Walmart may launch video streaming service

[alexdf17]

The article below covers the possibility of a Walmart streaming service like Netflix or Amazon video. I have a feeling that it won't do too well unless the price is a real bargain simply because of the massive competition in the market already.

 

"Walmart may be the next giant to enter the video streaming wars, according to a report from The Information. The retailer is reportedly considering launching its own video streaming service to battle Netflix and Amazon Prime Video. But Walmart wants to undercut its competition by pricing its service at $8 per month—or lower." - Ars Technica

 

Are they too late to jump on the streaming service?

 

https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2018/07/walmart-may-launch-a-video-streaming-service-to-battle-netflix-amazon/

[rcmaehl]

While this doesn't meet minimum post requirements. I'm pretty sure Walmart had a VERY lucrative deal with Vudu since you know... they bought Vudu on 2010.

 

Edit: Looks like it's fixed-ish now

[Guest]

But why?

[Froody129]

We don't really need/want more competition. Amazon already tried and paid a lot for exclusivity deals and their service hasn't really taken off. Netflix works great and is priced fairly reasonably

[yolosnail]

Tesco did this in the UK with Blinkbox, that didn't turn out well!

[Brooksie359]

4 minutes ago, Froody129 said:

We don't really need/want more competition. Amazon already tried and paid a lot for exclusivity deals and their service hasn't really taken off. Netflix works great and is priced fairly reasonably

I know alot of people who use prime video. I also know alot of people who do subscriptions to channels like HBO and Showtime through them as well. I would say prime video is doing just fine. 

[alexdf17]

1 minute ago, Brooksie359 said:

I know alot of people who use prime video. I also know alot of people who do subscriptions to channels like HBO and Showtime through them as well. I would say prime video is doing just fine. 

It's doing fine but it hasn't taken off the way Netflix did which dominates the market.

[yolosnail]

2 minutes ago, Brooksie359 said:

I know alot of people who use prime video. I also know alot of people who do subscriptions to channels like HBO and Showtime through them as well. I would say prime video is doing just fine. 

I use Prime Video all the time, there's actually some good shows and movies on there. Some of them are only limited time though so you have to catch it at the right time

[alexdf17]

7 minutes ago, Froody129 said:

We don't really need/want more competition. Amazon already tried and paid a lot for exclusivity deals and their service hasn't really taken off. Netflix works great and is priced fairly reasonably

I mean more competition is always better. It drives development and expansion if it's real and tough competition.

[lewdicrous]

Please read this and edit accordingly

[TigerHawk]

2 minutes ago, alexdf17 said:

I mean more competition is always better. It drives development and expansion if it's real and tough competition.

I am not so sure about in this case. It's the platform exclusivity that is becoming an issue now. Eventually you're gonna have to subscribe to 5 6 7 different places to catch all the shows you want and its gonna get expensive and cumbersome to be using different accounts for all this crap. It's gonna become a headache for the customer if they keep up with a lot of "exclusive" stuff.

[Noctus]

7 minutes ago, yolosnail said:

Tesco did this in the UK with Blinkbox, that didn't turn out well!

It did? When was this? Not had a whiff of that from several of my local Tescos' lol

[alexdf17]

1 minute ago, TigerHawk said:

I am not so sure about in this case. It's the platform exclusivity that is becoming an issue now. Eventually you're gonna have to subscribe to 5 6 7 different places to catch all the shows you want and its gonna get expensive and cumbersome to be using different accounts for all this crap. It's gonna become a headache for the customer if they keep up with a lot of "exclusive" stuff.

That's a good point, I have to agree with you in that case.

[jeffmeyer5295]

Yeah I'm honestly getting sick of all the streaming services at this point. Getting a bit out of hand

[alexdf17]

7 minutes ago, lewdicrous said:

Please read this and edit accordingly

Better?

[mynameisjuan]

9 minutes ago, alexdf17 said:

I mean more competition is always better. It drives development and expansion if it's real and tough competition.

More competition is better to a point. There is such a thing at too much competition. Streaming service is already saturated. 

[yolosnail]

3 minutes ago, Noctus said:

It did? When was this? Not had a whiff of that from several of my local Tescos' lol

Well, they sold it in 2015 to TalkTalk, but they had it from 2011. I'm surprised you didn't hear of Clubcard TV /s

The only reason I even know they had it was because I got a Hudl on sale and it came preinstalled

[TimeOmnivore]

42 minutes ago, alexdf17 said:

I mean more competition is always better. It drives development and expansion if it's real and tough competition.

When it comes to streaming services, competition would only be always better if all they were competing in was streaming quality, ease of use, compatibility, availability and various other quality of life features - but since they're competing in content exclusivity, competition just drives up the price consumers need to pay to legally access all of the content they want to watch. But there's only so many quality of life features you can have with a streaming service (unless you're Netflix, in which case you can just say "Fuck it." and actively make your user experience terrible), so they can only really compete with content, which makes most competition in the legal streaming market anti-consumer and annoying.

[Noctus]

37 minutes ago, yolosnail said:

Well, they sold it in 2015 to TalkTalk, but they had it from 2011. I'm surprised you didn't hear of Clubcard TV /s

The only reason I even know they had it was because I got a Hudl on sale and it came preinstalled

Ah okay. Well.... nothing lost on that venture i guess lol.

[mynameisjuan]

1 minute ago, TimeOmnivore said:

When it comes to streaming services, competition would only be always better if all they were competing in was streaming quality, ease of use, compatibility, availability and various other quality of life features - but since they're competing in content exclusivity, competition just drives up the price consumers need to pay to legally access all of the content they want to watch. But there's only so many quality of life features you can have with a streaming service (unless you're Netflix, in which case you can just say "Fuck it." and actively make your user experience terrible), so they can only really compete with content, which makes most competition in the legal streaming market anti-consumer and annoying.

100% accurate. Competition right now means you need to subscribe to netflix, hulu, HBO go, prime just to watch netflix 90% of the time and watch 1 or 2 shows on the others jacking up cost for the customer. 

[yolosnail]

4 minutes ago, mynameisjuan said:

100% accurate. Competition right now means you need to subscribe to netflix, hulu, HBO go, prime just to watch netflix 90% of the time and watch 1 or 2 shows on the others jacking up cost for the customer. 

Everybody thinks these streaming services are stopping piracy, but if anything, they're making it worse. Literally every TV show now has it's own streaming service which costs $9.99 a month.

 

In fact, that's given me a great idea! Why don't we just have one platform where you can pay one rate to access everything instead of paying for all the different streaming services... oh wait!

 

What people don't realise is by the time they've paid for Netflix, Prime Video, Broadband etc. they're paying pretty much exactly the same if not more than if they'd just stuck with cable TV

[mynameisjuan]

2 minutes ago, yolosnail said:

they're paying pretty much exactly the same if not more than if they'd just stuck with cable TV

meh....about half...but you arent paying for ads and you cant watch what you want when you want. 

 

I get where you are coming from but its still better than cable. Just please no more streaming services!!!!

[Brooksie359]

7 minutes ago, yolosnail said:

Everybody thinks these streaming services are stopping piracy, but if anything, they're making it worse. Literally every TV show now has it's own streaming service which costs $9.99 a month.

 

In fact, that's given me a great idea! Why don't we just have one platform where you can pay one rate to access everything instead of paying for all the different streaming services... oh wait!

 

What people don't realise is by the time they've paid for Netflix, Prime Video, Broadband etc. they're paying pretty much exactly the same if not more than if they'd just stuck with cable TV

Yes because I wouldn't buy internet if I wasn't watching Netflix? Get out of here with that nonsense. I can get prime and Netflix and get everything I want for much less than cable. Also I have never liked watching cable for obvious reasons like having to watch tv shows at certain times rather than whenever I want. 

[Christophe Corazza]

So in order to compete with a worldwide service like Netflix, Walmart is going to focus on the least populated parts of the US and somehow compete on subscriber growth?

 

Let me know how that works out.

[Peter S]

I think, offering a lower price cost compared to Amazon and Netflix is somehow Walmart's company tactics. I think they are planning to establish first their subscribers. But, the competition is also about the services offered by the streaming sites so, Walmart must meet or surpass the viewers expectations to catch-up to the popular streaming services available nowadays.