Sunday marks Apple TV+’s big debut at the biannual Television Critics Association (TCA) press tour, which means a lot of attention will be coming to the streaming service today — especially on Twitter. But not if rival Disney+ can help it.
#DisneyPlus is currently the top — and sponsored — “Worldwide” (and thus “United States,” too) trends on Twitter. That means The Walt Disney Company paid to promote the hashtag, placing it atop the naturally trending terms and tags.
If that sounds familiar, it’s because Disney did the same thing ahead of HBO Max’s big unveiling back in October.
Clicking on the #DisneyPlus promoted Twitter trend today takes a user to a video previewing movies and original series coming to the Disney+ service in 2020.
“It’s happening,” the tweet read. “From the biggest blockbusters to the most exciting new originals, here’s what’s coming to #DisneyPlus this year.”
Readers can see that tweet and video at the bottom of this story, as well as screenshots of the Top 5 Worldwide and United States trending topics at this time this post was published.
TheWrap reached out to spokespeople for Disney+ to ask if Sunday’s interestingly timed investment in Twitter promotion was timed to Apple TV+’s TCA day, or pure coincidence. We did not immediately receive a response.
We also reached out to Apple reps to see if they’d like to comment, but did not immediately hear back.
Back on Oct. 29, Disney heavily promoted Disney+, its upcoming streaming service, on Twitter — only hours before WarnerMedia was set to host a media event debuting HBO Max, its own upcoming streaming service.
See Sunday’s tweet below.
It’s happening. From the biggest blockbusters to the most exciting new originals, here’s what’s coming to #DisneyPlus this year.
— Disney+ (@DisneyPlus) January 17, 2020
The TCA press tour is a twice-yearly event where platforms roll out their new series and specials for television critics and entertainment reporters. As you might imagine, there’s a heck of a lot of live-tweeting that comes with such a media conference.
As promised, here are those Top 5 Worldwide and United States trending topics:
