Could separating local TV content from network-affiliate content be a thing going forward? Put on your imagination AI headset to find out.
This concerns the recent decision by the CBS Affiliate
board to reject a deal that CBS made with Fubo TV, a virtual pay TV provider. Weeks later, it was revealed that Sinclair-owned stations -- ABC affiliates -- didn't like the deal Disney made with its
in-house virtual pay TV provider, Hulu.
In both cases, the threat (alternative?) of both TV network groups that came through offering a "national feed" to those virtual pay TV providers was
tempting -- a slate that includes prime-time entertainment, early morning news shows, afternoon soaps, late-night TV, and, of course, the big NFL package of games that pull in major viewership.
So where does that leave TV stations going forward if they see smaller carriage, retransmission fees and revenues from virtual pay TV?
Can they really go out on their own and just make
deals for themselves?
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It doesn't seem so -- especially if their TV networks group makes separate deals without them -- retransmission deals that include their owned TV stations, which run all
their content.
What network affiliates will have left to consider is what their ever-expanding local TV news content means to virtual pay TV platforms -- and to a lesser extent,
entertainment/unscripted TV content they buy in the syndication market or that they produced themselves.
TV networks always say TV affiliates have a choice: let us negotiate your
carriage/retransmission deals -- or go on your own.
The problem is that going on your own means less negotiation weight that a network can bring, with some 200 affiliates.
So are local
TV stations in a bind when it comes to increasing the increasingly more challenging linear TV business based on traditional pay TV platforms -- cable, satellite, and telco -- as well as getting new
virtual pay TV providers (YouTube TV, Hulu + LIve TV, and Sling to name a few) to sign on?
On Monday, Nexstar Media Group -- the largest U.S. TV station group -- renewed a deal with YouTube TV
for 59 of its TV stations. (Overall, Nexstar owns or partners with 200 stations in 116 U.S. markets.)
At the same time, there is somewhat of change in the air. Remember that local TV stations
bring a lot of value when it comes to on-air promotion of TV networks. It is a partnership that has endured.
Still, the future is coming -- and it may already be here, according to some.
Should local TV stations just own up to the prospect that the future is no longer anything related to “over the air” signals -- that everything is just a streaming app?
Like the
regional sports networks, TV stations may need to focus on the last stage of their ongoing anguish: acceptance.