Op-ed: Apps promised to free us from ad-supported subscription bundles. Oops!

For a moment, it seemed like the streaming apps were the things that could save us from the hegemony of cable TV—a system where you had to pay for a ton of stuff you didn’t want to watch so you could see the handful of things you were actually interested in.

Archived version: https://archive.ph/K4EIh

  • pewter@lemmy.worldEnglish
    2·
    1 year ago

    Op-ed: Apps promised to free us from ad-supported subscription bundles. Oops!

    I feel like that was never the promise. It was just incidental. When Netflix started out they were mailing people DVDs. When Hulu first started out it was free, but completely ad supported.

    When Netflix focused on ad-free subscription streaming I think consumers just asserted that that was the standard they wanted.