The slow death of Peacock?

[Anonymous]

There has been no new shows added to Peacock since the start of the year when expiry dates for shows was brought foreward to 31 December 2022. 

Is Peacock dying a slow, bitter, painful death across UK, Ireland, Germany and Italy? Is Sky Showtime going to launch in its place?

What do you think will happen?

https://rxtvinfo.com/2023/no-new-shows-doubts-over-uk-future-of-peacock/

[xenon81]

Sky Showtime is for countries that don't have Sky or Paramount+. Everything on it is available directly from Sky and Paramount+ here.

I think Peacock will be phased out in Europe and anything worthwhile will be available through the relevant Sky channel (Comedy, Crime, Sci Fi etc.).

[TimmyBGood]

---

@Anonymous wrote:

Is Peacock dying a slow, bitter, painful death across UK, Ireland, Germany and Italy? Is Sky Showtime going to launch in its place?

---

I thought Showtime was only launching in territories without current Sky presence, as a Sky-branded in-app streaming service.  Presumably Comcast won't want it anywhere they think they can make more money from satellite or Glass/Stream hardware (and where they have expended considerable resources to become a regulated broadcaster)

[TimmyBGood]

---

@xenon81 wrote:

I think Peacock will be phased out in Europe and anything worthwhile will be available through the relevant Sky channel (Comedy, Crime, Sci Fi etc.).

---

It always looked like an uncomfortable corporate bodge rather than an actual strategy to me: Comcast has taken a write-down of over eight billion dollars on the Sky acquisition price, and bundling a cut-down version of Peacock for Sky subscribers (apparently without sufficient long-term content rights) may just have been a stop-gap attempt to demonstrate the claimed synergies actually exist.

[redsky88]

Increasingly it was very hard to see what the point was of Peacock. It just diluted Sky content and made it more of an effort to find. I think perhaps Sky wanted to diffuse some of the Disney content loss with an appearance of offering a free streaming service. to users. 

At this stage it would be no loss to just close it. 

[Timelord2018]

---

@redsky88 wrote:

Increasingly it was very hard to see what the point was of Peacock. It just diluted Sky content and made it more of an effort to find. I think perhaps Sky wanted to diffuse some of the Disney content loss with an appearance of offering a free streaming service. to users. 

At this stage it would be no loss to just close it. 

---

It wasn't going to launch in Sky territories in first place 

Shell added the international rollout for Peacock will avoid major markets like the U.K., Germany and Italy where Comcast parent NBCUniversal has a major presence with Sky.

“Peacock is a product we will use selectively in markets,” he told investors, as the AVOD’s programming will still land on Sky in the U.K. market.

---

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/peacock-hits-26m-sign-ups-says-nbcuniversal...

Guess Sky thought it would look good to offer a a free 'streaming service'

[Timelord2018]

I see my post , link and Quote saying it wasn't going to launch in first place (in Sky territories) has been removed,...

[SKY1992bf]

---

@Timelord2018 wrote:

I see my post , link and Quote saying it wasn't going to launch in first place (in Sky territories) has been removed,...

---

@Timelord2018  Most likely the dreaded spam filter caught it, it'll likely get reinstated at some point in time 

[nolte]

I felt that rxtv article is just reading posts from this forum as the basis for the article,  for example

https://helpforum.sky.com/t5/What-s-On/Peacock-series-disappeared-halfway-through/td-p/4204102

https://helpforum.sky.com/t5/What-s-On/Peacock-programs-disappeared/td-p/4215538

Personally, I'd say this is effect of not a great pick up of interest in the programmes that were uploaded to peacock. Felt a bit stashed away and hidden.

With comcast losses on peacock,  if it ain't earning hidden on sky, see where it is most profitable to make available 

[Plektrum]

It likely never helped that there seemed to be an inconsistent idea about whether it was launch in the first place...

It was originally announced as coming to Sky - https://www.reuters.com/article/us-nbcuniversal-streaming-idUSKCN1P82E9

Then when it was formally launched Sky was nowhere to be seen -  nbcuniversal-unveils-peacock-free-premium-ad-supported-streaming-service-subscription

Then the NBCU Boss doubled down on that saying Peacock would avoid Sky markets - peacock-hits-26m-sign-ups-says-nbcuniversal-ceo-4101678

So seeing Sky quietly wind it down doesnt suprise me - my guess is that it was likely launched as a way of appealing to Wall St that it was an expanding concern until Wall St pivoted and now seem more bothered about revenue than the number of subscribers... the fact NBCU went ahead and signed a couple of output deals in Australia rather than launching a product seems to indicate there is little appetite to expand the platform outside of the domestic market... which may not be a bad thing as it then opens up Peacock to be a lot more dynamic with their US proposition rather than have some identikit global strategy. If so, does it still serve a purpose when the Sky brand is being contunuously leant on for European operations? 

I guess what now remains to be seen is what happens with the NBCU owned programming... given that NBCU are not wedded to picking up all of Sky's original stuff makes me think it'll be much the same here... unless we're about to be surprised and see a standalone Peacock in some form, I expect we see more Sky/Peacock joint titles and Sky just selectively picking up the original stuff that makes strategic sense for them. 

[StargazerUK1984]

Peacock when first announced I was looking forward to it and finally getting universal's catalogue of titles under on roof. 

Then it was announced for sky and my first thoughts was more along the lines of this is just dead on arrival and not last long. It was limited and while I was hoping I was wrong about its DOA and it grow the amount of content over time but in my eyes it's sky and it's bound to be just handled badly.

I hate being right but besides the forums on very rare occasions no one really mentioned peacock and when it launched on sky it was DOA from day one. First no 5.1 audio on peacock content which was odd for sky, Second nothing in 4K HDR and little to no back catalogue which was just a joke.

I really just wish they done an app and done a proper launch with proper 23.976fps streaming 4K HDR and 5.1 or atmos. Trust this to be really screwed up by sky. I hope they reconsider and do a proper app and launch properly in the UK at least.

My next biggest worry is that Paramount+ not improving and following what happened in other countries and Comcast and Paramount coming to a deal to expand sky showtime. If sky showtime becomes a hit I am worried they might look to expand it and we might get it over here which I don't want sky anywhere near handling content as they can't get the right fps.

[RoisAN]

I only have a very small selection of programmes available on Peacock, how can I change this

[nigea99]

hi @RoisAN 

Nothing you can do - it does seem in decline at the moment.

Probably worth reading this:

https://helpforum.sky.com/t5/What-s-On/The-slow-death-of-Peacock/m-p/4217052

[RobertS83]

So apparently Peacock is going nowhere and the content will be evolving 

https://rxtvinfo.com/2023/sky-clarifies-future-of-peacock/

Sky Glass
Sky Broadband Ultra Fast 1
General Tech Geek

[Timelord2018]

Sky says that Peacock’s content “will continue to evolve … as we curate what we know our customers love including Bel-Air, Below Deck, The Office and many more world-class original and iconic TV shows from NBCUniversal.”

---

Sounds like the stock response Sky viewing relations gave , Below Deck leaves the service next month (its available on Hayu) and The Office is duplicated on Sky Comedy.