Hulu’s Live TV has rolled out in beta, offering more than 50 channels for just under $40 per month. What makes Hulu stand out from competing services is that it now offers a combination of streaming video plus live television. Among its live content, Hulu offers the four major broadcast networks, ESPN, HGTV and an array of news and animation content. Original content includes “The Handmaid’s Tale” and the service also boasts day-after TV shows and B-list movies, all melded into a single library. Continue reading Early Reviews Largely Positive for Hulu’s New Live TV Service

Facebook announced it is closing Oculus Story Studio and canceling all current projects, reports Variety. The award-winning studio, responsible for notable VR shorts including “Lost,” “Henry” and “Dear Angelica,” opened in early 2015. “We’ve been looking at the best way to allocate our resources to create an impact on the ecosystem,” wrote Jason Rubin, Oculus VP of content. “After careful consideration, we’ve decided to shift our focus away from internal content creation to support more external production. As part of that shift, we’ll be winding down Story Studio.” Facebook plans to continue investing in experiential VR content from outside artists and developers. Continue reading Facebook to Shutter its Oculus Story Studio VR Content Unit

Facebook reports that its Q1 profit leaped 76 percent to $3.06 billion, putting to rest concerns that video-ad performance or graphic content stymied growth. Alphabet enjoyed 29 percent growth in net profit in the same quarter, apparently undamaged by brands finding their content advertised against objectionable YouTube videos. The two tech titans currently account for 99 percent of the online ad industry’s revenue growth, says Pivotal Research, even as marketers express growing concern over fake news and live video issues. Meanwhile, Facebook continues to push new video content. Continue reading Facebook Benefits From Expanded Video Content, Digital Ads

Amazon rolled out a new Android app for its FreeTime service, which provides curated children’s content and parental controls similar to those found on Amazon’s Fire tablets. The FreeTime Web browser has vetted over 40,000 YouTube videos and websites as kid-friendly. FreeTime Unlimited offers more kid-centric content, including 10,000 books and videos from Disney, Nickelodoen, Amazon Studios, PBS Kids, Harper Collins, Sesame Street, Simon & Schuster and others, priced at $2.99 per month for Prime members and $4.99 for others. Continue reading Amazon Bows Android App for Kid-Friendly FreeTime Service

To help advertisers better target millennial and Gen-Z audiences, The Walt Disney Company debuted the Disney Digital Network, a conglomeration of more than 300 social media channels and a wide range of content. Disney says the new Digital Network reaches an audience of more than one billion. The content includes everything from classic Disney characters to the new material emerging from Maker Studios. Disney Co/Op, an in-house branded content service, puts advertisers together with Disney digital creators for customized campaigns. Continue reading New Disney Digital Network Connects Advertisers, Millennials

The ETC@USC has produced a 10-minute highlights reel edited from a one-hour discussion with a panel of eight USC students that took place at the ETC’s April 6th All Members Meeting. The panel of undergraduates included students studying business, the arts, journalism and technology. The students discussed what motivates them to go to a movie theater, the role of big screen TVs in their lives, what they think of VR and AR, what they would buy if they were given $3,000 to spend on entertainment, and a number of other interesting topics. Visit the ETC website or YouTube channel to access the video.

Continue reading Students Discuss Their Media Habits at ETC Member Meeting

Hulu just inked a deal with NBCUniversal that will bring live coverage of NBC and Telemundo-owned stations to its live streaming service. The deal is a coup for Hulu, which, when it unveils its new service later this month, will offer the top four broadcast TV channels. Hulu previously made deals with CBS, Disney-ABC and Fox as well as USA, Syfy, Bravo, E!, MSNBC, CNBC, NBCSN, Sprout and others, for a total of 50 live TV channels. The new deal also allows Hulu to license NBC and Telemundo broadcast affiliates. Continue reading With NBCU Deal, Hulu Will Stream All Top Four Broadcasters

As part of its plan to stream video 24/7 in its apps and on the desktop, Twitter inked deals with BuzzFeed, Vox Media, MLB Advanced Media and Live Nation to produce or provide live-streaming content. The company has already produced more than 800 hours in Q1 2017. It did lose one video outlet: NFL Thursday Night Football games, which Twitter streamed last season but lost to Amazon this season. Among the new content, BuzzFeed will produce a news/current events program, to be streamed live on Twitter every morning. Continue reading Twitter Creates More Partnerships in Push for Live Streaming

Streaming video giant Netflix will finally enter the Chinese market, via a newly inked licensing deal with iQIYI, one of that country’s streaming platforms. When Netflix launched its efforts to go global a year ago, it failed to make deals in only a few countries, among them China, Iran and North Korea. Although not many details of the new arrangement have been made public, what is known is that Netflix content will be available on a day-and-date or near-simultaneous basis, as with other global territories. Continue reading Netflix Inks Licensing Deal with Chinese Online Video Platform

An NAB panel on upcoming changes in Digital TV, moderated by NAB vice president of spectrum policy Alison Neplokh, focused on the challenges and promises of deploying ATSC 3.0., or as an increasing number of industry experts are dubbing it, Next Gen TV. Neplokh noted that FCC chair Ajit Pai stated the rules will be in place by the end of 2017, enabling broadcasters to adopt it quickly. South Korea is also going online with ATSC 3.0 next month, allowing U.S. broadcasters to learn from its experiences. Continue reading NAB 2017: Next Gen TV Will Bring Innovation, New Revenues

At last week’s NAB show in Las Vegas, numerous manufacturers offered tools related to streaming on various OTT platforms and social media. Telestream, which has provided file-based video transcoding and high-quality media exchange over IP networks since the late 1990s, has doubled down on such products for broadcasters. Although broadcasters have availed themselves of Telestream tools for some time, the upcoming ATSC 3.0 TV standard adds urgency to broadcasters’ need to adapt to the technologies behind IP networks and OTT platforms. Continue reading NAB 2017: Telestream Offers OTT Solutions for Broadcasters

At NAB 2017, China-based Z CAM, which offers an interchangeable lens mount 4K VR camera, inked a partnership with Assimilate, which offers an interactive, creative platform. The Z CAM S1 VR camera is a four-sensor system with high-speed Ethernet port, providing 4K at 60fps or 6K at 30fps (post-stitching output) and Z CAM’s WonderStitch. That is paired with Assimilate’s real-time Scratch VR Z bundle, which includes the features of Scratch and Scratch Web plus 360-degree tools and features, stitching and ambisonic audio. Continue reading NAB 2017: Assimilate, Z CAM Tackle VR Production Workflow

A hacker group that goes by the name “TheDarkOverlord” has reportedly stolen episodes from a number of television shows. Over the weekend, 10 episodes from the upcoming fifth season of “Orange Is the New Black” was shared after Netflix did not meet ransom requests. The hackers may have access to up to three dozen series from networks including ABC, CBS, Fox, FX, IFC, NatGeo and NBC. It provided a list of TV series and a few movies to cybersecurity blog DataBreaches.net, claiming that the content was stolen from audio post-production facility Larson Studios. Continue reading Hacker Releases Original Netflix Content, Threatens Networks

Oculus Story Studio founder/technical director Max Planck was invited to the ETC conference on AR/VR at NAB to discuss his company’s creation of “Dear Angelica,” a 13-minute dreamlike VR tale of how we remember our loved ones. The film, which played to great acclaim at the last Sundance Film Festival, is notable for the fact that it was entirely hand-painted inside VR space, by illustrator/art director Wesley Allsbrook, and written and directed by Saschka Unseld. Planck described how the inspiration for the film came out of graphic novels. Continue reading NAB 2017: Oculus Details Journey to VR Film ‘Dear Angelica’

Oscar-nominated “Pearl,” the short VR film directed by Passion Pictures’ Patrick Osborne, was the focus of a discussion about ambisonic audio during this week’s ETC conference on VR/AR in Las Vegas. Google Spotlight Stories creative director, audio and music Scot Stafford and Dramatic Audio Post sound designer/mixer Jamey Scott described their work on the film as well as their path to working on 360-degree and VR movies. Stafford pointed to his work at a story incubator at Motorola, run by Google, to make content for the mobile platform. Continue reading NAB 2017: A Look at VR Short ‘Pearl’ and Its Ambisonic Audio