Want to use NBCUniversal’s new Peacock streaming service? You may encounter some accessibility issues according to multiple reports including Variety.
For starters, the service was initially a no-show on Android and Android TV devices – hit with a delay in getting published to the Google Play store and wasn’t live as of 8am US-ET. That’s a contrast to iOS where the service actually became available early on iPhone, iPad and Apple TV devices. The app quickly shot up to the top spot on Apple TV’s app store.
Whilst people were able to sign up and pay for subscriptions without issues, the service appeared to be stopping numerous kinds of geo-blocking circumventions and privacy protection measures like VPNs – making it highly difficult for anyone trying to access from outside the United States (including U.S. residents presently overseas) or those within but who utilise VPNs.
Even if you’re in the United States there are other issues. Along with the ongoing disputes over distribution terms preventing the service running on Roku and Amazon fire devices, it’s also not on Samsung Smart TVs and won’t arrive on PS4 until next week.
Peacock is available in three tiers – Peacock Free with over 13,000 hours, Peacock Premium with more than 20,000 hours of programming (but with ads) for $4.99 per month, and Peacock Premium Ad-Free for $9.99 per month. The ad services will have limited commercial time of five minutes per hour and frequency capping to prevent the same ad coming up again too much.
NBCU is the last major media company to go the SVOD route, though CBS is expected to reboot its CBS All Access app early next year. Peacock is expected to go international at a later date but no plans on a global expansion have been announced at this time.
Meanwhile Peacock has made some announcements in regards to content. They’ve picked up the Archie Panjabi and Christopher Plummer-led mini-series “Departure,” set a September 3rd launch for the third season of “A.P Bio,” picked up Aussie drama “Five Bedrooms” for an August 13th launch, UK comedy “Hitmen” for August 6th and both seasons of anthology series “Sacred Lies” which are available now.
