From cable to clicks: Is streaming on Netflix the next frontier for TV news?
Since the invention of television news, despite evolution, innovation and sometimes unsuccessful experimentation, there remains a working blueprint for delivery which has never really changed. Networks have tried to reinvent the wheel, but facts – mostly – are facts, right?
The TV news market, too, seems cleanly carved up in most broadcasting markets around the world. In Australia and the UK, a mixture of public and commercial broadcasters dominate the landscape. In the US, cable news channels dominate discussion. And in countries such as Sweden and Denmark, online news and traditional TV news seem to own equal shares of the audience.
ABC News Breakfast hosts James Glenday and Bridget Brennan. In Australia, a mixture of public and commercial broadcasters dominate the news landscape.
But the question is, what comes next? If the blueprint was a square-shouldered man reading off an autocue, and the modern twist is presenters standing in studios with video screens and computer graphics and visual gimmickry, then how does one of the most competitive businesses in the world step into its own future?
The answer may lie not in the format, but the platform. Generationally, fewer people watch traditional TV than they used to. In the US, as much as 50 per cent or more of people under the age of 40 do not interact with traditional TV at all. They are exclusively watching streaming platforms, such as Disney+, Paramount+, Netflix and YouTube.
And it is the last two of those where much of the speculation presently sits. In the US, YouTube remains the most dominant platform for the consumption of TV or TV-type content, with 12.4 per cent of the market.
That might not seem like a big piece of the pie, but when you fold in the next four competitors, ranked by distributor or studio – Disney (10.7 per cent), Paramount (8.9 per cent), NBC Universal (8.2 per cent) and Netflix (7.5 per cent) – they collectively amount to around half of everything.
NBC News, MSNBC, and CNN signage at the United Centre ahead of the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in 2024.Credit: Bloomberg
Given Disney, Paramount and NBC Universal already own terrestrial networks and news operations – the American networks ABC, CBS and NBC, respectively – that leaves the question of innovation in the big-ticket streaming news space to either YouTube or Netflix.
In some ways, the introduction of streaming news is inevitable. Having maxed out the quality TV market for new subscribers, streamers then shift sideways, chasing mass-market content. And having played out that, live sport and other “traditional TV” genres now fall into the frame.
In the last decade, Netflix has invested in WWE Raw, Christmas Day NFL games, the FIFA Women’s World Cup and boxing exhibition fights, while Amazon has invested in the US NFL’s Thursday Night Football, NBA, and NASCAR. YouTube, meanwhile, hosts content from key sports players, such as the NFL, MLB, NBA and WWE, and carries sports channels on its linear streaming channel service. In Australia, Amazon has also secured exclusive rights to all ICC cricket events, including the Cricket World Cups, until 2027.
Australian cricket captain Pat Cummins is an ambassador for streaming service Amazon Prime Video, which broadcasts the Cricket World Cup.
Like sports, live news has a substantial commercial relationship with TV advertising. And despite a corporate infancy in which they sold the audience the promise of one low fee and no ads, most streaming services have, in the last few years, introduced ad-funded tiers to their offering. Platforms hungry to monetise those tiers will have a much easier time shoehorning ads into natural breaks in sports and live news than, say, episodes of The Crown, The Diplomat or Dept. Q.
No high-profile streaming platform has flagged plans to launch a news service in the short term, but both remain fascinating potential players, particularly in the US where controlling the message – the left-leaning MSNBC vs the right-leaning Fox News, for example – seems to be of paramount importance.
An unpredictable player, with fast access to a huge segment of younger, not-already-engaged news consumers, could upend the game. Imagine the potential of a YouTube News Channel, or a Netflix News Channel? Following the same trend, there is also enormous potential in a Facebook News, TikTok News or Instagram News.
There are risks. Digital news feels disposable, and news infrastructures require investment, patience and wisdom, a triptych that sometimes feels unreachable for some online brands. But YouTube and Netflix, for example, know they’re not chasing rusted-on TV news viewers and asking them to change their habit. Rather, that market, already disengaged from traditional TV, is already surfing the internet, or their social channels, searching for digital news.
In real terms, it is less a case of if than when.
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