WBD is shutting down its CNN+ streaming service at the end of April, and will be saying goodbye to project lead Andrew Morse. It’s been almost exactly one month since it first launched and garnered over 100k subscribers in its first few days on the market.
But the hype didn’t last long, at all – it was reported last week that the service was attracting less than 10k daily viewers. WBD has only recently merged, and has promised investors the deal will save at least $3bn for the business, a promise it couldn’t keep if it was sinking money into a failing service.
It’s not a good look for the industry. It throws gas on the fire that Netflix started with its declining users, causing doubts about the public’s previously insatiable need for video-on-demand content. What will this mean for WBD’s plan to merge Discovery and HBO to create a streaming giant?