The fight over Australian smart TV's gets angry

I begin the week fascinated by this story of in-fighting within the Australian TV industry over a proposal from Free TV Australia (a lobby group for the commercial broadcast TV networks) who are trying to force their not-hugely-compelling apps to have prominence on Australian viewers smart TVs.

A report from Calum Jaspan in the Nine Newspapers today focused on the lawyers getting involved. It seems Free TV Australia isn’t too happy about a campaign being waged by pay TV lobby group ASTRA (which is really just The Foxtel Group and a handful of Foxtel’s content suppliers and technology partners):

As the legislation expected to be introduced to parliament this month, Free TV Australia, the lobby group for commercial networks Nine, Ten and Seven, has sent a legal notice to Foxtel CEO and chair of ASTRA Patrick Delany demanding action over an advertising campaign run by ASTRA, alleging it misleads Australians.

The campaign led to internal fallout:

Apart from the legal stoush with Free TV, ASTRA’s campaign has also led to tensions inside the group. Paramount, the international owner of Network 10 and streaming service Paramount+, has withdrawn its membership from ASTRA just days after its ad was released and has instead put its support behind Free TV.

ASTRA’s campaign is themed around its message: “Warning: Now the government wants to control your TV”. Meanwhile the message from Free TV Australia: “Don’t let big tech take your free away”.

The idea that it is the price point and not that the FTA broadcasters are programming their apps with stripped, tired reality shows (which works for a broadcast linear schedule and not so-much on-demand viewing) and cheap library content, is laughable to me. Australian audiences are flocking to the likes of Netflix because they have been treated badly for years by broadcasters and aren’t being serviced very well by the commercial broadcasters online offer. Big tech are offering an actual alternative.

Of course, ASTRA/Foxtel’s interest in this extends beyond trying to ensure they can retain prominence on connected devices and Smart TVs for years to come. It also has its own hardware set for release. The upcoming “Hubbl” is a range of connected TV devices (think of them as being like an Apple TV or Google Chromecast, but operated by Foxtel) and Smart TVs. Obviously, Foxtel would rather that its digital products be seen front and center on the new devices and not its competitors.

And frankly, that is fair enough. If a user wants to buy into a Foxtel experience, then they should be able to get that experience. That customer isn’t buying into a Foxtel platform to have it dominated by services offering little more than Masterchef and Big Brother.

I’ve mentioned this in the newsletter before. My own position then as it is now is that as long as Australians aren’t locked into these networks having their apps locked as the first apps on their screen and this only impacts app store placements, I’m not going to be wildly angry. But do Australian broadcasters deserve this? Heavens no.

It’s a bit rich that these networks (which no longer have obligations around paying license fees and broadcasting children’s content, and produce almost zero local scripted dramas or comedies) still see themselves as worthy of such a privileged position.

• Series star Matt Bomer claims there is serious talk about bringing back the show White Collar. Madness - lets just bring back Burn Notice as well if we are now in the “given up completely” phase of TV show commissions. Read: TV Line

• A Bosch spin-off has been announced, bringing the Renee Bollard character to the screen. To be clear, Bollard hasn’t actually been featured in the TV show version of Bosch yet. Read: Dark Horizons

• Former host of The Late Show with David Letterman, David Letterman, will return as a guest on the show, which is now titled The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. Read: Rolling Stone

• Ride, a show that neither you, nor I, I had no idea existed, has been cancelled by Hallmark. It was a Yellowstone-esque inspired drama starring Nancy Travis. Read: Deadline

• Apple, Disney, Warner Bros. Discovery, Paramount, NBCUniversal, and more companies have paused advertising on Elon Musk’s X after he posted antisemitic comments. Read: The Verge. Meanwhile, free-speech advocate Musk says he plans to sue Media Matters for reporting on companies whose ads were placed against the comments. Read: Variety

• We were so close to living in a better world without the Golden Globes. But alas, CBS has picked up the once-corrupt awards show. Read: Indiewire

• An audit by analytics company Reelgood has found (the US) Paramount Plus had 830 movie titles available for streaming on Oct. 15, fewer than half of the 2,302 it had on October 17, 2021. That’s a drop of 64%. Read: NextTV

• Recurring The Sopranos star Suzanne Shepherd has died at age 89. She played Carmella’s mother in a recurring role. Read: THR

• Clay supplier Newclay Products has closed down, which is a huge problem for Aardman Animations which used its clay exclusively. Read: The Telegraph

• 450 props and costumes from The Crown are going up for auction. Read: Deadline

• Ardent movie enthusiast Nicole Kidman says that a third season of her TV show Big Little Lies is on the way. Read: Deadline

• Hugh Bonneville will star opposite Karen Gillan in Steven Moffatt dramedy Douglas is Cancelled. I’m very much there for it anytime Moffatt wants to write funny. Read: Variety

Blood Vessel debuts Dec 8 on Netflix.

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That’s the newsletter for today. More tomorrow.