“Peacock” Takes Flight

NBCUniversal's new streaming service, featuring 13,000 hours of movies and TV, along with live news and sports, launches today. NBC's Mark Barger reports.

(NBC News) — The streaming wars have a new entrant this morning as NBC’s parent company, NBCUniversal, takes its “Peacock” service national.

The service is playing catch-up to its established streaming rivals, but hoping that the free ad-supported, basic level of service will attract viewers to the more than 13,000 hours of movies and TV shows, as well live news and sports.

Two additional tiers of service allow consumers to pay for wider content access with either limited commercials or none at all.

While the service is available on most mobile devices and gaming systems, as well as many smart TVs, Peacock has not yet reached carriage deals with Roku and Amazon Fire TV, which service about 80 million U.S. homes. Discussions on that front continue.

More here.