A suspicious omission.
NBC’s Peacock launched earlier this month (July 15th), touting thousands of hours of NBCUniversal content. And yet, alongside the other recent massive streaming launch HBO Max, it’s currently not available on the two most popular streaming devices: Roku and Amazon’s Fire TV.
Much of this may lay at the feet of the often complex deals that tend to be cut between services and the manufacturer’s of the hardware used to access them. According to Variety, this is down to a combination of money and the now-expected-as-a-sticking-point user data.
This may, in that case, be a matter of pride before reason in the case of Peacock and HBO Max. Both have had less-than-stellar adoption at launch. And that may be due to the fact that Roku and Fire TV are the two most popular devices for streaming apps, the two accounting for 70% of all streaming devices in the US at 80 million users.
NBC’s Peacock, however, sings a different tune, placing this failure on the device manufacturers. Per a statement made to CNET:
“The Peacock app is ready to launch across platforms with the flip of a switch,” a Peacock spokeswoman said. “We think it’s important for consumers to know that Peacock is free to use and free to any platform who wants to distribute it. If Peacock is not available on a platform at launch, it is not because we didn’t make it available, and it’s not because we didn’t make it available for free.”
“Consumers have purchased these devices with the expectation they will be able to access all of the apps, so our hope is that all platforms will do right by their users and carry it,” she added.
Roku fired back, though, that Comcast rejected the industry standard terms they use for every service on their platform. In particular, they noted that NBC wanted to launch an ad-supported service on their platform without sharing the ad model with them. Their statement:
This shows a basic misunderstanding of what drives success in today’s modern streaming world, where successful publishers collaborate on advertising and achieve strong results by leaning into the unique tools we offer.
Roku
Amazon made no comment.
Which leaves us all at a stalemate. Since nobody really likes watching stuff on mobile devices when they don’t really have to. Especially since, you know, most people are currently stuck at home. Which, and I know this sounds crazy, means you’d see a massive uptick in users. But right now you’re getting:
Source: Gamespot
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