While the U.S. movie rental and the movie and TV-buying markets decline as subscription VOD revenue grows, rentals, purchases, SVOD and movie box office combined still fall far short of what consumers pay for pay-TV services, nScreenMedia analyst Colin Dixon blogged Sunday, pointing to Digital Entertainment Group numbers (see 1708030048).

After protracted negotiations, CBS and DirecTV Now announced Monday they have a deal for the streaming service to carry CBS programming, giving DirecTV Now subscribers access to the four major TV networks and affiliated channels. John Stankey, CEO of AT&T Entertainment Group, expressed hope for a deal “down the road” when DirecTV Now launched in November (see 1611280058), and Monday’s news is a “huge positive” for the network, Wells Fargo analyst Marci Ryvicker wrote investors. The nine-month negotiations likely hinged on ancillary rights rather than rate, said Ryvicker. The deal includes Showtime, CW, Pop and CBS Sports Network, and affiliates of CBS and CW also will have the opportunity to participate, they said. Ryvicker said the agreement appears to be with just DirecTV Now, not part of a broader deal for CBS with AT&T and DirecTV, and she expects it to be similar to those DirecTV Now has with other services for a rolling five episodes vs. an entire season or library. The companies didn’t respond to questions. DirecTV customers have access to more than 120 channels, said the provider.

The News Media Alliance is “deeply troubled” by Attorney General Jeff Sessions' statements Friday suggesting government leakers could face prosecution and that DOJ is reviewing its policy on media subpoenas, NMA said in a release Monday. The statements are “an attempt to chill communications between the press and government officials,” NMA said. “Threatening the use of subpoenas that could compel reporters to testify, and, in particular, to reveal the identity of a confidential source, will restrict the flow of information to reporters and ultimately to the public on matters of public interest,” said NMA. “The Attorney General’s statements are an attempt to stifle communications between government officials and journalists which will ultimately keep the public in the dark,” said CEO David Chavern. DOJ guidelines on subpoenaing the media shouldn’t be changed, NMA said. DOJ didn't comment.

Parking production assistants reached a proposed $1.75 million settlement with production companies Prodco, FTP Productions, Marvel TV, ABC Studios, Film 49 Productions, Hop Skip & Jump Productions and Lunar Mining. In an unopposed motion (in Pacer) posted Friday in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, the production companies denied that the parking workers were wrongly deprived of overtime pay but agreed to make the payment. Lions Gate, defendant in a similar suit, said in a July report (in Pacer) the parties expected to have settlement terms finalized by the end of September.

The FCC shouldn’t listen to the numerous broadcaster calls to relax or reduce the required filing of Form 323 ownership reports (see 1708040037), said several public interest groups, including Prometheus Radio Project, Common Cause and Public Knowledge, the National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians (NABET-CWA), and the American Civil Liberties Union in reply comments filed in the FCC's Media Deregulation docket 17-105 Friday. “Ownership reports are essential to the Commission’s ability to ensure that stations meet their statutory obligations to serve the public interest and to enforce its rules, the groups said. They also opposed changes to FCC rules for attributing stockholders, since relaxing them could allow some entities to get around ownership regulations. PK also separately filed comments asking the FCC to again consider set-top box market reform. “Promoting consumer choice, ensuring that new entrant video programmers can access video programing and keeping prices low are goals the Commission should pursue today as much as ever,” PK said. Reduction of paperwork and notification requirements that apply to cable carriers should extend to DBS providers, said AT&T. It opposes broadcaster requests to do away with hard copy mailed carriage elections, AT&T said. “AT&T opposes any proposal to shift this burden” to carriers, the filing said. Nexstar, NAB and others also cited regulations they don’t want the FCC to change, such as retransmission consent rules. “NAB opposes certain proposals that would increase the burdens faced by broadcast licensees, reduce the quality of service to the public, or merely shift burdens to another entity or the public,” NAB said. NAB and the Educational Media Foundation asked the FCC to be careful with requests from other broadcasters to relax interference rules for full-power FM stations. The commission should move slowly in areas of “substantive engineering considerations,” the Educational Media Foundation said. GatesAir was among broadcasters asking the FCC to allow FM booster stations to originate programming. “The existing prohibition on independent transmissions by FM booster stations is a relic of the past, dictated not by any compelling policy rationale,” GatesAir said. Viacom supported broadcaster calls for re-examination of the children’s TV rules. “The pace and scale of technological and behavioral change is sufficient justification for a comprehensive re-examination of the children’s programming rules,” said Viacom, which owns Nickelodeon. The network affiliate associations for ABC, CBS and FBC jointly sought more kids’ TV flexibility and a general streamlining of FCC reporting requirements such as those related to equal employment opportunity rules.

U.S. consumer spending on home entertainment content rose 2.6 percent in 2017's first half to $9.17 billion, said a Digital Entertainment Group Thursday midyear report. Subscription streaming was the report’s big winner, as spending in that sector jumped 24 percent in first half to $3.62 billion, DEG said. Brick-and-mortar rentals moved closer to extinction, falling 20.2 percent to $207.11 million. Though sell-through of packaged goods fell 10.4 percent in the first half to $2.31 billion, the rate of decline in Q2 was only 5.8 percent, after the 14.3 percent decline in Q1. This was due to a 2 percent Q2 rise in spending on Blu-ray titles. Other findings: (1) More than 4.8 million Ultra HD TVs were sold in the first half, bringing the total number of sets sold to date above 20 million; (2) About a million Ultra HD Blu-ray playback devices were sold in the first half, bringing the number of players sold life to date to 4.3 million, including game console; (3) availability of Ultra HD Blu-ray content is “expanding rapidly,” with 166 titles on the market.

Hulu users' loyalty to it over traditional pay-TV tops Netflix and Amazon Prime users' and could help that service convert its subscription VOD users to Hulu Live TV subscribers, The Diffusion Group said in a news release Wednesday. TDG said 67 percent of Hulu users who also subscribe to a traditional pay-TV service say that, if forced to choose, they would stick with SVOD, compared with 52 percent of Netflix dual-service users and 49 percent of Amazon Prime dual-service users. TDG said Hulu, with its emphasis on broadcast and cable TV shows over movies, makes it a better substitute for live legacy pay-TV than Netflix or Amazon Prime.

Streaming services like Netflix often push their own content over licensed content in their recommendations, and while some say that could be harming consumers, and video streaming businesses themselves suffer harm if they aren't able to boost content, nScreenMedia analyst Colin Dixon blogged Monday. With many programmers limiting what they license to subscription VOD services, Netflix has dramatically boosted its original content, making the persuasion of subscribers to watch more of that and less licensed content "a strategic imperative," nScreenMedia said.

Some analysts have concerns about Pandora growth prospects, as it scaled back from revenue guidance of $1.5 billion-$1.65 billion for the year to $1.45 billion-$1.5 billion and Q3 revenue to $370 million-$385 million. Revenue advanced 10 percent over Q2 2016 to $376.8 million as paid subscribers jumped 24 percent, said the company Monday. Recent management changes (see 1706270031) “create uncertainty” and subscription numbers are expected to grow more slowly as Pandora focuses on overall audience growth, Wedbush Securities' Michael Pachter wrote investors Tuesday. Chief Financial Officer and interim CEO Naveen Chopra said lower guidance reflects the plan to prioritize growth and retention of active users “rather than aggressively pushing all users to subscriptions,” a projected $50 million-$55 million loss of revenue from the sale of Ticketfly and the closing of some Pandora international operations. Cowen & Co.'s John Blackledge later cited “a ton of moving pieces” and remained “cautious” on the company. Pandora shares closed down 3.35 percent Tuesday at $8.65.

Google's YouTube Red subscription VOD service hasn't been a success since its 2015 launch, but has big potential, nScreenMedia's Lloyd Dixon blogged Thursday. Its estimated 1.5 million subscribers would seem like a success, but that's less than 0.1 percent of YouTube's total monthly user base, and on the iTunes app store it ranks far below Netflix and Hulu, he said. Red being advertising-free is of limited appeal since ad-blocking software is widely used, and its original content -- while perhaps enticing to younger demographics -- is limited, said the analyst: Subscription VOD growth is slowing in the U.S., which could limit YouTube Red growth. But he said the huge YouTube user base is a big opportunity. Google didn't comment Friday.