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| This week on TechHive: Disney+ and Netflix couldn’t differ more |
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| Disney appeared to drop a bomb on Netflix this week by announcing a $13-per-month bundle for all its streaming services. When it launches on November 12, the package will include Disney+, Hulu, and ESPN+, all for the same price as Netflix’s most popular plan. (Disney+ will cost $7 per month on its own, while Hulu and ESPN+ will be priced at $6 per month and $5 per month respectively if purchased separately.)
Reporters and analysts quickly cast the Disney+ bundle as an assault on Netflix, which makes sense on some level. No two companies quite capture the clash between old and new media like Disney versus Netflix, and both companies will be competing for precious time and money in the age of cord-cutting.
Lost in the rivalry narrative, however, is that Disney+ and Netflix will have little in common. From pricing and packaging to advertising and the content itself, the two companies are taking opposite approaches to almost every aspect of streaming video. Read the full column on TechHive. |
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| Weekly rewind |
| CBS All Access gets kid-friendly: CBS may be feeling the pressure from the likes of Netflix and Disney, as it’s announced plans to bring children’s programming to its $6 per month All Access service. Starting in late 2019, the service will include more than 1,000 episodes of classic kids shows, including Inspector Gadget, Madeline, and Heathcliff. CBS is also promising original series, including a new seasons of Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs and the remade Danger Mouse. Realistically, it’s hard to imagine parents choosing this over Disney+, but perhaps it’ll add a bit more staying power for those who are already subscribing to CBS All Access for other shows (like the forthcoming Star Trek: Picard).
Plex’s new look: Plex is rolling out an overhaul to its apps on TV devices, with a customizable sidebar for switching between media types and tabs for quickly switching between recommendations and your full library. More importantly, the new design brings some much-needed consistency to Plex’s apps, which in past have varied from one platform to the next. If you’re using Plex as a media server or for over-the-air DVR, you can now move between Roku, Fire TV, Apple TV, and Android TV without having to learn a new interface on each device.
In related news, Plex and Nvidia appear to have fixed a longstanding issue with hardware transcoding when using Nvidia’s Shield TV streaming box as a media server. Just in time for rumors of new Shield TV hardware.
YouTube on all Fire TV devices: After getting an official YouTube app on newer Fire TV devices last month, Amazon has rolled it out to all devices, including the first-generation Fire TV Stick and all Fire TV boxes. That means you no longer have to use a web browser as a workaround.
Amazon also extended its handy “announcements” feature to Fire TV devices this week. If you have an Amazon Echo speaker elsewhere in the home, you can say, “Alexa, announce [your message],” and it’ll broadcast to other Echo speakers and Fire TV devices around the house. You can also broadcast messages from the Fire TV to your other Alexa devices. |
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| Save more money |
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| For today only, Channel Master’s Stream+ DVR is on sale for $94 when you use the code PUNT at checkout. That’s $55 off the regular price. Plug in an external USB hard drive and antenna, and you can record over-the-air channels with no subscription fees.
As noted in my review, the Stream+ has some big limitations. It only works with a single television, its recording capabilities are somewhat basic, and as a streaming device it’s missing support for Netflix and Amazon Prime. Still, it’s a fairly inexpensive way to watch and record over-the-air channels in their native broadcast quality, especially at this price. |
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| If you want to support my work and become more tech-savvy along the way, check out Advisorator, my other newsletter that’s focused on tech advice beyond cord-cutting. The latest issue has tips on bringing sanity back to your inbox, news on the latest smart speaker scandals, and a more polite way to share web links. I’ll be glad to send it your way as part of a free trial. |
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| Thanks for reading! |
| Now that I’m following my own advice on email management (see above), I should do a much better job staying on top of all your wonderful emails! Please keep the feedback, story ideas, and questions coming by replying to this email.
Also: I’ve started hearing some horror stories (including one here) about folks getting the runaround from DirecTV and Dish Network when trying to cancel or adjust their satellite TV packages. If this has happened to you, I’d love to hear from you. And if you’re planning to cancel, consider recording the call (with disclosure, if your state requires two-party consent) for evidence if things go sideways.
Until next week,
Jared |
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