Major League Baseball has rolled out a standalone streaming option of MLB Network for $5.99 per month without requiring a pay-TV subscription. The direct-to-consumer subscription streaming service is currently available to baseball fans in the U.S. without the need for cable, satellite or Internet TV. For die-hard fans, the MLB Network + At Bat bundle — available for $6.99 per month — also includes live game audio for all MLB teams through MLB At Bat, live Minor League Baseball games, and access to highlights and live look-ins via MLB Big Inning. Current MLB.TV subscribers can stream MLB Network for the rest of this season at no additional cost. Continue reading MLB Network Launches $5.99 Standalone Streaming Service

Amazon Prime Video is releasing a newly redesigned app that promises to bring “clarity and simplicity back to streaming” with AI-powered improvements to navigation, personalization, purchases and recommendations. Among other upgrades, the app makes it easier to quickly identify movies and series that are available to Prime members at no additional cost. Prime members had been lobbying for a brighter line between what is included with a subscription and what comes with an additional cost. A global rollout began this week, and eventually the app will be available to all Prime Video customers. Continue reading Responding to Members, Prime Video Updates User Interface

Netflix reported that its popular streaming service has added 8.05 million subscribers during Q2, a healthy gain from 5.89 million newcomers during the same period a year earlier. The streamer’s total of more than 277 million worldwide customers makes it by far the largest subscription service of its kind. Revenue climbed to $9.56 billion, a nearly 17 percent second quarter gain that outperformed its own projections. Subscriptions on the ad-supported tier grew 34 percent compared to Q1. Amidst upheaval in more traditional media environs, Netflix seems to be gliding along, closing Thursday with a market valuation of $277 billion. Continue reading Netflix Reports Q2 Subscriber Growth as Revenue Tops $9.5B

Verizon is offering a year of Netflix Premium at no charge to Verizon Mobile and Home Internet customers who buy an annual subscription to Peacock Premium through its content subscription hub +play. That’s a $275 value (at $22.95 per month) in exchange for a $79.95 Peacock plan, according to the telecom company, which rebranded last month, launching a host of promotional plans in the lead-up to its 2025 silver jubilee. The offer, which started last week, ends August 31. The Peacock push dovetails with parent company NBCUniversal’s presentation of the 2024 Paris Olympics. NBC Sports coverage of the Olympics will include streaming on Peacock. Continue reading Verizon Offering Free Netflix Premium with Peacock Purchase

Paris-based global streaming platform Deezer is fielding an AI playlist generator in an international beta launch. The move makes the indie-centric service more competitive with Spotify and Amazon Music, which have already been testing the feature. YouTube is reportedly also experimenting with AI-powered personalized radio. As of now, 5 percent of Deezer’s paid subscribers have been selected at random to try Playlist with AI, which creates playlists from text prompts that invoke moods, genres, decades, activities or “anything else that comes to mind,” according to Deezer. Continue reading Deezer Adds AI Playlists to Compete with Spotify and Amazon

DreamFlare has emerged from stealth to launch what is being billed as the first streaming platform for GenAI video. In addition to the consumer-facing subscription platform, the business model includes a sort of AI studio where creators can tap the expertise of professional storytellers to produce AI video using third-party tools like Runway, Sora and Midjourney. The company will feature two types of content: Flips, which are animated narratives with audio that viewers can also examine frame-by-frame, as with comic books, and Spins, described as “short movies” featuring branched narratives that provide interactive plot choices. Continue reading DreamFlare Launches AI Video Studio and Streaming Service

Spotify recently introduced a new $10.99 per month Basic streaming plan in the U.S., which includes “the music streaming benefits of your Premium plan without the monthly audiobook listening time.” As part of its move to provide “more choice for U.S. subscribers,” Spotify now offers subscriptions including an $11.99 per month Premium Individual plan, $16.99 Premium Duo option, $19.99 Premium Family (for up to 6 members of one household), and Audiobooks Access for $9.99 per month. Additionally, in an effort to boost video content the company is allowing podcasters, even those not officially hosted by Spotify, to upload video podcasts. Continue reading Spotify Offers Basic Streaming Plan, New Podcaster Feature

YouTube is rewarding paid subscribers with early access to test features. Available now to those on the Premium tier are smart downloads and picture-in-picture for YouTube Shorts. Smart downloads populate automatically for convenient offline viewing, while PiP is touted as a convenience for multitaskers. The platform is also rolling out its “Jump Ahead” navigational feature to all Premium subs, starting with Android and coming to iOS “in the next few weeks,” the streamer explains. Powered by “a combination of AI and viewership data,” Jump Ahead lets users double-tap to skip ahead through a video. Continue reading YouTube Premium Offering Smart Downloads, PiP for Shorts

Figma is rolling out its third redesigned user interface, UI3, aimed at making the company even more competitive with Adobe. New are native AI features that accelerate workflows, letting teams build high-quality software. Available in limited beta, Figma AI adds the ability to generate design drafts with a single prompt, enabling rapid experimentation and prototyping. The move advances Figma’s goal of moving beyond design tool to a full-blown product development platform, while making the service intuitive and friendly enough for novices while maintaining the full features demanded by Sigma’s professional users. Continue reading Figma Redesigns Its User Interface and Adds New AI Features

A federal jury in Las Vegas has convicted five men for illegal streaming operations perpetrated through a company called Jetflicks, which generated millions of dollars in subscription revenue while causing “substantial harm to television program copyright owners,” according to the Department of Justice. Jetflicks, which charged customers $9.99 per month, had a catalog that included “hundreds of thousands” of copyrighted TV episodes, larger than the combined offerings of Netflix, Hulu, Vudu and Amazon Prime, prosecutors said, explaining the outfit “used sophisticated computer scripts and software to scour pirate websites for illegal copies of television episodes.” Continue reading DOJ Scores Criminal Conviction Against Operators of Jetflicks

Runway ML has introduced a new foundation model, Gen-3 Alpha, which the company says can generate high-quality, realistic scenes of up to 10 seconds long from text prompts, still images or a video sample. Offering a variety of camera movements, Gen-3 Alpha will initially roll out to Runway’s paid subscribers, but the company plans to add a free version in the future. Runway says Gen-3 Alpha is the first of a new series of models trained on the company’s new large-scale multimodal infrastructure, which offers improvements “in fidelity, consistency, and motion over Gen-2,” released last year. Continue reading Runway’s Gen-3 Alpha Creates AI Videos Up to 10-Seconds

Instagram is testing unskippable ads that will appear in users’ feeds. Screenshots of the new ad unit, which users can’t scroll through, began circulating on sites like Reddit and X, prompting general outrage, followed by confirmation that the test is underway. The ads include a countdown timer like those used in some streaming shows that prevent the ability to fast forward and also lock users onto the message without the ability to browse elsewhere on the site until the ad plays through. The approach is similar to the YouTube model for ads that appear before and midway through videos. Continue reading Instagram Users Angered by Test of ‘Unskippable’ Video Ads

After a limited introduction in select markets and to Premium subscribers, YouTube’s Playables free gaming catalog is rolling out to all users. More than 75 games are currently accessible on desktop, Android and iOS by visiting the main YouTube home page and selecting Playables in the Explore menu. Games can be shared by tapping the three-dot “more” menu. The lightweight offerings include popular titles like “Angry Birds Showdown,” “Words of Wonders,” “Cut the Rope” and “Trivia Crack,” among others. Availability will ramp up gradually over the coming months. Continue reading YouTube Adding ‘Playables’ Free Game Catalog for All Users

Web-based editing application Canva unveiled a significant makeover this week in Los Angeles at the Canva Create event. Touting “a whole new Canva,” the company shared changes that impact the entire platform, from pricing to tools, templates and user interface. The new editor, designed to make it easier to jump between projects, is “available to the first one million users who discover the secret portal hidden in their Canva homepage, before becoming available to the entire Canva community from August.” The 11-year-old company, which claims 183 million free and paid monthly users, also unveiled an enterprise solution. Continue reading Graphics Productivity Tool Canva Unveils Enterprise Redesign

Amazon is planning to add generative artificial intelligence to its decade-old voice assistant, Alexa, which will require a monthly fee to offset the cost of the technology, according to reports. Although the new Alexa price plan has not been disclosed, it is not expected to be included in the $139 yearly Amazon Prime plan. The possible move comes as Apple is also undergoing an AI overhaul of its voice assistant, Siri. Once considered precocious by many consumers, Siri and Alexa are now playing catch-up to AI assistants from leaders in the space including Google, Microsoft and OpenAI. Continue reading Amazon to Upgrade Alexa with AI, May Add Subscription Fee