When your cash hoard is hundreds of billions, $20 billion is couch cushion change.

And they HAVE made their argument. Apple, for many years, has stated they're trying to drastically alter their product mix so that hardware/items gives way to services revenue. Apple TV subscription business fits that strategy.

Selling an iPhone requires... an iPhone. Thousands of parts. Intricate assembly. Packaging. Shipping. Sure, there's revenue, but every phone sold means a lot of expenses to design and build the thing. Sell more iPhones, you have more costs because you're building multiple units.

With services, the revenue can be scaled and expanded without degradation or cost. The money you spend making Ted Lasso is the same whether you collect subscription money from 2 customers or 2 million customers.

That was my initial reaction.

But considering it in a long term context, 30 years ago it cost $6.99 to rent one movie, for one night. And everyone was happy to pay it. Usually you'd rent 2 movies, maybe $9.99 for two. Then you'd go back and do it again. Spending $20+ per week at blockbuster was normal, and that when $20 was worth a lot more than it is today.

If you had a crystal ball back then, the idea of watching hundreds of tv episodes and movies for $6.99 would have been mind blowing, and you wouldn't be fussing over $4.99 vs $6.99

The current streaming prices don't reflect the true cost of creating and distributing the content. It's only been kept in this fake unnatural state because of stock market exploitation (some cases, like Netflix) or because the richest companies in history are giving it away as a loss leader.