Remember streaming password sharing? For ages the online movie and TV companies did nothing as subscribers gleefully gave their logins to everyone they knew. Who could afford to watch all the hot shows when subscribing to every streamer was costing more than having cable? Turns out that wasn’t profitable for the companies. Netflix started cracking down first. Disney+ followed suit later (while raising rates). Now the axe is coming down for one of their fellow corporate streamers.
Per The Hollywood Reporter, subscribers to Hulu — which, like ESPN, is also owned by Disney — received a surprise email on Wednesday bearing a new agreement, effective starting March 12.
“Unless otherwise permitted by your Service Tier, you may not share your subscription outside of your household,” it read. “‘Household’ means the collection of devices associated with your primary personal residence that are used by the individuals who reside therein.”
There was also some ominous threats.
“We may, in our sole discretion, analyze the use of your account to determine compliance with this Agreement,” the message read. “If we determine, in our sole discretion, that you have violated this Agreement, we may limit or terminate access to the Service and/or take any other steps as permitted by this Agreement.”
The move was teased last summer during a Disney earnings call, when honcho Bob Iger said he and his team were “actively exploring ways to address account sharing and the best options for paying subscribers to share their accounts with friends and family.” The solution they came up with? Only sharing accounts with family and/or friends subscribers live with.
The news comes after Netflix, which was once bleeding subscribers and cash, reported two consecutive quarters of big subscriber growth, totaling 22 million. Surely Disney is hoping the same windfall will happen to their streamers.
So if you’ve been sharing your Hulu login — or, better yet, been generously gifted with someone else’s — you have less than a month-and-a-half to change your ways. The move should particularly irk those who’ve been handed logins to Hulu’s ad-free version, because ads are so numerous now that viewers aren’t the only ones annoyed.
(Via THR)
Source: https://uproxx.com/tv/hulu-banning-password-sharing-like-disney-plus/
