Netflix and Amazon Face Formidable Video Rival in YouTube

Netflix is strategizing ways to court the hundreds of thousands of people in places like India that are glued to watching YouTube on their mobile phones. Only a few months, ago, Netflix chief executive Reed Hastings said sleep was Netflix’s biggest competitor. But since his company is also eyeing India for its next 100 million Netflix subscribers, that country’s focus on YouTube is concerning. Netflix and Amazon, both of which have spent billions to produce original content, still find it difficult to crack emerging markets. Continue reading Netflix and Amazon Face Formidable Video Rival in YouTube

EA Announces New AI-Powered, Cloud-Native Gaming Tech

Electronic Arts unveiled Project Atlas, its “cloud-native gaming” technology, via a Medium blog post by chief technology officer Ken Moss. Although he did not say when it would be fully deployed and functional, Moss described Project Atlas as designed to “harness the massive power of cloud computing and artificial intelligence and putting it into the hands of game makers in a powerful, easy to use, one-stop experience.” The game engine combines rendering, game logic, physics, animation, audio, and more. Continue reading EA Announces New AI-Powered, Cloud-Native Gaming Tech

Congress Scrutinizes Social Media Liability for User Content

Social media platforms such as Google and Facebook are exempt from liability for user-posted content, a protection that top Republican legislators want to end. House Judiciary Committee chair Bob Goodlatte (R-Virginia) quizzed Twitter representatives about the exemption, asking why they should be “treated differently than,” for example, a hotel that faces limited responsibility for illegal actions on its property. Goodlatte is one lawmaker who also looked at the purported silencing of conservative points of view on the platforms. Continue reading Congress Scrutinizes Social Media Liability for User Content

Wattpad Disrupts Hollywood Status Quo as New IP Incubator

Wattpad, a digital literature app with social networking, draws 65 million unique monthly visitors with a core readership of 13- to 35-year-olds, who spend about 20 billion combined minutes per month on the site. The site is home to user-generated stories and fan fiction in a wide range of genres, including sci-fi, young adult, horror and poetry. Wattpad also debuted Wattpad Studios two years ago, a “one-stop shop” for new intellectual properties in Hollywood, such as “The Kissing Booth,” a story turned into a Netflix movie. Continue reading Wattpad Disrupts Hollywood Status Quo as New IP Incubator

Tech Giants Defeat Strict Copyright Law Proposal in Europe

In the battle between media outlets that want control over how their content is distributed and shared online and the tech companies that don’t want the Internet to be regulated, the tech companies won a recent skirmish in Europe. The European Union wants to expand on its recent regulatory victory, with the just-implemented GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation), slapping companies with antitrust fines and scrutinizing their privacy policies. But the tech behemoths, including Facebook, Google, Reddit and Wikipedia, are fighting back. Continue reading Tech Giants Defeat Strict Copyright Law Proposal in Europe

In Response to User Outcry, Snap Retreats on Chat Redesign

Snapchat fans have loudly complained about the company’s redesign of its app, with more than 1.25 million people signing a Change.org petition and Kylie Jenner tweeting that the changes were “sad.” Parent company Snap announced that it would redesign the redesign (at least part of it), in response to the complaints and slowed business. The company reported a 54 percent revenue increase to $231 million and a rise in daily users to 191 million, both below analyst expectations, causing stock to fall more than 15 percent. Continue reading In Response to User Outcry, Snap Retreats on Chat Redesign

Snapchat Debuts Stories Shared via Web to Spur User Growth

Snap has just made a radical change to how users can share their stories, in a move to expand its reach. Now, even people who haven’t downloaded the app will be able to access content via a link. Anyone with an official account, like celebrities, will be able to share stories, hosting the content on Snapchat.com. People without official accounts who submit content publicly to a group video will also be able to share their content. With this change, videos on Snap will be seen by more people, which could increase downloads. Continue reading Snapchat Debuts Stories Shared via Web to Spur User Growth

Virtual Reality Execs Advocate VR Standards, Open Systems

Execs from HTC, Hulu, GoPro and Black Box VR looked at “Tapping Virtual Reality’s Real Potential” during a panel discussion at CES 2018. Each company had its own strategies, but everyone agreed on one thing: the need for the nascent industry to create standards and adopt open systems. “If you’re making a fitness app, you don’t want to have to optimize for every platform,” noted HTC senior vice president of virtual reality Rikard Steiber. “It’s too hard, doesn’t scale and isn’t sustainable. We as an industry must push towards an open platform.” Continue reading Virtual Reality Execs Advocate VR Standards, Open Systems

Facebook, Universal Music Ink Licensing Deal for User Videos

Vivendi’s Universal Music Group, the world’s largest record company, has licensed its music catalog to Facebook. The deal, which focuses on the music in user-generated videos, covers songs that will be used in the background on videos and so-called social experiences on Facebook, Instagram, Messenger and Oculus. For Facebook, the deal is aimed at encouraging users to post more videos, key to the company’s current video-centric strategy. A day before this deal was struck, Universal also reached an agreement with YouTube. Continue reading Facebook, Universal Music Ink Licensing Deal for User Videos

Steemit: Social Media Platform Pays Contributors for Content

Users of Facebook, Instagram and Twitter enjoy moments of entertainment in exchange for giving up personal data to social media platforms that monetize the information. Steemit, a social news and networking site on top of a blockchain database, has a plan to change that paradigm, paying users in cryptocurrency for every post. The virtual currency, dubbed Steem, can be cashed out into hard currency — or amassed for those who believe in Steemit’s future. The new company started as a 44-page white paper released in March 2016, arguing that content creators should be paid. Continue reading Steemit: Social Media Platform Pays Contributors for Content

Facebook Considers Brand Safety With Upcoming Video Ads

Facebook is going forward with its “video-first” strategy, including new “in-stream” video advertising. But it’s also paying careful attention to brand safety, to prevent the kind of incidents that have bedeviled YouTube and other rivals. To do so, the company debuted monetization eligibility standards to provide clear guidance on the types of content permitted to be paired with advertising on the platform. Also specified are the types of publishers and video content creators who can earn ad revenue. Continue reading Facebook Considers Brand Safety With Upcoming Video Ads

Facebook Paying for Music While Building its New ID System

Facebook has focused on an increase in video on its site, but with the growth of video has come a contentious music rights issue. Many of those uploaded videos include music to which Facebook doesn’t have the rights, and the involved rights owners have to ask Facebook to take down the infringing content. After many months of negotiation with music rights owners, Facebook vowed to build a system to identify music that infringes copyrights. While that system is being constructed, say sources, Facebook has begun paying rights holders. Continue reading Facebook Paying for Music While Building its New ID System

Facebook Buys Source3 to Strengthen Rights Management

Facebook just purchased the technology of startup Source3, which can detect intellectual property that has been shared on the Internet without permission.  No financial details were revealed, but Crunchbase reported that Source3 recently raised $4 million in venture capital funding, led by a 2015 seed round by Contour Venture Partners. Two years ago, Facebook released so-called Rights Manager technology to combat the posting of video clips by unauthorized users. YouTube uses Content ID, a similar but more advanced technology. Continue reading Facebook Buys Source3 to Strengthen Rights Management

Twitter Debuts First Apple TV App to Support Live 360 Video

Twitter updated its Apple TV app this week, adding support for Periscope’s Global Map and the option of viewing live 360-degree videos. Apple TV owners can now “use the Siri remote to move around the video to view its content from different angles,” reports TechCrunch. Twitter’s TV applications are also available on Fire TV, Roku and Xbox One, with the intent of featuring Twitter’s live video shows, “including those from the WNBA, BuzzFeed, Viacom, Live Nation, and others.” In addition to Twitter’s new premium video, user-generated content is regularly streamed through tweets and the Periscope app. Continue reading Twitter Debuts First Apple TV App to Support Live 360 Video

MGM Television Is the First Major Studio to Ink Deal with Snap

MGM Television became the first major studio to ink a deal with Snap Inc. to create original short-form programming for its Discover platform; there were no details on the exact nature of the upcoming shows or when they would premiere. The deal marks the latest in Snap’s many media partnerships, which include ABC, NBC, ESPN, the NFL, Turner, the BBC, Vice Media, A+E Networks and Discovery Communications. MGM also recently made a co-production pact with Jukin Media to produce competition shows using user-generated content. Continue reading MGM Television Is the First Major Studio to Ink Deal with Snap