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Comment by dgritsko | Hacker News Reader

I'm really curious as to what Apple's broader strategy is with live sports, since that's typically been one of the last big reasons to keep a cable subscription. However, given that Apple TV Plus is going to have at least some MLB games[1] and is rumored to possibly be the new home for the NFL Sunday Ticket[2], they could be seeking to make it the must-have subscription for fans of live sports.

https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2022/03/apple-and-mlb-announc...

https://www.tomsguide.com/news/apple-tv-plus-could-become-ho...

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There is a lot i don't understand about how they view things in Cupertino.

I mean, there must be a lot of people at Apple thinking about the future - what it will look like, how media is consumed and then again how Apple can own that pipeline and ecosystem.

Both on the media side, hardware side and software side the offering is lacking in ways i find very strange coming from Apple.

For instance why haven't Apple just gotten the internet broadcast rights to a lot of sports to build a moat around it - not because it is popular but because they can. With Apples finances they could also get alot of popular sports on Apple TV as well.

Why didn't Apple buy any movie studios to kickstart Apple TV and get a big catalogue from the get go - seems like a no brainer.

Apple does a lot of stuff right, but there are more than a few areas where they fail to really provide value.

>For instance why haven't Apple just gotten the internet broadcast right to a lot of sports to build a moat around it -

It is possible that they want all or nothing rights. There are a ton of complicated rules by NHL/MLB/NFL/NBA on blackout games, parceling out different games to different broadcasters in different areas, and then of course, different broadcasters by country. All with different contract expiry dates.

I will not pay for sports until the sports organizations make it easy to find everything (within their sports org) in one place.

I think this is the key - Apple is painfully famous for "it may be expensive, but it's really simple" - iTunes music was the same way. They want you to not have to think about it at all, so they want all or nothing (the all, of course, being available for a Price).

Yes, I think blackouts are sticking point for Apple because it is a terrible user experience. Their MLB Friday games are not subject to blackout rules, which is different from the MLB app experience.

Sports are an interesting approach for Apple, but in a way it makes sense as it is an area that has the opportunity to be disrupted. People loves sports but the consumption of sports can be a frustrating experience. Many leagues still do not have a good streaming experience and the leagues that do, such as MLB, are subject to blackout rules. If Apple can cut through the red tape to eliminate blackout rules and create a white-labeled app experience for sports leagues it might be lucrative for Apple and beneficial to the league and their fans.

A lot of those rights are already bought up, in some sports. I suspect Apple will need to wait til those contracts expire, no matter how much they are willing to spend.

As for Apple TV+, no, it's not a no-brainer. The approach they took was to sign up a lot of creative talent, instead, and make their own content. That's already been a proven success, so it's hard to say that a diametrically-opposed approach (which is kind of lame and would not even result in any new content) was a "no-brainer".

> For instance why haven't Apple just gotten the internet broadcast rights to a lot of sports to build a moat around it - not because it is popular but because they can. With Apples finances they could also get alot of popular sports on Apple TV as well

Because it's not in the interest of those sports leagues to kill off their viewing audiences. The average person who has cable has ESPN channels as part of their basic cable package. You don't even NEED cable to watch a lot of sports because terrestrial television has sports on constantly. The NFL realized a long time ago that there is a niche market for those who want a sheer firehose of content... but the vast majority will not directly pay for it. Sports fans will just find something else to occupy their time with.

Also, in many cities the sports teams also own the channel that the games air on.

A team isn't going to yank its own games off of its own channel without a very good reason.

There is a lot of latent demand for people who just want to simply stream a game without having to pirate it or get worked around by the leagues. Most people I know today do it on illegal streams or share an mlb/nfl password with everyone they possibly know. Imagine if you monetized that market. The leagues are clearly too petty and incompetent to do it right, but Apple could make it really user friendly.

it's likely a loss leader strategy to get subscription numbers up. the long term goal is to replace cable... with cable-like appletv+. they're not expanding the pie, but rather fighting to capture existing pie, particularly against netflix & amazon, who they see as more direct competitors than traditional media companies. apple likes lives sports because there's no fan base to build up, and they get to just be a distributor (similar to music) rather than a content creator (which is a harder and riskier business). they don't like giving up editorial control, but they need the subscriber base.

frankly, i'm not a fan of this strategy as there's no synergy between the computing and content businesses, but apple has fallen for the relentless march to grow at all costs, and sees content as low-hanging fruit for them (again, i disagree with this assessment).

apple home, car, glasses, etc. make much more sense, but those are too slow growing for both professional and unprofessional investors alike.

Apple isn’t paying for rights to MLS to be part of AppleTV+. The exclusive deal is for the MLS to have their own “channel” that you subscribe to separately that you can only buy through the AppleTV app.

right, they want to draw people to the appletv app and entice them to subscribe to appletv+, via, for example, a tie-in with "ted lasso". in any case, they'd most certainly roll up those mls subscriptions into total subscriber numbers in any investor relations as "proof" of their strategy.

It also gives them a compelling way to tier their service & grow revenue from existing subscribers.

From this perspective, something like Sunday Ticket makes a lot of sense even with the hefty price tag, so long as they’re allowed to parcel out those games as they’d like.

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