News Corp. COO Vows Company Will Continue to Impose Delays on New-Release Product for Kiosks, Streaming Platforms

Discussing News Corp.’s operating priorities during a Wednesday earnings call, chief operating officer Chase Carey said that the company’s studio subsidiaries would continue to delay availability of new video programming on digital platforms such as Hulu — as well as in DVD rental kiosks from Redbox and others — in efforts to preserve content “value.” “We need to intelligently take advantage of expanding digital platforms that continue to reshape our business,” Carey said (transcript via Seeking Alpha). “We believe authentication is a core strategy in this regard, both to maximize and protect the value of our content. Recently, this has led us to put an 8-day delay on pre-unauthenticated access to our network content and it has been a cornerstone for new digital extensions to our franchises like ‘Big Ten’ to go.” Under the company’s first “authentication” initiative, online viewers of Fox TV shows such as “Glee” will need to prove they are a Dish Network subscriber to access new episodes. Otherwise, viewers will have to wait 8 days to access new episodes on Hulu.com and Fox.com. Carey added that News Corp. would continue to “make sure we are vigilant about attacking practices that undervalue our products, like $1 rentals, and building new platforms that fairly value our content. We’ll do business with new emerging digital platforms like Netflix, where we establish clear rules about what is library product...However, our priority is to make sure we’re thoughtful and do not allow a quick buck to jeopardize the longer-term value of our product.”