SYRACUSE, N.Y. (NCC News) – Settling down with the whole family to watch a Disney movie or getting together with your friends to watch the latest ESPN 30 for 30 documentary will soon become much more difficult.
Disney announced last week that it’ll be launching its own streaming service this fall called Disney Plus. The new service will become the exclusive home for all content owned by Disney.
The service will cost consumers $6.99 a month, which is less expensive than Netflix’s price of $8.99 a month.
All Disney content will be removed from Netflix as a result of the launch. This will leave consumers with a choice: either stop paying for Netflix or shell out the money for both services.
Syracuse University professor Ed Hersh said the trend of companies launching streaming services for their content is changing the industry.
“All the big media companies are now competing with each other for your $5.99 a month,” Hersh said. “And how quickly will that $9.99 or $7.99 [add up]?”
He continued, “Because the big deal is you can no longer get everything you want from one service anymore.”
This is especially critical since consumers won’t be able to find the content for multiple different companies all in one place, as they could on Netflix previously.
“Now you can’t just get one cable bill and watch all these different channels, you’re going to have to decide, ” Hersh said. “Maybe if you’re a family with little kids, so Disney Plus is going to be really really valuable.”
Depending on Disney Plus’ success, other companies may consider copying Disney’s streaming model, Hersh said. He added that Discovery and Time Warner Cable are already in the process of launching their own services in the coming future.
“So, this is really in uncharted territory,” Hersh said. “How many of these different services are going to be able to survive and thrive in this new environment before, just like cable, people go ‘wait a minute, I don’t need all that stuff. ’”
Hersh said it will be some time before consumers reach that point, but once there, the industry will reach another critical point.
