If the goal is make money then it seems like having one of the weakest streaming services around is not a great way to do it, a lot of people think it's just a big money pit:
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.fo...1/27/its-time-for-apple-to-kill-apple-tv/amp/
Now you argue that it's their money to burn, but if it's going to be anything but a money pit, they would need to mount a better effort then what they have done so far. Frankly there is only one show that sounds even remotely appealing to me on that service and one show is not enough for me to sign up for a service and I think a lot of people feel the same way.
I think ViacomCBS could be seen as an easy take over target during the streaming wars, not that I am saying it should be taken over, more competition is better than less, but that is not the direction the entertainment market is going.
Okay, this has gotten kind of stupid now...
Apple is the most valuable company in the history of the known universe... with a streaming service that is not nearly as popular as the biggest streaming services. Therefore, streaming services is obviously not that huge of a deal to them. Otherwise they would rectify that situation really quickly by buying whatever is available. Because there's really smart people at Apple who know how to make a tremendous amount of money. (And that's largely through insanely huge markups on their hardware.)
Also, they only charge $4.99 a month for Apple TV+. So again, it's obviously not that huge of a deal to them, because next to nothing from Apple is that inexpensive. So it's just a service that they offer. And it's part of my
Apple One plan and I don't even think about it's cost, because again it's only $4.99 a month. And I'm on the Premier plan, so it's actually less than $4.99 a month; and so I ultimately don't even notice the cost.
Also, if Apple get a hit show or two out of it, fine. And if not, obviously "oh well." And if streaming was a huge deal to Apple, then Apple being Apple, Apple TV+ would be $19.99 a month or $24.99 a month, or something like that. And they'd be rivaling Amazon in spending. Like Amazon reportedly spending over a half a billion dollars on their
Lord of the Rings series, Apple likewise would be spending a similar insane amount of money on some property that they bought the rights to. But obviously they're not doing that because it ain't that important to them.
If they bought ViacomCBS, they'd be the most valuable company in the history of the known universe. And if they didn't buy ViacomCBS, they'd still be the most valuable company in the history of the known universe. So it makes no difference to them, and they obviously have a different business strategy than buying nearly century-old media companies.
Granted, their strategy of creating the content themselves may not work, and if Apple TV+ fails because of that, then they'll obviously just do something else (like make an electric self-driving car or something).
No, but buying ViacomCBS won't change anything anyway, because that back catalog is only going to go so far, you still have to constantly create new content. Because that's exactly what ViacomCBS is doing, constantly creating new content. So why buy them? You still have to make new content with what you bought, so save the money on buying them and create your own stuff with the money that you would have spent.
Star Trek is I guess a somewhat valuable IP, but obviously not that valuable to Apple and their overall business strategy, otherwise they would already own it. And I can't imagine much of anything else at ViacomCBS is worth it to them either.
Of course, who knows, Apple may turn around next month or whenever and buy ViacomCBS.
It's highly doubtful, but they might.
I remember when Apple bought Beats Electronics back in 2015 for $3 billion dollars and how weird of a thing it was, because what were they going to do with Beats headphones? Obviously they were getting into the music streaming business, and took Beats' streaming service and turned it into Apple Music. Last year I believe Apple Music made Apple $4.1 billion dollars, which was less than 8% of Apple's services revenue; and not their overall revenue, but just their services revenue.
When it comes to the movie and TV streaming business they're obviously taking a somewhat different course of action. Again, they're just going to make the content themselves... which of course is what everyone is doing now. So I imagine they have no desire to buy anyone else.
Or yes, I guess Apple could buy ViacomCBS, and Star Trek along with it, and do like they did with Beats and try and turn it into a moneymaker for them. Is it worth it though? Because you buy Star Trek and then what are you going to do with it? Make new content. What kind of new content though? Something that appeals to the old fans? Or just forget about them and make new stuff for a new audience?
Apple being Apple they would almost unquestionably do the latter. Because they would be buying Star Trek in order to grow their streaming service.
So again, is it worth it? Is Star Trek that valuable of an IP? And if it is, then why didn't Apple buy it when they started Apple TV+?
Ultimately though of course we'll know when streaming becomes important to Apple. Because they'll charge $19.99 a month for it when it becomes important to them. And they'll buy whatever hugely popular IP is available and make insanely expensive shows with it.
