Best known for its apps serving up locally-stored media, Plex is reportedly jumping into the world of ad-supported movies, as well as selling subscriptions to outside services.
For the new content, the company may be building off a recent partnership with Tidal, allowing people to pay $9.99 per month for a bundle including both Plex Pass and Tidal's music catalog. New transaction functions had to be built for the arrangement.
The company is "in discussions with rights holders and content providers," according to a recent report by TechCrunch. Plex users can already stream online news, podcasts, and Web shows, but these are all free.
Roku has enjoyed some success with the Roku Channel, an app exclusive to its platform with a small selection of ad-funded movies. The approach attracted the attention of YouTube, which recently began emulating the formula.
Amazon helped pioneer selling third-party subscriptions with Channels, which lets Prime members add subscriptions to networks like HBO and Cinemax. The advantage is the ability to get on-demand content from multiple services within Prime Video, instead of having to switch apps to find a particular show or movie.
Apple is rumored to be working on its own equivalent of Channels as a companion to over $1 billion in original movies and TV shows. Combined with hardware sales, outside subscriptions could help pay for the costs of the original content and pave the way for a paid first-party service, though Apple is allegedly searching for "tent pole" shows that would draw in the public, much like "Game of Thrones" on HBO or "Stranger Things" on Netflix.
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15 Comments
Plex is near enough the only reason I use my AppleTV, its great. Auto processing of TV shows and movies and on the fly re-encoding to the correct format. Apple's "computers" app is crap. It needs exactly the right format and needs iTunes running all the time on an awake computer. Bonjour sleep proxy doesn't work reliably with iTunes or the computers app either. It'll be interesting to see Plex's TV offerings, if they ever come to the UK.
Apple's current stance is that they're only going for family-oriented politically correct shows, which might be nice for some, but won't be quite the revered "tentpole" that the likes of Game of Thrones, Walking Dead and Orange is the New Black are.
Plex yes, ads in any form - no.
Seems everyone is determined to push ads in your face. I see ads as the scourge of our time, from “naming rights” to in app advertising. Even PBS which gets tax money and billions in tax exempt donations in the form of memberships, pushes “enhanced” underwriting- code for advertising.
There is no free lunch and I do not mind paying for ad free content. I do not want to pay for content and be served ads.