Last week, the world was introduced to Quibi, a mobile-only streaming service put together by CEO Meg Whitman and former Disney executive Jeffrey Katzenberg. With millions of people holed up in their homes waiting out the coronavirus pandemic, you’d think this would be a good time for streaming, and indeed, services like Netflix and Disney+ have seen jumps in their subscriber numbers.
But the tricky thing about Quibi (a portmanteau of “quick bites,” pronounced “Qui-bee”) is that its 10-minutes episodes are designed to be watched during the “in-between moments” of life…you know, sitting on a train during a commute, or waiting at a gate in an airport, and other things no one is doing right now. So when it debuted to a comparatively small 300,000 downloads, few were terribly surprised.
And a few others started to get worried. Speaking to CNBC’s Sara Eisen, Whitman said that there’s a plan in the works to allow users to watch Quibi shows to their televisions…like a normal streaming service. “We had always planned to be able to cast to your TV, so we’re gonna see if we can accelerate that in the engineering roadmap,” she said. “We’ll eventually get there but it was never a part of the launch. If we had known about COVID, maybe it would have been.”
Notably, although there will be a way to watch Quibi on TV, there doesn’t appear to be a smart TV app in development. Explaining the reasoning behind that decision to
Vulture
at launch, Katzenberg said that “As soon as you go out and try to be all things to all people, you end up being nothing to anybody.”
But isn’t that kind of what Quibi is now? If a mobile-only streaming service can be watched on non-mobile devices, was it ever a mobile-only streaming service? Was this just a bad idea?
I know it’s easy to make fun of Quibi right now, but to be fair, there are some interesting-looking shows on it, from the Will Arnet-hosted comedy show Memory Hole to the drama survive, starring Game of Thrones vet Sophie Turner. So if you still find yourself wanting something to watch in those “in-between moments,” feel free to give it a download.
To stay up to date on everything fantasy, science fiction, and WiC, follow our all-encompassing Facebook page and sign up for our exclusive newsletter.
Get HBO, Starz, Showtime and MORE for FREE with a no-risk, 7-day free trial of Amazon Channels
h/t The A.V. Club