What’s in a name? For Apple TV, it’s certainly not a plus. In yet another subtle rebrand for one of our major streaming services, Apple is shedding the plus for a fresh, clean look. With all the details, we have our entertainment lawyer from Blake & Wang P.A., Brandon Blake, to keep us in the loop.
A New Identity
Apple quietly revealed the name change during its press release around the shift of its highly successful release, F1: The Movie, onto the streaming service. While their claims of it being a “vibrant new identity” may be stretching it a bit far, it does highlight a swing we’ve seen to simpler, clearer brand identification among the top streaming platforms of late.
The Little Streamer That Could
While Apple TV remains one of the smallest mainstream streaming platforms, with only 45M subscribers and most indications suggesting it runs at a notable loss (perhaps even $1B a year), covered by the rest of the Amazon shopping ecosystem, it does have some accolades that earn it its “major” status.
Most notably, Apple was the first streaming service to win the Academy Award for Best Picture with a win for CODA. They have also had further successes with The Boy, The Mole, The Fox and the Horse in the animated short film category, and, of course, Killers of the Flower Moon netted 10 nominations, the equal of many a legacy studio in the day. With their TV Original, Ted Lasso, having also dominated in several Emmy awards seasons, Apple TV accounts for 620 wins and 2,816 nominations, with 22 of those in the latest Emmy session.
While the quiet dropping of the plus is likely to go mostly unnoticed within an industry that already saw them as just “Apple” to start with, it does raise the question of whether we will see other action from Apple ahead, as they have also been very active in the deal and bundling market of late.
Film and Television 