he's pushing is the snowball effect. Losing subscribers leads to less revenue, which leads to not being able to afford all of their broadcast rights, which leads to less live sports content, which leads to fewer subscribers, which leads to less revenue and so on and so on. You also need to factor in the possibility that ESPN will be forced to lower its subscriber fee by cable companies, causing the revenue to drop off even more.
Does it spell a dead channel? Probably not. That's pretty hyperbolic, as there almost certainly be a floor. But, what will that floor represent, if it comes to fruition? A shell of the media titan that ESPN is/was.
It's floor is Fox Sports 1, and it's not likely to drop that far. I do agree that they're likely to have to give up some of their broadcast rights, but they're still backed by ABC(who also needs broadcast rights) and Disney. I bet they don't get the next MNF contract (though ABC might and use ESPN employees)
Again, this is a Fox fan boy dreaming his big dream of being more important than ESPN.
- Mar 27, 2006
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If that is indeed the floor, ESPN becoming similar to FS1 would still represent a massive change, and a total shakeup in how the company would be forced to do business. ESPN's subscriber fee is roughly 7 times higher than FS1. We're talking an enormous shift in where they'd need to get their revenue.
