>>130189381(1/2)
Marketing is a big factor here; the refusal to give up creative control and allow some cartoons to expand to new markets is also an issue. This is most obvious for shows like Amphibia and TOH. Look at the numbers for True Colors on Disney's YouTube -- 3.4 million views, released the same day TC dropped. These are bonker numbers that, if they had been on cable, the company would've salivated over. That's how many people actually watch Amphibia. It numbers in the millions.
Now look at Escape to Amphibia, which was released on their YouTube channel a month after its initial release: 217k views. That is a massive decrease. You would be right to ask: did Amphibia really drop that many viewers? And the answer is: no, that's fucking stupid, of course they didn’t. The problem was that *everyone had already seen the episode,* and they didn’t watch it on cable or from Disney – cable is a dead and expensive medium, and Disney gatekeeps their content on all other platforms. Instead, they pirated it: watched it on streams, watched it on WCO or KissCartoon or any of the other websites that put it up day one, for free, no questions asked. These are more easily accessible than Disney is, fundamentally. They don’t require an account, and they are quick. I actually have Disney+, and I still end up watching basically every cartoon I care about on WCO because it’s way less of a hassle.
People naturally look for the most accessible, easily-streamlined medium for watching media they enjoy, and for anyone that has an internet connection, which is everyone, that is always going to be sites that are free to use. Disney and other corporations need to stop clinging onto cable and pay-to-use streaming services. These are not going to be revitalized while the internet is open and free, and they will never be able to stop the internet from being open and free no matter how much dumbshit legislation they try to put through. It is a beast that is too big to tame.
