The Melbourne Cup is proof that Australia’s big moments cannot be paywalled
The Melbourne Cup is famously billed as the race that stops a nation - proof positive of its place as a cultural marker in the lives of Australians. Bridget Fair, the CEO of Free TV Australia, argues that free-to-air TV is vital in keeping our nation's moments free and available to all.
The millions of people who tuned in this year to watch the Matildas’ FIFA Women’s World Cup campaign, the NRL State of Origin series, the AFL Grand Final and the finale of Married At First Sight proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that free-to-air TV continues to play an important role in our lives. But more than that, local, free TV is still what creates the huge cultural moments that unite Australia.
Free-to-air TV is built on universal free access for all Australians to news, sport and other culturally important content. But to continue creating the moments that unite the nation, Australians have to be able to find it. And that is under serious threat. Our local free TV services are becoming increasingly hard to find on connected TVs, with deep-pocketed foreign giants including Netflix, Disney, You Tube and Amazon Prime grabbing the best real estate and buying prominent visibility.
Turn on any connected TV set and take a look at which services have the best positions on the screen. Overwhelmingly, they are the global services that people have to pay for. The local free-to-air services – the ABC, Seven, Nine, Ten and SBS – are much less prominent and sometimes not visible at all.
Here’s the problem. Our local free TV services are delivered to all Australians for free. They invest billions in fresh and unique content each year and they need to reach millions of Australians each day to generate the advertising revenue that keeps those services free. Yet TV manufacturers want to charge local TV providers up to 30 percent of revenue just to be present on the TV screen. That money would come directly out of Australian content.
Recognising the valuable role free-to-air TV plays in keeping Australians informed and entertained, its key role in telling Australian stories and the significant contribution it makes to the Australian economy, the Albanese government is planning to legislate a “prominence” law that makes sure local free-to-air TV services can easily be found on television devices. Put simply, it will ensure free live TV and the five broadcasters’ apps (including ABC and SBS) are offered to consumers when the TV is first set up. If people don’t want them, they can move or delete them.
While “prominence” itself is a clunky term that means little to most people, there is widespread support for the idea that the local free TV services we know and love should be easy to find.
A survey of 2,075 people by Free TV Australia and Seven West Media earlier this month found that 78% of people with connected TV sets believe it is important they can easily find free TV services (only 8% said it wasn’t important). That is almost eight in 10 who don’t want to have to search their TV device to find a free service.
About 87% of the people surveyed had a connected TV, and it’s worth noting the survey found most people don’t customise that connected TV home screen because they aren’t confident about being able to do. They rely on TV manufacturers to do it for them. In fact, 83% of people think a connected TV should come with free services already installed.
Digging deeper, the research discovered that 84% of people want to receive a free service option before the paid option when they are looking for something to watch. They want to see what Seven or Nine or the ABC have on offer before they turn to a paid service. Of course this seems logical, but on some TVs the search function is directing people to paid content even when there is a free option.
Eighty-one per cent of respondents did not agree with the idea that local free TV services should have to pay a TV manufacturer for visibility on the home screen. The same proportion said commercial interests should not dictate where TV services appear on a connected TV.
The argument advanced by some TV manufacturers that Australians will get fewer and lower quality TV devices if prominence goes ahead is nonsense. They claim it would create “significant” costs in reconfiguring TV sets and would result in a much smaller range of TV sets available to Australians. While there may be minimal associated costs, the TV device manufacturers are already regularly investing in product updates to keep pace with new technology, on top of charging up to thousands of dollars for the TV itself.
The issue is simple: in order to protect Australian stories and the services that make them part of our collective memory, in order to continue experiencing moments like the Matildas’ stunning World Cup run at home, we need to protect Australians’ ability to find them. It’s what the people want: Free TV Australia’s research proves that.
Not only do they want to be able to find their local free TV services easily, but the vast majority of people are also opposed to the idea of commercial interests determining which services are prominent. It undermines the principle of free, universally accessible content, and it stifles our ability to connect with other Australians in the interest of personalised echo chambers of content based on what we’ve watched before, not what we might like to watch next.
Prominence is an issue the overwhelming majority of Australians support. We now just need to legislate and get on with it, so we can all continue to enjoy a choice of local media services and the big moments that bring us all together as a nation.
Bridget Fair is CEO of Free TV Australia
