Worldwide over-the-top TV and video revenues are projected to reach $51.1 billion by 2020, a significant increase from the $26 billion anticipated this year. In addition, SVoD revenue is expected to surpass that of OTT advertising. “According to the ‘Global OTT TV & Video Forecasts’ report from Digital TV Research, the U.S. will remain the dominant territory,” reports Advanced Television, “with OTT TV and video revenues rising by $16.6 billion between 2010 and 2020 to $19.1 billion… OTT revenues will exceed $1 billion in 11 countries by 2020.” China is projected to reach fourth place in global rankings.

Liu Chunning, president of Alibaba’s Digital Entertainment arm, announced that the Chinese e-commerce giant is planning to launch a new subscription video service in two months called Tmall Box Office (TBO). “We aim to become [the equivalent of] HBO and Netflix in the U.S.,” he said during the Shanghai International Film Festival. The service will stream local movies and TV shows, imported content and original programming produced by Alibaba. The service will be available on Alibaba’s smart TVs and OTT box. Continue reading TBO: Alibaba Announces Plans for Subscription Video Service

Netflix announced the launch of its new website, the first major update in four years. The goal is to provide subscribers with a “richer, more visual experience.” The site promises expanded search functions, more detailed content descriptions, improved speed and better animations. “The site is also touch-friendly, meaning those who are browsing on mobile devices can tap to play content, view details about a movie or show, or swipe to scroll instead of click,” reports TechCrunch. “You can also explore similar titles through a new ‘More Like This’ link at the bottom of the page, or even be directed to titles from the same cast, genre, or mood.”

After steadily releasing iOS apps as part of its “mobile to desktop to workflows” initiative, Adobe is updating its Android offerings with four new apps. The company also just released “a new stock photo service, a video-focused iOS app and a suite of updates to its Creative Cloud lineup of desktop apps,” explains Mashable. Users will have access to 40 million stock images with the new Stock application, while Creative Cloud users will be able to upload stock images and receive payments when their images are used. “On the mobile side, Adobe’s Brush, Shape Color and Photoshop Mix apps are all available on Android with the same features as their iOS counterparts.”

Disney/ABC Television Group Executive VP of Global Operations and Chief Technology Officer Vince Roberts received the Bob Lambert Technology Leadership Award from the Entertainment Technology Center@USC on June 11. ETC’s Studio Technology Leaders Dinner, held at USC’s Town and Gown, brought together influential media, entertainment and technology executives from major studios and leading tech companies. The evening also featured a panel of top studio tech leaders discussing the most pressing trends, challenges and opportunities facing the entertainment industry. Continue reading ETC and the Entertainment Tech Industry Honor Vince Roberts

“Jurassic World” posted $204.6 million in estimated domestic weekend sales, and $511.8 million worldwide. The film, released by Universal Pictures with backing from Legendary Entertainment, landed just behind “Marvel’s The Avengers,” which took in $207.4 million in May 2012. “A slight uptick on Sunday could push ‘Jurassic World’ past ‘The Avengers’ after final weekend sales are tallied, and its worldwide take was also poised to set new performance marks,” reports The New York Times. According to RealD, 3D screens were responsible for about 48 percent of “Jurassic World” domestic sales.

Verizon showed Rep Guidance, software that provides its FiOS sales and support representatives with individualized data designed to improve customer service and experience, at a recent NY Meetup event. According to a Verizon representative, “It’s about streamlining and simplifying the conversation, fostering a more intelligent, better-informed experience with customers rather than having a back and forth exchange and having the rep ask the customer questions that, frankly, they expect we should know anyway.” Continue reading New Verizon Software Delivers Customer Service Intelligence

Google announced on Friday that it plans to launch YouTube Gaming this summer. The mobile app and website will take on Amazon powerhouse Twitch and newcomers such as MLG.TV by offering video game videos and live streams. “More than 25,000 games will each have their own page, a single place for all the best videos and live streams about that title,” explains the YouTube Blog. “You’ll also find channels from a wide array of game publishers and YouTbe creators.” YouTube already features a wide range of gaming videos, notes The New York Times, “but creating a stand-alone app puts gaming one click closer and adds another square icon to gamers’ phones.”

Samsung debuted its first mirror and transparent OLED display panels at Retail Asia Expo 2015 last week. The pair of 55-inch displays combines Intel RealSense and Samsung OLED technology. The company envisions applications from signage to virtual changing rooms. “While mirrored and transparent LCD displays have been around for a while now, Samsung says its OLED technology (the first of its kind) offers better contrast and viewing angles,” reports The Verge. According to the press release, the Mirror OLED display panel “delivers at least 50 percent higher reflectance than competitive Mirror LCDs.”

Twitter announced that CEO Dick Costolo plans to leave the company at the end of the month. Co-founder and former CEO Jack Dorsey will serve as interim CEO starting July 1 until a successor is found. Twitter shares jumped eight percent following the announcement. Since the company went public in 2013, Twitter has experienced numerous challenges, including an effective means of attracting new users and developing revenue streams based on advertising. Some are speculating that Twitter is ripe for acquisition, with Google listed as one of the interested parties. Continue reading Besieged Twitter CEO Dick Costolo to Step Down This Month

In a wide-ranging keynote at the Augmented World Expo tradeshow this week, Tom Furness, a pioneer in human interface technology, traced his career innovating in virtual reality and announced the formation of the Virtual World Society. Often called a grandfather of VR, Furness’s groundbreaking work includes developing the first VR flight simulator, first VR consumer product and first retina display. His latest vision is for a network of labs where young creatives and technologists turn their talents to solving Earth’s urgent environmental and social problems. Continue reading AWE: Grandfather of VR Seeds an Industry, Calls it to Action

Luke and Marika Neumann have uploaded a two-minute video to YouTube called “Ghost Towns,” the first 8K content to appear on the site. According to the description on YouTube, the video was shot with “the RED Epic Dragon 6K in Portrait orientation and then stitched together in Adobe After Effects.
 Some shots simply scaled up by 125 percent from 6.1K to meet the 7.6K standard.” Google says that 8K has been supported by YouTube since 2010, but the 4320p/8K setting option was only added this year. While this may be an important milestone, there are currently very view consumers with displays that can support such high-resolution content played at a high frame rate.

Consumers typically use only a small percentage of available apps each month, but their time spent with these apps is dramatically increasing. According to Nielsen, the time spent engaged with these apps has increased 63 percent over the past two years. In Q4 2012, consumers spent a little more than 23 hours per month with apps, while that figure jumped to 37 hours and 28 minutes in Q4 2014. Meanwhile, the number of apps used has only marginally increased: 23.3 apps per month in 2011, 26.5 apps in 2012 and 26.8 apps in 2013. Continue reading Nielsen: Consumers Spending More Time Engaged with Apps

San Francisco startup HackerOne wants to connect problem-solving hackers with companies that have cybersecurity issues. They hope to convince other hackers to behave responsibly regarding security flaws in the process. Tech companies such as Square, Twitter and Yahoo as well as banks and oil companies are currently working with the service. “HackerOne gets a 20 percent commission on top of each bounty paid through its service,” reports The New York Times. “About 1,500 hackers are on HackerOne’s platform. They have fixed around 9,000 bugs and received more than $3 million in bounties.”

The Federal Trade Commission is going after the company behind “The Doom That Came to Atlantic City” in its first ever enforcement action against a crowdfunded project, reports The Washington Post. The game’s Kickstarter campaign launched in 2012 with illustrator Lee Moyer, game designer Keith Baker, sculptor Paul Komoda and special effects guru H.R. Giger attached, and nearly quadrupled its financial goal. However, Portland, Oregon-based The Forking Path never delivered the game. Now the FTC is alleging that Erik Chevalier, the individual behind The Forking Path, spent the funds on himself, rather than developing the game. The order includes a $111,793.71 judgment against Chevaliar.