Streaming always was the future. Whether it came to games, TV, or movies, streaming was always going to upset the balance of power, taking customers away from other media services. Now, well into a pandemic where fewer people than ever go to movie theaters, those streaming services are fighting one another. The first casualty of this infighting is, surprisingly, Sony’s. The media and tech giant has long used PlayStation consoles to sell fans movies and TV shows, but that’s coming to an end. According to a post on the PlayStation blog, users soon won’t be able to buy or rent movies or TV shows via the PlayStation Store.
Sony isn’t taking down this service for a while, though. Movies and TV shows will be removed from the PlayStation Store on August 31, 2021. Vanessa Lee, the head of the video business at Sony Interactive Entertainment, wrote in the post that the change was due to a “shift in customer behavior.”
It seems that there’s been a boom in PlayStation users going to subscription-based streaming services like Hulu and Netflix. This likely resulted in less profits coming in from selling or renting out TV shows and movies.
If you’ve been buying your shows off of the PlayStation Store, don’t worry, they’re not going anywhere. According to the post, when this service is removed anyone that has already bought media through the PlayStation Store will still have access to it on their PS4, PS5, or other devices.
