How Stay-at-Home Orders Supercharged Streaming’s TV Takeover

How COVID Changed Hollywood Special Report: “No one really cares that much anymore about the traditional bundle. It has already been written off for dead,” one analyst says

When Disney+ launched in 2019, even the most optimistic person in the Magic Kingdom would have not have predicted its subscriber count would be in the triple digits before its 18-month birthday. But with the pandemic keeping everyone at home, streaming turbocharged its takeover of the entertainment business.

Streaming’s swallowing of the pay-TV bundle is irreversible and will continue to change a business model that has endured for decades.

“The pivot to streaming and increasing investments by traditional media companies to put their best content on their own services is one clear lasting impact,” MoffettNathanson analyst Michael Nathanson told TheWrap. “This will likely accelerate cord-cutting, create more fragmentation, create new gate-keepers, destroy the entertainment cable network model and hurt theatrical attendance forever.”

Amid stay-at-home orders that dovetailed with declining TV production and the debut of streaming services like Peacock and HBO Max […]

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