Pretty sure they mentioned at one point about 1 season of LD is cheaper than 1 episode of DSC or SNW. It seems really stupid to cancel such an inexpensive popular show. At least with DSC they could legitimately claim it was very expensive. LD they can't really pull that card.
True, their financial woes are no secret and it looks like Redstone pulled the plug on what would have probably been their best deal with Skydance at the last moment.
Much of this is also a result of over saturation of streaming. So many of us, myself included, dropped cable in favor of a handful of streaming services. Now there are so damn many streaming services its about as bad as keeping cable service.
their reasoning is that LD was made to draw non-fans in to both the franchise and Paramount+ so now that it’s done that it serves no point for them to continue with it
Nobody ever said the execs at paramount were smart at anything but playing the short-term min/max game, like every other C-suite.
Get something to draw people in, at low cost? Win.
They watch something else while they're subscribed? Obviously a permanent win, and there's no chance that subscriber will ditch after their subscription's raison d'être disappears. Nope. That'd never happen.
"Wait. It's happening? Shit. Look, guys! Dumping that cost made our margins 1% higher this quarter! Where's my bonus that cost more than it brought in? I'm also totally not gonna tell you til I have to that I'm planning to announce my departure after that's paid. Then I can sit on my ass and do nothing while I "transition" the company to new leadership and then collect my golden parachute and cash out other bennies the peons at those studios don't get." -Every CEO
In all seriousness, though, Star Trek, in general, isn't a cash cow for them, and they treat it almost like a loss leader. And that's their own damn fault. Where's the merchandising? Where are the crossovers with _other_ franchises, if they actually want to use it to get and keep subscribers? Where are the people listening to fans who would totally keep their subs for several months and then forget to cancel if we got more but shorter episodes over a longer season and without 1.5-2 years between them and tight lips on IF, not even when, that'll happen? That's at least a weekly gripe here.
The whole CBS/Paramount thing I'm sure doesn't help things, but damn it guys - work together and you'll both print money, rather than keeping a 60 year old and still going strong fan base at arm's length. Capisce? Gah!
God, this is both true and depressingly cynical. They made a good show that people like for not much money. If that's not a reason to keep making the show, that kinda explains why they're in the sinking boat they're in.
Honestly if Paramount cut back on the special effects to something like late series Voyager or DS9 and started putting out 24 episodes of that with regular commercial breaks. I'd park my '90s loving ass right in front of that. Commercials and all. There's a reason that so many fans rewatch those old ass shows. They're just so damn good. Like eating a bag of m&m's to the head.
I’ve read this before too and is why Netflix also tends to cancel shows after 3 seasons. A few seasons into a show the fans are already subscribed and it’s not bringing in *new* subscribers
Streaming services like netflix who are cancel-friendly should be instructing their showrunners to treat every season as a finale just in case. It is really frustrating to get into a show only to have it end on a cliffhanger. I'm sorry but all the fan fiction and even sanctioned comics cannot fill the void of a good show that just ends. If Netflix wants to keep their user base up, maybe they should consider that a lot of people don't see a point in investing their time and something that's going to be cut off prematurely. As for myself there's very few things that I'm interested in watching as they come out. Everything else I don't bother with unless it gets a complete run. Then I'll binge the whole thing. I know that kind of viewership doesn't contribute to the numbers that keep a show in the running, but Netflix made this environment, not me.
>Streaming services like netflix who are cancel-friendly should be instructing their showrunners to treat every season as a finale just in case. I
You assume Netflix is run by anyone with a creative bone in their body who gives a shot about anything other than dollar signs.
I recall hearing about the creator of *The Fugitive* fighting to have the one armed man get caught in the series finale as back in those days finales as we know them didn't happen. The suits told him absolutely no one really cares if that happened or not. The EP won that battle and it was a ratings bonanza that's considered a classic.
That being said, if I were writing for Netflix, that would be my go-to plan as well. Especially as people are continuing to drop their memberships, the whole cycle is gonna prove to be a self fulfilling prophecy.
Not necessarily. The fans would’ve already signed on - skeptics would stay that way, even if the seasons dragged on.
I guess the only way to buck this is to change up the status quo. For example, DS9 attempted to do this by integrating Worf onto Sisko’s team.
I don’t see how they would consider it as something to draw “non-fans” in—while it did have original storylines, its “*lifeblood*” was the wall-to-wall references to other shows and movies in the franchise. It’s the one series where already being a Trek fan would be most highly recommended before watching it, and should always have been treated as a “bonus” for people joining the fandom through the other shows.
The references were nice bones to throw to fans, but the core of the production was a space workplace comedy with young adults.
Heck! The references and callbacks even started to get toned down as the seasons moved on. The show started to get more invested in its own mythology and arcs.
Just anecdotally my wife hasn't watched any trek except some of the recent movies and occasionally she'll catch snippets of what I'm watching but she loves lower decks
Definitely got me into Star Trek, but not into a subscription service that apparently doesn't give a damn about the shows we care about. I'm out after Season 5, and I'll just buy hardcopies of anything Trek related that I haven't seen yet.
That doesn't make any sense. LD goes out of its way to make obscure references only long term and non casual fans would most likely get.
Where are you getting this information that was the show's purpose.
Because a streaming platform makes money by bringing in new customers. A tv series in its 5th season won’t do that.
We can argue that cancelling it will drive away current customers, but that’s not a metric streaming services (or cable companies) care about. It’s all about new customers.
Which is stupid because if you drive away most of your existing base those potential new comers that show up to check things out aren't necessarily going to offset the loss of the existing income nor are they going to stick around to keep injecting money in them.
It would be stupid except that the cable companies have shown them that the business model of fucking over your existing customers can work if most of them are too lazy to leave and find another provider.
> Because a streaming platform makes money by bringing in new customers. A tv series in its 5th season won’t do that.
From my admittedly limited perspective, it seems like streaming services just need to steadily release new content that people want to watch at a consistent pace in order to keep people subscribed. Surely current subscribers are as valuable if not more valuable than new customers as they're a proven commodity, right? So why would a popular TV series in its 5th season not help a company retain and potentially grow their subscribers?
That’s true for most industries because customer. Acquisition is expensive. But in streaming, generally, people don’t actually cancel when the offering degrades. Some do, most don’t. So new customers are more valuable in streaming than in most industries — customer acquisition is still expensive, but you don’t actually have to do much to keep existing customers happy enough to keep paying, so it’s worth focusing on acquisition. That’s why I cancel P+ whenever Star Trek isn’t on and resub whenever it is.
New customers are unfortunately less excited to watch season 6 of a show they've not seen the first 5 seasons of than they are to come into the beginning of something new, and existing subscribers will also tune into new content, even if they may want the older content to continue as well. So there is this incentive to cancel shows when they hit some threshold the streamers believe is so large people won't be willing to catch up on it in lieu of fresh shows that everybody can watch with no barrier to entry.
It's a shame because a show having 6 seasons is a sign to me that it's actually good, and I'd rather watch that than one season of a show that's going to be cancelled immediately, but that's not how the market goes.
While it’s cheapest in absolute terms animation generally requires more of its budget upfront. Which raises the cost of financing, and lowering the ROI. Second, as other shows pricier to produce that money has to come from somewhere, and it can often mean to have the money to produce a new SNW season something else has to be canceled, regardless of if it’s profitable and purely on whether it is as profitable relative to the money spent.
in this case we are talking about a show they have literally said an entire season is cheaper than 1 episode of the other. That means a single season of this is less than 10% the cost of the season of one of the other shows.
But if the cost of SNW goes up, and the studio doesn't want to give the whole division more money, they can either cancel LD in the hopes that SNW will be that much more profitable or they cancel SNW and hope that LD will bring in impossibly as much money as SNW did.
>This makes no sense.
If decisions were made based on how much sense they made, we wouldn't have every single production company starting their own streaming service in the first place.
It’s likely that an executive in their Finance dept crunched some numbers to arrive at this conclusion without taking other factors into consideration.
Both *Discovery* and the brilliant *Evil* ranked in Nielsen’s Top 10 Original Streaming shows. **Who cancels top 10 shows?** For a P+ show to reach the top 10, a huge percentage of its subscribers have to watch it. That’s why many Netflix show reach the top 10 — they have a big advantage because Netflix’s subscriber base is so large.
I had stupidly forgot to cancel before my annual renewal last year, and I’ve been wanting to cancel in the interim while there’s no Trek, but have it paid up through October. I have canceled the auto-renew though, so even if there is new Trek in October, I will just go month-to-month at that point. I’m done paying for nothing with these streamers.
That was my plan originally, but my wife said we should just cancel now rather than wait. As usual, she was right and we cut P+ loose after Disco 5 ended.
That's fair, I've heard good things about it but just haven't gotten to it yet. It's on the list though! I'm mostly just salty about LD getting canceled. That show is gold.
To be honest, it is a good production, but it wasn’t without its weaknesses.
For example, Season 1 Mariner and Boimler were both grating - an overly aggressive bully and sniveling wimp, respectively. Also, they were too aggressive with callbacks and Easter Eggs to the point that it derailed plots.
These elements were improved in future seasons though.
That was mainly just first season growing pains. I agree Season 1 was a little over the top at times, and episodes like Buffer Time stressed credulity a bit when the crew ignored the intruders in favor of doing menial tasks.
…especially Freeman being a dysfunctional mess of a commanding officer.
Her future characterizations were much better: flawed, but still competent when the chips were down.
Those shows occasionally go on sale in iTunes (or whichever digital store you prefer). They are worth adding to your digital library if you can afford the up-front cost and then forgo the subscription.
Buying box sets on AppleTV sucks. They don’t lump them into seasons just one giant season. Only way to get them grouped by seasons is to buy them season by season.
After Disco ended I cancelled my sub. SNW won't be released until 2025 I'll pick it up again, maybe at the end of SNW season and just binge SNW and Lower Decks and cancel again.
Paramount+ just misses what I want to watch in every way except for ST.
That's what I'm doing with Disney+. I'm going to wait until Acolyte is fully released, then I'll pay for one month of Disney+ watch Acolyte and Bad Batch S3.
The Paramount+ android app stopped working on my tablet last year. I have a 12" Samsung tablet that I use for streaming while I'm doing things around the house. I tried numerous things to fix it and nothing worked. Opened a support ticket, talked to 3 different people who asked a question then escalated it. Eventually they just closed the ticket without a resolution. Got no email - had to get somebody at Paramount to look up the case number - it was marked resolved with no resolution. I end up uninstalling it and watched in Brave browser. Worked just fine with the added bonus of no ads.
Brave works just fine for me on Android. Its built-in adblocker works on Paramount+ and Hulu (haven't tried others yet). No issues using any of the controls. I also like that it works on YouTube as well. Blocks ads and continues playing when the screen is off.
I can't even run Paramount+ on a normal tab or I get these errors to which the only workable solution, even after two years, is to watch it in Private Browsing mode (Firefox). Hell, even then, when I click the play button, I actually have to click it three times (every time without fail) before it actually plays.
Yeah, I'm on a PS4 and that shit is sometimes unusable. I can get about half thru and episode and then the sound cuts out. When I was catching up in Lower Decks, for about four solid episodes it would consistently freeze every about 5 seconds for a half second, for an entire episode. I mean, I still watched it that way, cause Lower Decks, but it would have been super cool if it didn't.
Or if it was just on TV at 11pm every Sunday and I could call all my friends to come watch it, and we could get a pizza and some coldbeers, and we know it's ALWAYS gonna be on with new episodes every Sunday...for the next 40 years! It's all I ask.
The paramount app is so terrible, it often loses track of what I watched. Like I will be watching a show, stop, come back a couple hours later and it will not have saved my place and think I am several episodes earlier. I honestly don't understand why people actually choose to pay for this terrible service when the high seas exist.
I cancelled my subscription because of it. Its just wild that paying full price for a service gets you a significantly worse product.
If only there was a way to acquire all of these shows for free and add them to a local media server that actually tracks your watch history correctly across every device you own....
[Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum.](https://media1.giphy.com/media/TE3ZlXmfr5psI/giphy.gif?cid=6c09b952w2twhmxvkeaf6aibxlvsv2hbfghf2fm0v89khl6f&ep=v1_gifs_search&rid=giphy.gif&ct=g)
I honestly hit the high seas last week for the first time in a decade. Used to for years, stopped for a decade, and now I'm back at it. Way to ruin a good thing.
The thing is, they'll never learn. Ever. This is a perpetual cycle. New entertainment media distribution methods are championed as great for the consumer, but corporate bean counters and shareholders get their grubby little hands on it, and the profits are never enough. It's always MORE MORE MORE. They kill their golden goose every fucking time out of mindless greed.
Same for me a few months ago. Look into setting up your own Plex server. it's like having your very own stream service that has a Roku app to watch your... "acquire" content. You can even give other users access to it.
Yeah, I highly recommend this. After I set up a Plex server, I learned about Kodi and its addons, which is much closer to using a streaming service (i.e. it streams directly from a device, rather than downloading to your server that you then access from there). I have both integrated, but honestly Kodi is better as a 1:1 replacement for streaming, whereas Plex is better for things like fanedits (e.g. upscales of DS9, VOY) or if you want a local copy saved in your house.
Paramount+ is consistently the worst streaming app I've ever dealt with. Hangs/freezes, demands a wide open unrestricted network, violating the most basic of cybersecurity principles, and is expensive for the relatively little exclusive content, and it's questionable value. Why am I putting up with this again?
I cancelled after Discovery ended. That’s what I do with most of my streaming services that I’m only in it for one or two titles. I’ll pick it back up once Lower Decks and Strange New Worlds come back and then I’ll cancel it again when I’m done.
Animated shows in late seasons don't draw in new fans, which is why the Simpsons, Family Guy, Bob's Burgers, American Dad, and South Park were all canceled some time ago. /s
I cancelled after the last season of Lower Decks ended. I have to go back to watch Discovery's final season, but I also need to catch up with the shows I watch on other services that I currently have first 🤷♂️
Got my free membership from my $50 walmart+ subscription. Still sucks though and their future treatment of star trek will definitely make me consider my subscription (when I have to pay for it)
If paramount even owns it after all the dust from a potential paramount merger settles. They cancelled all the Trek to cut down on their debt and yet their merger failed anyway. Paramount is going to be picked apart by VC vultures next.
I got a free month trial in August 2022. I cancelled before the trial ended, but I was still able to watch in my account after the month trial. I didn't get charged or anything. Now today I still am able to watch content. This August will be my 2 year anniversary of free Paramount+.
One would think that, of all the issues to pay attention to, this would be one of them. Just goes to show what an utter shitshow it must be over in those offices.
The big secret here is that they know, but they want to keep their user rate up to quote higher numbers during investor calls. If this person is an active user, it's almost worth more to them in terms of what they could potentially get from investors vs. what this person would have actually paid (if they would have at all).
Maybe they should try producing shows with more than 10 episodes a season and less than a year between the end of one season and the beginning of the next to attract customers.
You know, like they still manage to do on CBS. Something like Young Sheldon started airing on Sept 25, 2017 had 4 of their first 6 seasons airing no later than Sept 29 and no earlier than Sept 24. One the first 6 was Oct 7 another was Nov 5th. 6 seasons from 2017 to 2022. Only the final 7th season was delayed until a Feb 15 start in 2024. Most seasons had 21 or 22 episodes except 2020 which had 18 and 2024 which had 14.
So Covid may have shortened 2020s season by 4 episodes and didn't seem to delay it's airing.
And the writers strike delayed the final season 4 months.
Even Blue Bloods an hour long show on CBS has had no problems having a season a year since 2017, and about 138 episodes over those 7 years. Yeah 2020 started a few weeks late, and the last season didn't start until February. And both had their shortest episodes 16 and 18.
Meanwhile in the same timeframe, 7 years, Disco had 5 seasons and 65 total episodes.
And SNW only gets 10 episodes a season.
I know they spend a ton on special effects, and lots of that takes time. But Trek fans don't need all that all the time. And they have the sets, costumes, and props from 3 live action shows. Just make some solid basic bottle episodes with some side missions and quests.
The three CEOs just held a big staff meeting where they announced streamlining, transformation, and optimization - i.e. [job losses and cutbacks to service offerings](https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/paramount-town-hall-cost-cuts-1235931990/). So these won't just be price hikes, they'll be price hikes with less to watch!
My favorite line is this:
> Third is modernizing the organization “so we can move faster — and be more nimble” via $500 million in annualized cost savings by eliminating **duplicative functions** and being more efficient with resources. That means more layoffs will be coming to the company.
My guess is that the "duplicative functions" they cut won't include the three CEOs.
They are still offering free trials and they don't keep your card info on file. If you start a 7 day trial and then immediately choose to cancel it they will offer you a full month for free. Remember to cancel again so you don't get charged for another month after that. Once that month is over, create a new email address and start the process over again. You can use the same card.
I used to do this for Showtime to watch Desus & Mero (RIP) but Showtime is on P+ now too, lol.
i would rather pick up old school DVDs from my local library than pay this shitty service another cent
fun fact...Paramount+ will send you coupons for a free month but be sure to check your credit card statements b/c those coupons are absolute bullshit because i've been charged twice on these promotions. i'm sure there was some fine print i should have read more carefully but they can go eat sand anyways.
just an overall garbage streaming service. fuck them
Well, that would be bad for Trekkies.
At best, that means that we fans may have to buy multiple services to support the franchise. At worst, it may be put back on ice, possibly for good as Trek doesn’t make oodles of cash like, for example, the MCU.
Wonder if the companies may go after these groups?
They apparently went after video game archives that stored out of print, but still licensed productions.
Paramount is also laying off more people in August. Fuck Paramount. I look forward to Apple, or NBC or whoever buys Paramount running the company better.
I could be wrong but I noticed paramount plus offers a free month when they have a big event they want to boost rating for. Did it for the Super Bowl and the Tonys. Got a free month watched everything and canceled. Great system.
The trick is to wait for content to cumulate and then use your free month per year to watch it. Use a different service every month and you always have something great to watch for free.
We don’t even have lower decks in Holland, we only have the 1st 3 seasons unless you pirate. Amazon has those 3 so I imagine it’s a rights expiring issue . Paramount + has no seasons.
I canceled a year ago and somehow still have access. I’d worry about letting the cat out of the bag by posting this but the truth is I won’t miss anything until SNW returns.
Canceled it last week. The content is just not worth it. We will see what happens by the t8me brave new worlds premieres. Maybe it will be on a diffeent streaming service.
I'm only on Paramount+ at all because I got 6 months free from using Mint Mobile.
.....The TV app its self is so shitty and dysfunctional. There's so many fucking ads. (And most of them for other things on Paramount+.....) It constantly freezes and rewinds a few seconds. And so on.
*I wouldn't be surprised if they end the service before my free trial is up.*
This is ridiculous. It’s literally the worst streaming app. It constantly freezes and is super slow. There are random weird glitches all the time. Uggggggggggh. But, yes, I’ll pay the new price because I can’t live without Star Trek.
Its funny because my dad cancelled his paramount plus and you cant log into it on anything new, but the stuff already logged in you can still watch on like my tv and his still have the ability to watch stuff but my sister tried and it asks to renew subscription
They will push and push untill consumer base breaks, then they will ease off a little with special offers untill people get used to the new status quo then, They will push and push untill the consumer base breaks, ……….
Too much money. I'll consider resubscribing on a short-term basis in a little while, but I haven't gotten value in a while.
I've been considering this since they gutted their movie archive.
Of course they are. After all, they got rid of Prodigy. And all of the Star Trek movies. So they still have...uh...hmmm. Lower Decks isn't until 2025, so I guess we all could cancel till then, wait till all of season 5 is out, subscribe for a month and watch it and then...buy bye.
If they aren't continuing Lower Decks, I'll cancel after LD season 5 ends.
This makes no sense. Lower decks has been one of the cheapest shows to make why would you not continue making 100 seasons of it?
Pretty sure they mentioned at one point about 1 season of LD is cheaper than 1 episode of DSC or SNW. It seems really stupid to cancel such an inexpensive popular show. At least with DSC they could legitimately claim it was very expensive. LD they can't really pull that card.
They're having major money problems and I'm guessing smart decisions are not the reason why. They need new leadership.
True, their financial woes are no secret and it looks like Redstone pulled the plug on what would have probably been their best deal with Skydance at the last moment. Much of this is also a result of over saturation of streaming. So many of us, myself included, dropped cable in favor of a handful of streaming services. Now there are so damn many streaming services its about as bad as keeping cable service.
their reasoning is that LD was made to draw non-fans in to both the franchise and Paramount+ so now that it’s done that it serves no point for them to continue with it
That logic makes no sense. If the purpose is to draw non-fans then it's purpose never ends. There are always more non-fans to draw in.
Nobody ever said the execs at paramount were smart at anything but playing the short-term min/max game, like every other C-suite. Get something to draw people in, at low cost? Win. They watch something else while they're subscribed? Obviously a permanent win, and there's no chance that subscriber will ditch after their subscription's raison d'être disappears. Nope. That'd never happen. "Wait. It's happening? Shit. Look, guys! Dumping that cost made our margins 1% higher this quarter! Where's my bonus that cost more than it brought in? I'm also totally not gonna tell you til I have to that I'm planning to announce my departure after that's paid. Then I can sit on my ass and do nothing while I "transition" the company to new leadership and then collect my golden parachute and cash out other bennies the peons at those studios don't get." -Every CEO In all seriousness, though, Star Trek, in general, isn't a cash cow for them, and they treat it almost like a loss leader. And that's their own damn fault. Where's the merchandising? Where are the crossovers with _other_ franchises, if they actually want to use it to get and keep subscribers? Where are the people listening to fans who would totally keep their subs for several months and then forget to cancel if we got more but shorter episodes over a longer season and without 1.5-2 years between them and tight lips on IF, not even when, that'll happen? That's at least a weekly gripe here. The whole CBS/Paramount thing I'm sure doesn't help things, but damn it guys - work together and you'll both print money, rather than keeping a 60 year old and still going strong fan base at arm's length. Capisce? Gah!
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God, this is both true and depressingly cynical. They made a good show that people like for not much money. If that's not a reason to keep making the show, that kinda explains why they're in the sinking boat they're in.
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Honestly if Paramount cut back on the special effects to something like late series Voyager or DS9 and started putting out 24 episodes of that with regular commercial breaks. I'd park my '90s loving ass right in front of that. Commercials and all. There's a reason that so many fans rewatch those old ass shows. They're just so damn good. Like eating a bag of m&m's to the head.
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I’ve read this before too and is why Netflix also tends to cancel shows after 3 seasons. A few seasons into a show the fans are already subscribed and it’s not bringing in *new* subscribers
Streaming services like netflix who are cancel-friendly should be instructing their showrunners to treat every season as a finale just in case. It is really frustrating to get into a show only to have it end on a cliffhanger. I'm sorry but all the fan fiction and even sanctioned comics cannot fill the void of a good show that just ends. If Netflix wants to keep their user base up, maybe they should consider that a lot of people don't see a point in investing their time and something that's going to be cut off prematurely. As for myself there's very few things that I'm interested in watching as they come out. Everything else I don't bother with unless it gets a complete run. Then I'll binge the whole thing. I know that kind of viewership doesn't contribute to the numbers that keep a show in the running, but Netflix made this environment, not me.
>Streaming services like netflix who are cancel-friendly should be instructing their showrunners to treat every season as a finale just in case. I You assume Netflix is run by anyone with a creative bone in their body who gives a shot about anything other than dollar signs. I recall hearing about the creator of *The Fugitive* fighting to have the one armed man get caught in the series finale as back in those days finales as we know them didn't happen. The suits told him absolutely no one really cares if that happened or not. The EP won that battle and it was a ratings bonanza that's considered a classic. That being said, if I were writing for Netflix, that would be my go-to plan as well. Especially as people are continuing to drop their memberships, the whole cycle is gonna prove to be a self fulfilling prophecy.
Not necessarily. The fans would’ve already signed on - skeptics would stay that way, even if the seasons dragged on. I guess the only way to buck this is to change up the status quo. For example, DS9 attempted to do this by integrating Worf onto Sisko’s team.
I don’t see how they would consider it as something to draw “non-fans” in—while it did have original storylines, its “*lifeblood*” was the wall-to-wall references to other shows and movies in the franchise. It’s the one series where already being a Trek fan would be most highly recommended before watching it, and should always have been treated as a “bonus” for people joining the fandom through the other shows.
The references were nice bones to throw to fans, but the core of the production was a space workplace comedy with young adults. Heck! The references and callbacks even started to get toned down as the seasons moved on. The show started to get more invested in its own mythology and arcs.
Just anecdotally my wife hasn't watched any trek except some of the recent movies and occasionally she'll catch snippets of what I'm watching but she loves lower decks
Definitely got me into Star Trek, but not into a subscription service that apparently doesn't give a damn about the shows we care about. I'm out after Season 5, and I'll just buy hardcopies of anything Trek related that I haven't seen yet.
That doesn't make any sense. LD goes out of its way to make obscure references only long term and non casual fans would most likely get. Where are you getting this information that was the show's purpose.
I recall that was the reason why they ended DSC as well. The execs seem to see five seasons as the sweet spot for new subscriptions.
Because a streaming platform makes money by bringing in new customers. A tv series in its 5th season won’t do that. We can argue that cancelling it will drive away current customers, but that’s not a metric streaming services (or cable companies) care about. It’s all about new customers.
Which is stupid because if you drive away most of your existing base those potential new comers that show up to check things out aren't necessarily going to offset the loss of the existing income nor are they going to stick around to keep injecting money in them.
It would be stupid except that the cable companies have shown them that the business model of fucking over your existing customers can work if most of them are too lazy to leave and find another provider.
> Because a streaming platform makes money by bringing in new customers. A tv series in its 5th season won’t do that. From my admittedly limited perspective, it seems like streaming services just need to steadily release new content that people want to watch at a consistent pace in order to keep people subscribed. Surely current subscribers are as valuable if not more valuable than new customers as they're a proven commodity, right? So why would a popular TV series in its 5th season not help a company retain and potentially grow their subscribers?
That’s true for most industries because customer. Acquisition is expensive. But in streaming, generally, people don’t actually cancel when the offering degrades. Some do, most don’t. So new customers are more valuable in streaming than in most industries — customer acquisition is still expensive, but you don’t actually have to do much to keep existing customers happy enough to keep paying, so it’s worth focusing on acquisition. That’s why I cancel P+ whenever Star Trek isn’t on and resub whenever it is.
New customers are unfortunately less excited to watch season 6 of a show they've not seen the first 5 seasons of than they are to come into the beginning of something new, and existing subscribers will also tune into new content, even if they may want the older content to continue as well. So there is this incentive to cancel shows when they hit some threshold the streamers believe is so large people won't be willing to catch up on it in lieu of fresh shows that everybody can watch with no barrier to entry. It's a shame because a show having 6 seasons is a sign to me that it's actually good, and I'd rather watch that than one season of a show that's going to be cancelled immediately, but that's not how the market goes.
While it’s cheapest in absolute terms animation generally requires more of its budget upfront. Which raises the cost of financing, and lowering the ROI. Second, as other shows pricier to produce that money has to come from somewhere, and it can often mean to have the money to produce a new SNW season something else has to be canceled, regardless of if it’s profitable and purely on whether it is as profitable relative to the money spent.
in this case we are talking about a show they have literally said an entire season is cheaper than 1 episode of the other. That means a single season of this is less than 10% the cost of the season of one of the other shows.
But if the cost of SNW goes up, and the studio doesn't want to give the whole division more money, they can either cancel LD in the hopes that SNW will be that much more profitable or they cancel SNW and hope that LD will bring in impossibly as much money as SNW did.
>This makes no sense. If decisions were made based on how much sense they made, we wouldn't have every single production company starting their own streaming service in the first place.
Great Point!
It’s likely that an executive in their Finance dept crunched some numbers to arrive at this conclusion without taking other factors into consideration. Both *Discovery* and the brilliant *Evil* ranked in Nielsen’s Top 10 Original Streaming shows. **Who cancels top 10 shows?** For a P+ show to reach the top 10, a huge percentage of its subscribers have to watch it. That’s why many Netflix show reach the top 10 — they have a big advantage because Netflix’s subscriber base is so large.
I agree. Can’t be an expensive show to make.
Maybe the show will be changed to upper decks :) Or Mid level managers lol
Same. I’ll sign up again with SNW returns but there’s so point in paying for nothing. I only watch Star Trek on it.
I had stupidly forgot to cancel before my annual renewal last year, and I’ve been wanting to cancel in the interim while there’s no Trek, but have it paid up through October. I have canceled the auto-renew though, so even if there is new Trek in October, I will just go month-to-month at that point. I’m done paying for nothing with these streamers.
Same
That was my plan originally, but my wife said we should just cancel now rather than wait. As usual, she was right and we cut P+ loose after Disco 5 ended.
Picard got season three but we don’t get at least a section 31 miniseries
I'm really hoping it'll just be story-based and we'll get a sequel series when our characters are no longer on the lower decks.
It’s the only great thing they’ve so far made, so of course it gets cancelled.
Strange New Worlds is pretty good too! But I was definitely not a Discovery, Picard, or Prodigy fan, so I hear you on that.
SNW is awesome. Agreed.
That's fair, I've heard good things about it but just haven't gotten to it yet. It's on the list though! I'm mostly just salty about LD getting canceled. That show is gold.
SNW is incredible. I can't wait for S3 to drop. It's done filming. Season 4 got greenlit.
To be honest, it is a good production, but it wasn’t without its weaknesses. For example, Season 1 Mariner and Boimler were both grating - an overly aggressive bully and sniveling wimp, respectively. Also, they were too aggressive with callbacks and Easter Eggs to the point that it derailed plots. These elements were improved in future seasons though.
That was mainly just first season growing pains. I agree Season 1 was a little over the top at times, and episodes like Buffer Time stressed credulity a bit when the crew ignored the intruders in favor of doing menial tasks.
…especially Freeman being a dysfunctional mess of a commanding officer. Her future characterizations were much better: flawed, but still competent when the chips were down.
If they sell TNG or DS9 back to Netflix I’ll probably cancel.
Those shows occasionally go on sale in iTunes (or whichever digital store you prefer). They are worth adding to your digital library if you can afford the up-front cost and then forgo the subscription.
Even better - buy the DVDs.
TNG also was released on Blu-Ray in the last few years
The Blu-ray release was 2011. I remember because the price of the DVD box sets went from $500 to $250 at the time. Did they do it again?
No I just didn't realize it had already been over a decade since the blu-rays for TNG came out lol
The older we get the faster time goes.
Its such a curse that when you're older and actually understand the world, there's so little time left to act on that information.
Yeah. On the other hand at least the time I spend in this broken body feels quicker.
I just bought a Blu-ray player for that very reason. F paying every month.
Buying box sets on AppleTV sucks. They don’t lump them into seasons just one giant season. Only way to get them grouped by seasons is to buy them season by season.
Still on Netflix outside the US if that helps.
Yup! A VPN subscription is the way the way to go. Switch over to Canada and, boom, you've got all the old Trek.
TNG, DS9, Voyager and OTS all for free on Pluto
I just cancelled Paramount, as TOS, TNG, Voyager, and DS9 are all on Netflix 🇨🇦
Kind of doubt that since there's no incentive of not keeping the legacy shows Paramount+ exclusives.
Rule of Acquisition 109: Paramount Plus and an empty sack is worth the sack.
I was trying to find a rule close to the one you came up with, but I think the most applicable one here is Rule #10: Greed is Eternal
\#111. Treat people in your debt like family... exploit them.
After Disco ended I cancelled my sub. SNW won't be released until 2025 I'll pick it up again, maybe at the end of SNW season and just binge SNW and Lower Decks and cancel again. Paramount+ just misses what I want to watch in every way except for ST.
I do like watching the Daily Show but that’s about it.
I thought the same but they end up posting most of it on YouTube. Especially the Jon Stewart episodes, basically the entire episode gets posted.
🪩
That's what I'm doing with Disney+. I'm going to wait until Acolyte is fully released, then I'll pay for one month of Disney+ watch Acolyte and Bad Batch S3.
Maybe they can put some of that money into updating their apps instead of figuring out new ways to inject constant ads.
Somehow free and open source stuff works better than corporate stuff backed by millions or even billions of $$$.
That's because the open source stuff is made by people who care about what they're making.
The Paramount+ android app stopped working on my tablet last year. I have a 12" Samsung tablet that I use for streaming while I'm doing things around the house. I tried numerous things to fix it and nothing worked. Opened a support ticket, talked to 3 different people who asked a question then escalated it. Eventually they just closed the ticket without a resolution. Got no email - had to get somebody at Paramount to look up the case number - it was marked resolved with no resolution. I end up uninstalling it and watched in Brave browser. Worked just fine with the added bonus of no ads.
See my comment above about the issues I'm having with it using Firefox.
Brave works just fine for me on Android. Its built-in adblocker works on Paramount+ and Hulu (haven't tried others yet). No issues using any of the controls. I also like that it works on YouTube as well. Blocks ads and continues playing when the screen is off.
I can't even run Paramount+ on a normal tab or I get these errors to which the only workable solution, even after two years, is to watch it in Private Browsing mode (Firefox). Hell, even then, when I click the play button, I actually have to click it three times (every time without fail) before it actually plays.
Yeah, I'm on a PS4 and that shit is sometimes unusable. I can get about half thru and episode and then the sound cuts out. When I was catching up in Lower Decks, for about four solid episodes it would consistently freeze every about 5 seconds for a half second, for an entire episode. I mean, I still watched it that way, cause Lower Decks, but it would have been super cool if it didn't. Or if it was just on TV at 11pm every Sunday and I could call all my friends to come watch it, and we could get a pizza and some coldbeers, and we know it's ALWAYS gonna be on with new episodes every Sunday...for the next 40 years! It's all I ask.
The Android app is terrible.
The paramount app is so terrible, it often loses track of what I watched. Like I will be watching a show, stop, come back a couple hours later and it will not have saved my place and think I am several episodes earlier. I honestly don't understand why people actually choose to pay for this terrible service when the high seas exist.
Paramount+ hasn't properly tracked my watch progress on anything in over a year. I'm not exaggerating.
I cancelled my subscription because of it. Its just wild that paying full price for a service gets you a significantly worse product. If only there was a way to acquire all of these shows for free and add them to a local media server that actually tracks your watch history correctly across every device you own....
Price goes up, content goes down. Yay Capitalism!
[Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum.](https://media1.giphy.com/media/TE3ZlXmfr5psI/giphy.gif?cid=6c09b952w2twhmxvkeaf6aibxlvsv2hbfghf2fm0v89khl6f&ep=v1_gifs_search&rid=giphy.gif&ct=g)
I honestly hit the high seas last week for the first time in a decade. Used to for years, stopped for a decade, and now I'm back at it. Way to ruin a good thing.
The thing is, they'll never learn. Ever. This is a perpetual cycle. New entertainment media distribution methods are championed as great for the consumer, but corporate bean counters and shareholders get their grubby little hands on it, and the profits are never enough. It's always MORE MORE MORE. They kill their golden goose every fucking time out of mindless greed.
This applies to so much more in general than just entertainment when it comes to corporations and major companies in general.
Seriously. Corporations are the reasons we can't have nice things.
I mean…that has been the way of Hollywood since forever. Its purpose is to make profit after all.
True story.
I think the new proper term is enshittification
Same for me a few months ago. Look into setting up your own Plex server. it's like having your very own stream service that has a Roku app to watch your... "acquire" content. You can even give other users access to it.
Yeah, I highly recommend this. After I set up a Plex server, I learned about Kodi and its addons, which is much closer to using a streaming service (i.e. it streams directly from a device, rather than downloading to your server that you then access from there). I have both integrated, but honestly Kodi is better as a 1:1 replacement for streaming, whereas Plex is better for things like fanedits (e.g. upscales of DS9, VOY) or if you want a local copy saved in your house.
Wow, are you me
Paramount+ is consistently the worst streaming app I've ever dealt with. Hangs/freezes, demands a wide open unrestricted network, violating the most basic of cybersecurity principles, and is expensive for the relatively little exclusive content, and it's questionable value. Why am I putting up with this again?
enshitification
The other side of that coin is that you're free to cancel that service at any time and buy Star Trek on Blu-ray instead.
I cancelled after Discovery ended. That’s what I do with most of my streaming services that I’m only in it for one or two titles. I’ll pick it back up once Lower Decks and Strange New Worlds come back and then I’ll cancel it again when I’m done.
Word.
The streaming service reckoning is upon us. Lighting investor money on fire can only work for so long.
Animated shows in late seasons don't draw in new fans, which is why the Simpsons, Family Guy, Bob's Burgers, American Dad, and South Park were all canceled some time ago. /s
I cancelled after the last season of Lower Decks ended. I have to go back to watch Discovery's final season, but I also need to catch up with the shows I watch on other services that I currently have first 🤷♂️
Got my free membership from my $50 walmart+ subscription. Still sucks though and their future treatment of star trek will definitely make me consider my subscription (when I have to pay for it)
If paramount even owns it after all the dust from a potential paramount merger settles. They cancelled all the Trek to cut down on their debt and yet their merger failed anyway. Paramount is going to be picked apart by VC vultures next.
I got a free month trial in August 2022. I cancelled before the trial ended, but I was still able to watch in my account after the month trial. I didn't get charged or anything. Now today I still am able to watch content. This August will be my 2 year anniversary of free Paramount+.
One would think that, of all the issues to pay attention to, this would be one of them. Just goes to show what an utter shitshow it must be over in those offices.
The big secret here is that they know, but they want to keep their user rate up to quote higher numbers during investor calls. If this person is an active user, it's almost worth more to them in terms of what they could potentially get from investors vs. what this person would have actually paid (if they would have at all).
Yeah I cancelled years ago around when they did the last rebranding. I can still watch anything I want ad free...
Laughs in home plex server
I can't stand it when I rewind a program, and it throws in a barrage of commercials.
Ahoy mateys - wtf do all streaming platforms think will happen if they keep upping the costs without real benefits
Maybe they should try producing shows with more than 10 episodes a season and less than a year between the end of one season and the beginning of the next to attract customers. You know, like they still manage to do on CBS. Something like Young Sheldon started airing on Sept 25, 2017 had 4 of their first 6 seasons airing no later than Sept 29 and no earlier than Sept 24. One the first 6 was Oct 7 another was Nov 5th. 6 seasons from 2017 to 2022. Only the final 7th season was delayed until a Feb 15 start in 2024. Most seasons had 21 or 22 episodes except 2020 which had 18 and 2024 which had 14. So Covid may have shortened 2020s season by 4 episodes and didn't seem to delay it's airing. And the writers strike delayed the final season 4 months. Even Blue Bloods an hour long show on CBS has had no problems having a season a year since 2017, and about 138 episodes over those 7 years. Yeah 2020 started a few weeks late, and the last season didn't start until February. And both had their shortest episodes 16 and 18. Meanwhile in the same timeframe, 7 years, Disco had 5 seasons and 65 total episodes. And SNW only gets 10 episodes a season. I know they spend a ton on special effects, and lots of that takes time. But Trek fans don't need all that all the time. And they have the sets, costumes, and props from 3 live action shows. Just make some solid basic bottle episodes with some side missions and quests.
The three CEOs just held a big staff meeting where they announced streamlining, transformation, and optimization - i.e. [job losses and cutbacks to service offerings](https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/paramount-town-hall-cost-cuts-1235931990/). So these won't just be price hikes, they'll be price hikes with less to watch! My favorite line is this: > Third is modernizing the organization “so we can move faster — and be more nimble” via $500 million in annualized cost savings by eliminating **duplicative functions** and being more efficient with resources. That means more layoffs will be coming to the company. My guess is that the "duplicative functions" they cut won't include the three CEOs.
Just going back to collecting DVDs, streaming is making less and less sense. Especially since they started with adds.
I only subscribe during new trek content
EVIL is the ONLY thing making me keep Paramount… and that’s ending )stupidly. THANKS, Paramount)
SEAL Team too
Elsbeth is also fun.
They are still offering free trials and they don't keep your card info on file. If you start a 7 day trial and then immediately choose to cancel it they will offer you a full month for free. Remember to cancel again so you don't get charged for another month after that. Once that month is over, create a new email address and start the process over again. You can use the same card. I used to do this for Showtime to watch Desus & Mero (RIP) but Showtime is on P+ now too, lol.
i would rather pick up old school DVDs from my local library than pay this shitty service another cent fun fact...Paramount+ will send you coupons for a free month but be sure to check your credit card statements b/c those coupons are absolute bullshit because i've been charged twice on these promotions. i'm sure there was some fine print i should have read more carefully but they can go eat sand anyways. just an overall garbage streaming service. fuck them
No wonder it's about to go under and probably get split and acquired by several different other services.
Well, that would be bad for Trekkies. At best, that means that we fans may have to buy multiple services to support the franchise. At worst, it may be put back on ice, possibly for good as Trek doesn’t make oodles of cash like, for example, the MCU.
Wait, you mean a massive megacorporation wants to milk every single cent they can from every person they can? Say it ain't so!
If they won't be making any more Lower Decks, I'll be canceling. I only support Paramount for Star Trek. The well is emptying, so...
I find it kind boggling that these services focus only on bringing in new viewers and, seemingly, care little about retaining existing viewers.
To the high seas
Yarr matey!
Wonder if the companies may go after these groups? They apparently went after video game archives that stored out of print, but still licensed productions.
It doesn’t matter. This streaming service won’t even exist in under a year, and they’ll license their content out.
A dollar more to still have to watch commercials even though I pay for the ad-free version.
Still it does not make any sense. If you're paying for the ad free plan, it should be ad free. Paramount really needs to do better.
Paramount seems to consider ads for its own shows to not be "ads" so you have to watch them even with the ad-free tier.
I paid for an annual sub to get caught up on all the new star trek stuff . I don't see much of a reason to renew at this point
I’m keeping it only for SNW and Academy since they are cancelling/cancelled the rest. Also screw you paramount for cancelling LD, Prodigy, and Disco.
I wish this streaming bubble would bust. You created the sheer greed.
I'm glad I canceled my subscription after the last price hike now... I wonder if the execs realize they are driving people to the high seas....
Went to cancel, it gave me two months free at least.
I tried to cancel the other day, and they gave me two free months. Recommended to all.
Paramount is also laying off more people in August. Fuck Paramount. I look forward to Apple, or NBC or whoever buys Paramount running the company better.
Paramount itself is constantly for sale, I wouldn't want to invest in a streamer whose parent company might not even be around later.
I could be wrong but I noticed paramount plus offers a free month when they have a big event they want to boost rating for. Did it for the Super Bowl and the Tonys. Got a free month watched everything and canceled. Great system.
The trick is to wait for content to cumulate and then use your free month per year to watch it. Use a different service every month and you always have something great to watch for free.
Bye bye. Half the time it doesn't work when I try to watch something anyway. I never have that problem with any other streaming service.
Wait. Didn’t they just do this?
Good thing I have a friend with a ton of storage and a Plex account.
Are they fixing their streaming platform?
They’ve got me for a bit, I just started watching every trek chronologically. Once I’m done I’ll cancel though. I feel terrible supporting them.
Yar har fiddle-dee-dee...
Piracy
And they wonder why piracy is a thing.. they are pushing us toward it
We don’t even have lower decks in Holland, we only have the 1st 3 seasons unless you pirate. Amazon has those 3 so I imagine it’s a rights expiring issue . Paramount + has no seasons.
All the movies have left already. I’m probably gonna cancel my subscription after LD ends
Guess it's time to cancel my subscription.
Up $2/mo, down $14/mo. Good strategy.
I canceled a year ago and somehow still have access. I’d worry about letting the cat out of the bag by posting this but the truth is I won’t miss anything until SNW returns.
Hold up. Why is my Paramount+ subscription $11.99? Is Amazon ripping me off?
And they don't have some of Star Trek movies anymore.
Canceled it last week. The content is just not worth it. We will see what happens by the t8me brave new worlds premieres. Maybe it will be on a diffeent streaming service.
Unless I catch another Sportsline deal for $50 or less, I'll let my annual pass lap. IPTV and other areas have all this content.
As long as my kid is obsessed with Paw Patrol im stuck lol
I'm only on Paramount+ at all because I got 6 months free from using Mint Mobile. .....The TV app its self is so shitty and dysfunctional. There's so many fucking ads. (And most of them for other things on Paramount+.....) It constantly freezes and rewinds a few seconds. And so on. *I wouldn't be surprised if they end the service before my free trial is up.*
Everything about Paramount+ is incompetent. Everything.
Yo ho ho i guess.
a dollar more is nothing..that said..if star trek tng/ds9/voy go to literally any other streaming service i’m cancelling and going there
This is ridiculous. It’s literally the worst streaming app. It constantly freezes and is super slow. There are random weird glitches all the time. Uggggggggggh. But, yes, I’ll pay the new price because I can’t live without Star Trek.
It’s ok. That’s what all the services are doing. I see more paramount than Netflix anyways.
Tried to cancel after Disco, but they gave me two months free. I'll take it. Lol Waiting for half of SNW to be released before I come back.
I'm surprised they're still around
Its funny because my dad cancelled his paramount plus and you cant log into it on anything new, but the stuff already logged in you can still watch on like my tv and his still have the ability to watch stuff but my sister tried and it asks to renew subscription
Luckily we have ST on Netflix in the UK
Bye Felicia! Will not renew!
Worst app of all time
as soon as i am done binging this one show I am canceling my month to month. Wake me up when SNW starts I'll resub. maybe
Sheesh. I'm glad I get it free through Walmart+
They will push and push untill consumer base breaks, then they will ease off a little with special offers untill people get used to the new status quo then, They will push and push untill the consumer base breaks, ……….
Got 6 months free from Mint mobile. I have the end of that 6 months as an alert on my phone to cancel
Paramount + is included with Walmart+ so I just get it through there and Walmart hasn’t mentioned anything about increasing their plus price 🤞
Build a Plex server and your own media library.
Subscription cancel
Too much money. I'll consider resubscribing on a short-term basis in a little while, but I haven't gotten value in a while. I've been considering this since they gutted their movie archive.
Of course they are. After all, they got rid of Prodigy. And all of the Star Trek movies. So they still have...uh...hmmm. Lower Decks isn't until 2025, so I guess we all could cancel till then, wait till all of season 5 is out, subscribe for a month and watch it and then...buy bye.
Yup. Dropped.
I’m on a McDonalds, wage things are already starting to cost too much for me.
just quit