Apple throws weight around in TV negotiations
While Apple harbors big TV ambitions, it's having a tough time getting media companies to play along. — Apple is pushing ahead with plans to launch a streaming TV service by Christmas — despite making little headway in its negotiations with content providers, The Post has learned.
Context & Ripple Effects
The Wall Street Journal flagged Apple's TV ambitions back in December 2011; this New York Post report adds the friction point — confirmed little headway in licensing talks with media companies, even as Apple pushes a Christmas 2012 launch target. The story traveled unusually wide on pickup day, with MacRumors, Business Insider, VentureBeat, The Verge, Electronista and others all running versions.
The timing matters because Apple's hardware cadence is already in motion: sources point to a new Apple TV box launching alongside the next iPad in March, with confirmed AirPlay integration between iPads and Apple TVs. A hardware refresh without fresh content deals leaves the platform leaning on existing iTunes inventory.
First-order effects
- Media companies face a direct negotiation test: Apple wants a subscription streaming service by Christmas 2012, and their refusal to license on Apple's terms is the single blocker standing between the plan and reality.
- Apple's March Apple TV hardware refresh ships into a content gap — the box can stream what iTunes already has, but the differentiated subscription offering depends on deals not yet secured.
Second-order effects
- If Apple cannot close licensing terms, expect it to route around the impasse through its own pipes — AirPlay mirroring from iPads and an upgraded set-top turn every screen Apple owns into a distribution surface that content owners do not directly control.
- Cable distributors and other pay-TV intermediaries gain leverage from Apple's stalemate: any rival bundling deal Apple fails to sign strengthens their position as the default gatekeepers between programmers and viewers.
Third-order effects
- If content owners hold the line on licensing, the pattern points toward platforms buying or producing programming outright rather than renting it — shifting TV economics from carriage fees toward owned-content competition, though whether Apple takes that path remains unconfirmed.
- A failed 2012 launch would harden the lesson for every consumer-electronics company eyeing TV: distribution hardware alone does not unlock premium content, making rights negotiation the real moat in connected-TV.
The trend: Consumer-tech platforms entering television are colliding with programmers' licensing leverage, forcing a choice between accepting bundle economics and building owned content instead.