Awful Announcing is reporting that ESPN hasn't abandoned the idea of putting the first hour of major WWE Premium Live Events on its linear channels, even though that hour went missing at SummerSlam. The stated reason is a scheduling conflict rather than a change in strategy. SummerSlam ran across two nights on August 1 and 2, and the channels had a Savannah Bananas game on the Saturday and a WNBA/NWSL doubleheader on the Sunday.
The first-hour simulcast started with WrestleMania 42 and it's a strange piece of television. You hand the opening hour to a big cable audience, then tell them the rest lives on ESPN Unlimited. It's a funnel rather than a broadcast, and whether it works depends entirely on how painless the jump is.
Which is where this has been a mess. When Unlimited launched, several pay-TV and live TV streaming providers had no authentication path at all, so people already paying for ESPN through their provider were being asked to buy ESPN a second time. There's a class action over that now, including a plaintiff who paid separately for Wrestlepalooza and then cancelled. YouTube TV subscribers with ESPN in their package only became eligible for Unlimited access through account linking ahead of SummerSlam, and even that rolled out gradually, so plenty of people met a paywall on the night.
For a reported five-year, 1.6 billion dollar deal, spending a year teaching your audience that having ESPN doesn't mean having ESPN is an expensive way to onboard them.
Did anyone here get the YouTube TV account linking working first try, or were you in a support chat halfway through the card?
The first-hour simulcast started with WrestleMania 42 and it's a strange piece of television. You hand the opening hour to a big cable audience, then tell them the rest lives on ESPN Unlimited. It's a funnel rather than a broadcast, and whether it works depends entirely on how painless the jump is.
Which is where this has been a mess. When Unlimited launched, several pay-TV and live TV streaming providers had no authentication path at all, so people already paying for ESPN through their provider were being asked to buy ESPN a second time. There's a class action over that now, including a plaintiff who paid separately for Wrestlepalooza and then cancelled. YouTube TV subscribers with ESPN in their package only became eligible for Unlimited access through account linking ahead of SummerSlam, and even that rolled out gradually, so plenty of people met a paywall on the night.
For a reported five-year, 1.6 billion dollar deal, spending a year teaching your audience that having ESPN doesn't mean having ESPN is an expensive way to onboard them.
Did anyone here get the YouTube TV account linking working first try, or were you in a support chat halfway through the card?
