I miss the good old days of the WWE Network, where it was a giant hub of everything in the WWE bubble with the pay-per-views, NXT (before it went to USA Network), tons of documentaries (like WWE 365) and original programming (like Ride Along and Legends House).
Ever since WWE switched over to licensing its content to Peacock, things have gone downhill. And now, with Comcast's latest announcement of changes to the platform, we're in store for yet another downgrade.
To quickly recap, Peacock launched in 2020. In 2021, WWE decided to move its content over there, and immediately, we were hit with one of the first major problems: not everything was going to be included.
It was announced that they'd have everything up and running by SummerSlam (MONTHS down the line), but in the meantime, people were paying for a fraction of what they used to get. And that doesn't just mean the content itself, but things like the live stream not functioning correctly with rewind/live capabilities.
Eventually, most of the content was posted on Peacock, but you'd also never be able to tell, since here we are 2 years later and the organization system is still horrific. If you want to search for the 1999 Royal Rumble, you can't just type "Royal Rumble 1999" or "1999 Royal Rumble" or anything along those lines. You have to go to the Royal Rumble series, then, since everything is labeled as a season for some reason instead of the year, you need to count up from the first (and you need to know what year that happened) to scroll up to the one you want.
Problems like this and so much more (like how they didn't have NXT UK up on time for something like a full year, and I seemed to be the only person in the entire United States who would help Peacock try to figure out what they were doing wrong #TonyFixesAmerica) and WWE no longer producing ANY content anymore beyond the bare minimum pay-per-views, has really made it not worthwhile to subscribe.
The only reason you'd want to have Peacock is if you wanted the service for something else on top of it, like to watch The Office.
But hey, you get it at a discount if you're an Xfinity customer. So that's nice. I'm only paying around $5 a month for the Peacock Premium Plus (instead of $10) because Peacock Premium (the $5 tier with access to all content, but with advertisements) comes bundled with my service.
Well, not anymore—and this is where I throw my hands up in frustration.
You see, last month, Peacock nixed their entirely free tier, which only gave you access to some things and had advertisements on it. Ultimately, their strategy was obviously to try to get people to sign up, check out the content, feel frustrated that they couldn't get access to more things and that they didn't want to see the ads, and then, they'd upgrade to the other tiers. Then, a good number of people would just bake this into their monthly subscription costs and forget about it.
You might laugh at that last bit, but it is true. Research from different sources have numbers ranging from 42% to 51% or more sign up for a free trial and then forget to cancel. They can be spending an average of $133 dollars per month on forgotten subscriptions. This has gotten so bad that there's a market out there for apps to track and manage your subscriptions.
But now, Comcast is also going to stop bundling Peacock Premium in for their subscribers for free.
Starting April 3, new Xfinity customers will be eligible to get 6 months of Peacock Premium free, and then, have a discounted rate after that. Current customers are going to see that starting June 26, they'll be forced to purchase a subscription to Peacock Premium (or Peacock Premium Plus) as an add-on at a discounted rate—at a price point that hasn't been announced yet. Conveniently. My guess is this either is going to come out that the $5 and $10 tiers have been upcharged, and it will be $10 for the ad-supported tier, and $15 or even $20 for the Peacock Premium Plus situation, and they're going to "discount" customers to make it $15 so they still try to pull the wool over your eyes by making you think you're getting a deal, when in actuality, you're paying $10 more per month than you were when you got it for the $5 difference.
Frankly, the only reason I have Peacock at all is because of the WWE "premium live events" (I hate that phrasing). And while $10-$15 is still cheaper than the $50 price tags pay-per-views used to cost (and still do with AEW), it is becoming increasingly harder to justify the cost.
That is in part due to how Peacock can't even be viewed outside of the United States. At all. You try to log in and it will tell you that this content is not available in your location and you're screwed.
Unless you're using a VPN, I'd assume. That is, if you aren't already using something like a VPN to log in to the proper WWE Network instead of Peacock, as is. And that is another point to talk about.
These companies don't realize that money is tight for everyone these days. Wages aren't equal to inflation, and the less people make enough money to pay for the things they need, the less they're able to spend on frivolous stuff.
That is why you get situations like movie theaters trying out this AMC Sightline nonsense to bleed every dime out of their most loyal fan base, rather than to just address the issue that "people cannot afford to spend $25 to go see a movie sometimes even once a month, let alone to buy concessions on top of that."
Companies just look at numbers. They think they have x amount of customers, and if they bump up the price, they'll lose "a few" people, but everyone else who sticks around will not only counterbalance that and make up for the losses, but they'll make more money overall. And that'll please stockholders. And that's all that matters for this quarter. Then, a year or two later, they're hemorrhaging money, and they go out of business, because gradually, people decided not to waste their income.
Upping the price of Peacock and Disney+ and such, companies like Netflix trying to bully people into no longer sharing their passwords, and simultaneously downgrading their content (like Kevin Feige saying the Marvel Cinematic Universe is going to scale back on Disney+ content) isn't going to lead to growth. You're giving people LESS for a HIGHER COST and expecting them to be okay with it?
Mark my words. The streaming bubble is bursting way faster than cable and not learning any of the lessons from that disaster. Because what people want is more content, better content, easier access, and at a price they think it is worth it. And when they don't get it, guess what they do. Piracy.
I guarantee more people will be watching WWE pay-per-views through illegal online streaming methods or by sharing each other's passwords or some other $0 costs after this Peacock switch than they were beforehand.
You're not going to convince me that it is a good deal or an upgrade to pay more money to receive less content. $5 for Peacock Premium Plus was a worthwhile enough exchange in comparison to the downgraded search structure and the absolute plummet of original content. But if you want me to pay the same price as what I paid before for the WWE Network (or MORE money), and you can't even give me access to watch that "Superfan: The Story of Vladimir" documentary you already finished and just don't want to release?
Forget about it.
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