HBO Max is dead to me; merged service with Discovery will just be called “Max”

I wonder how long before our AT&T free subscriptions get cancelled.

There's no way that streaming services can make a profit when there are 50 streaming platforms and thousands of shows within each of those platforms for content.

Too many options; not enough views.

I picked up MAX for $1.99 a month for three months. I'll watch And Just LIke That (So far it's awful) and White Lotus and then when I'm finished I'll cancel it.

Just like that.

[quote] thousands of shows within each of those platforms for content.

People subscribe for something new. The legacy content doesn't add anything. Just ask Paramount Plus.

Watch, in three months they will raise the price to $19.99.

R4, I have TUBI, which is free and it has tons of classic TV on there; Dark Shadows, Maude, Batman; I can spend a lot of time watching that stuff and when I'm watching that stuff I'm not watching the latest hot program on Netflix.

There's just too much out there.

Keep them separate. The demographics are different, and I have no interest in paying extra for the Discovery reality garbage crap.

The HBO name is the prestige name, and has the cachet.

Max is a stupid name for a streamer.

More shows like my 600 lb Life and Sister Wives.

HBO's brand has been so confusing. HBO Go, HBO On-Demand, HBO Max and now just Max? I think the HBO Max name suggests you get Cinemax programming too, as HBO and Cinemax are often bundled/promoted together. This is just another example of corporate greed fucking over customers with too many choices. Right when I think I have all these streamers figured out and, in turn, am able to explain it to my aging parents, shit gets shaken up and confusing again.

Ugh. I get Max for free now since I'm an HBO subscriber. I'd prefer the option of paying a few more bucks for HBO in order to also Max. Discovery seems to have a lot of trash that I don't want to pay for.

r3 be sure to watch Hacks before you cancel HBOMax

Why would you ruin and forsake both brand names (HBO and Discovery) for the name “Max”? Max has no brand or goodwill behind it. I don’t understand that as a corporate strategy.

Macksh.

I just subscribed this past weekend as part of a gear's free promotion via Xfinity. I'm catching up on the latest seasons of Curb and Veep which I never got to see. The Gilded Age is interesting, and I'll be givu White Lotus a try in due time. Most wonderfully, I'll be getting reacquainted with my beloved TCM, which is included. It's been years now since I'd gone free stream.

Their new CEO from Discovery has no idea what the fuck he is doing. HBO Max was actually very successful.

That CEO is loyal to Discovery first since he was running them for 15 years. Discovery is a flop. Now he wants Discovery to piggyback off of HBOMax’s success combining the two so people don’t choose one over the other. The shows this guy did are Sister Wives and those women who are fat fucks. He also is doing away with scripted shit. He wants all reality on the streamer.

The CEO knows exactly what he is doing

He is starving the company so it can be dismantled in 2024 in a widely anticipated sale to Comcast. This is about bringing costs down and one streaming service is more economical than two. In all likelihood Max, having a diminished brand identity, will be merged into a successor to Peacock that will probably end up being called Universal Plus.

So even more content? Cool!

I guess Sam and Ben were already taken?

[quote] The CEO knows exactly what he is doing

He is starving the company so it can be dismantled in 2024 in a widely anticipated sale to Comcast. This is about bringing costs down and one streaming service is more economical than two. In all likelihood Max, having a diminished brand identity, will be merged into a successor to Peacock that will probably end up being called Universal Plus.

So 30 Rock basically predicted the future and Kabletown is becoming a reality!

This is so stupid. The HBO name is what lends some prestige to the brand. And what of pricing? Will fans of HBO's scripted programming have to subsidize Sister Wives and My Next Door Mormon Polygamist Retard and whatever other exploitative reality trash Discovery produces so that we can continue to watch our series. These streaming platforms all began as showcases for prestige television and they're all turning into a race to the bottom.

It’s not TV, It’s HBO. I mean, It’s not TV, It’s Max.

You were divine, Max

You were like wine, Max

Who could decline, Max?

You filthy swine, Max!

In old Chicago, by the sea...

I'm all caught up on the last few seasons of Curb, Veep, and I really liked Guilded. Can anyone recommend another series to binge? I've already done all the older series ie Sopranos, True Blood, Thrones, etc. Recommend some newer ones and why should I see them?

Enlightened with Laura Dern.

Max rebrands next month

Will HBO subscribers still get it free?

Agree with r22. I don’t want to have to wade through all the trash to find a few good programs I want to watch.

I wonder if Comcast is only interested in buying HBO which would explain the service dropping the name.

OK so what is going to happen now

Max is going to be combined with a TON of Discovery Garbage

If you subscribe to HBO Max/ Max, there will be no way to filter out the HBO/WB programming from the new garbage

However, if you just want the Discovery garbage by itself, you will still have the option to subscribe to Discovery Plus which will be the same service minus the HBO/WB programs

I just hope my show, which is on one of these services, survives the transition.

What happens to me?

I'm already paying $15.99/month for HBOMAX and $6.99 for Discovery+?

Will you should cancel your Discovery Plus after the merger.

The new service will have three price tiers

If you want ad free you can pay 16, or 20 per month if you want 4K

I get HBO Max because of my AT&T cable but I’m assuming that will sunset

At this point it’s extremely unlikely I will subscribe to Max until The Last of Us or White Lotus returns

They really destroyed the brand

I consider myself pretty media savvy but this shit is still very, very confusing and off-putting. It's difficult to build brand loyalty and avoid "churning" when you don't know what the fuck you are or what to call yourself. I'm over it.

HBOMax/Max is the Trans nonbinary of the entertainment landscape

[quote]HBOMax/Max is the Trans nonbinary of the entertainment landscape

What are its pronouns?

Also note they changed the color from Bright Purple to Blue

Disney Plus and Paramount Plus are also Blue

Major Branding Fail

🟦🟦🟦

And Prime is Light Blue

R36, I agree. It's all quite confusing.

R28,

I’m an HBO subscriber (via my cable provider) and get HBO Max for free.

I just received an email stating in part…

What to Expect on May 23

We’ll move your HBO Max account to Max – your profile and watch list will be waiting for you.

Streaming services should be nationalized and merged with a pay-per-view model rather than subscriptions.

I may run for President on this platform.

I think I will just stick with my beloved MHzChoice

If you have HBO Max, does this mean you will still get HBO through this stupid merger?

i'm with R4 and TUBI

You can wath endless reruns of Chuck Connors ass in those tight jeans on The Rifleman channel 24/7.

It really is the easisest decision one can make.

WBD stock actually fell because of the presentation

Granted that is the ultimate goal; drive the price so low so a competitor can acquire it

r42 didn't read the fine print.

[quote]If you subscribe through a TV, mobile, or wireless provider, your provider will let you know of any price or plan changes.

Every time I read Max I hear Agent 99 saying it.

I hear Tony Roberts.

I agree with a poster on another site who said, why would you choose a name that doesn't include "HBO" in it? HBO is a highly-recognized brand name that has come to signify high-quality programming. You cut it out and just go with "Max"? Makes no sense.

So is HBO content being removed from Max?

Because David Zaslav wants to kill HBO. I don't understand the reasoning behind it, other than he is the dumbest tool to ever be made the head of any company (though it would seem even the dumbest idiot in the world would understand this is a terrible idea), but there it is.

No, with the exception of several programs which were announced earlier were being sold to third-party Free Ad-Supported Streaming Channels.

I was in a blu-ray forum last night discussing a new disc of Warner Bros Looney Tunes shorts, and more than one person said (this was from Jan of this year) that Zaslav had removed both the Looney Tunes and The Flintstones cartoons from the platform. I logged on and they are both still there, but I can't imagine several people had this experience without it being true. I wonder what made them reinstate both.

I had been watching The Flintstones on and off on HBO Max to see what the remasters looked like before I decided to upgrade to blu-ray (they're gorgeous and a huge step up from SD quality) and I did notice that they were missing from my "Continue Watching" queue, so it's likely they had been removed at some point, even though they're back.

If his goal is to strip the company for parts then the rebrand makes some sense because it’s going to eventually have to be rebranded anyway. Remember, the buyer for HBO will most likely be Comcast, Amazon or Apple and all three already have existing streaming services. They may not want to go through the hassle of acquiring and integrating the Max streaming service; they may just want to tack on HBO to their existing platforms. So Discovery will likely continue to run Max as a service for their own programs which have no real value as an acquisition target.

What Zaslav is actually doing is smart if you view it from the POV of him restoring pedigree and value to the HBO Brand because was AT&T did was sully it by attaching it to an omnibus general entertainment product with lots of awful content like Velma and Fuckboy Island. HBO is the Tiffany brand of the old Time Warner portfolio.

Umm, no. What Zaslav is doing is NOT smart. Once a brand falls the way HBO has under Zaslav, it's going to be nearly impossible to restore it to what it was. He's killed the value of it, not to mention the reputation.

Well it’s smart for himself, he’ll obviously make a lot of money dismantling the company. No one actually wants Warner Bros to disappear.

There's no dismantling the assets here. Zaslow is just painting the house to sell the whole property to Comcast. He doesn't give a shit about historical legacies or maintaining reputation as long as he can get a great return on his investment.

It’s all a scam to keep raising the price to over $20 a month. Soon it will be $59, then $100 a month.

Comcast doesn’t need some assets like CNN (it already owns MSNBC)

They will just want the Warner Bros studio, HBO and a handful on tv brands like Cartoon Network and TCM

I thought that I would save a lot of money by "cutting the cord" but I'm now paying the same price for all my streaming services that I was paying for expensive DirecTV.

Like buying cable, Zaslow isn't going to make lots of smaller deals so that other companies can just pick and choose what assets they want to buy.

It will be an all or nothing deal and then will be Comcast's problem with having both CNN and MSNBC. No big mergers are perfect fits and there's always lots of redundencies.

Comcast is also trying to expand its Universal theme park business and having the DC, Cartoon Network, Harry Potter, etc characters would be a big help to take away business from Disney

I am giving up in Netflix. It’s crap.

R32 which show?

So once it’s sold to Comcast, Zaslov is out?

Zaslav would be a major Comcast shareholder like the Murdochs are at Disney but would not have any control over the way the sold properties are run. Zaslav would most likely continue to run the company with the remaining assets Luke the Murdochs do with Fox Corp.

Would more people subscribe to Peacock if it were just Cock?

Zavlov can’t go fast enough.

"Hmm, let's see, we have these couple of brands here. One is Nordstrom the other one is K-Mart, and now we're adding a bunch of Dollar General programming to the basket. Let's drop Nordstrom and rebrand everything K-Mart, surely that's a smart brand move and doesn't throw out billions in brand value, right?"

[quote]Will HBO subscribers still get it free?

Peacock is free to all Comcast customers but only until June when they will start charging $2.99