• by Wayne Friedman , Staff Writer, August 23, 2021

Disneyland wants to charge $20 extra for those that might want to skip lines at its theme parks, according to one report. Does this kind of premium for quicker access to top level entertainment/media sound familiar?

We are not talking skipping lines at Disneyland. We are talking quicker access of big theatrical movies on streaming platforms.

Since it started 18 months ago, Disney+ was priced at a low $6.99 a month. (It is now at $7.99 a month). At the same time, Disney has tempted consumers with the idea of getting big theatrical movies at home on the same day those movies are available in cinemas.

For an extra $30, under its Disney+ Premier Access service, you can skip lines at movie theaters for “Black Widow,” “Cruella” and others.

TV Watch believes Disneyland will have some restrictions/limitations, as well. One can get to skip lines at Disneyland using an app called the Disney Genie+. Ah hah! It’s always about the “plus.”

This isn’t to say other media platforms don’t have their own form of cutting in line for their TV-video platforms. This is true when it comes to ad-supported CTV options, limited ad-supported and no-ad options.

They are just another form of cutting the line. In this case, cutting out the advertising to get to the actual TV and movie content quicker.

To be fair, and to encourage higher CTV consumer behavior, many legacy TV companies already offer ad-supported options with modest ad loads of around four-to-five minutes a hour. That is significantly lower than the 13 to 17 minutes per hour of ads, on-air promos, PSAs, and other non-programming content run on linear TV networks.

One wonders if this might be a future trend for other media and entertainment.
Me? I’d pay to skip advertising — as well as the boring bits of any one-hour drama that doesn’t cut to the chase.

Perhaps that really means I can be the editor/producer of some content, getting it just the way I like.

With so much content out there, good and bad, it only makes sense. Which will give many TV producers/writers nervous breakdowns. What would be the "premium" price tag of that access?