Los Angeles (AFP)

Mery Montenegro temporarily trades the screen of her television against that of her calculator: to the $ 1,500 that this American mother pays throughout the year for various video-on-demand services, she will now have to add the subscription to Disney + .

The eldest of her two daughters, Victoria, aged 6, "asks every day when will come" this new platform and its impressive catalog of movies and series Disney, Marvel or Star Wars.

Mery Montenegro, who works at an advertising agency in Washington, knows the date by heart: from November 12, she will start paying $ 6.99 more every month.

In addition to Disney +, operators are scrambling in the streaming market, with HBO Max (AT & T), Peacock (Comcast), Apple TV + and short formats of Quibi next year. An increasingly tense market, such as consumer finances.

"It's going to have a huge impact on people's budgets," Tom Nunan, an Oscar-winning producer and teacher at UCLA California University, told AFP. "I do not think the average American has the ability to subscribe to all these video-on-demand services."

According to a study published last March by Deloitte, 69% of respondents said they had at least one streaming subscription.

Mery Montenegro, 36, subscribes to both television and streaming. She pays about $ 90 for her television subscription but assures "almost never use it" except for news or baseball games.

She regrets that she does not really have a choice: "to take only the internet subscription is more expensive" than the offer including television. This is the case for most American homes.

At $ 90 a month, she adds $ 5.99 for Hulu and $ 16 for Netflix, which is essential for him. "I use it in the subway when I go to work, when I cook, when I want to see something at home," she says.

Amazon's videos, included in the premium subscription of the internet distribution giant, cost him $ 12.99 more.

The addition totals $ 124.98 a month, plus $ 6.99 ahead for Disney +, for an annual total of $ 1,583.

- Back to square one? -

The mother stops there, but the note could be even more salty, between the paid option of YouTube ($ 11.99) and specialized platforms for fans of musicals, wrestling and other sports championships.

The Los Angeles Times has identified some 40 platforms, which would cost a total of $ 353.43 per month, when the Deloitte study mentions up to 300 video-on-demand services.

Nearly half of the respondents were worried about this inflation of offers, which "makes the content more difficult to find".

"At first, it was not hard to choose, there were two streaming services: Netflix and Amazon," recalls Tom Nunan. "But am I really going to subscribe to six or seven? I doubt it."

Ironically, streaming may end up resembling the traditional TV it was supposed to revolutionize, with an overabundance of expensive offers and too many programs for the subscriber to really look at.

"What could happen in the future is that consumers are rebelling and saying they have too many products when they only want to see four or five," says marketing professor Gene Del Vecchio. at the University of Southern California.

For the expert, "we may end up having a formula + à la carte +, with consumers who just want individual programs and who will not pay for others".

A return to the literal definition of "video on demand"?

© 2019 AFP