Weekly Digest from the West
Jean-Baptiste Piron
Cultural Attaché I Attaché culturel I Québec Office Los Angeles
Streaming Services Face an Economic Reckoning After Covid-19: As Hollywood sets sit empty because of the Covid-19 pandemic, streaming-video apps that were just getting off the ground are now running out of fresh movies and TV episodes. But this is only a hiccup compared to the vexing problem that awaits the industry when it finally emerges from the crisis. Is it possible to make money in the business of streaming? The meteoric rise of Netflix Inc. has warped the U.S. media industry, forcing companies such as Walt Disney Co. and AT&T Inc. that have long enjoyed fat profits to embrace a business model that is fundamentally broken: Spend billions of dollars to create an endless supply of content, then sell monthly access to this deluxe all-you-can-eat buffet for little more than the cost of dinner at McDonald’s. Oh, and subscribers can basically cancel whenever they want: Analysts from Cowen & Co. have estimated that while Netflix’s annual rate of churn, or customer turnover, is 10% to 20%, it may be as high as 50% for other streaming services. Having so many options might sound like a treat for consumers, but it hasn’t worked out that way. The downside of the proliferation of streaming apps is that some of the most sought-after TV content now lives behind a chaotic jumble of paywalls. You need different accounts for CBS All Access, Disney+, HBO Max, WWE Network and so on. Their low prices would be great if you could get away with having just one service, but most families may require more. The race to attract and retain subscribers — and turn a profit — was challenging enough before the coronavirus shut down entire swathes of our economy. Now, the U.S. is in a recession and consumers are rethinking how much content they need and what’s a worthwhile household expense. When all a country can do is sit home and gorge on movies and TV, a free trial to stream Netflix or any other services is worth its hours of content in gold. (Look no further than Netflix’s recent spike in subscriptions.) The question is, will users just ditch once those free trials are up? ? If and when we return to some type of normal, the economic realities are going to hit these services," Steve Nason, a research director at Parks Associates, a consultancy for consumer-technology products, said over the phone. Americans who recently signed up for a streaming-TV service were asked how often they expect to use it when life returns to normal:
To make streaming viable in a post-Covid-19 world, it has to become less frustrating for users and less painful for media’s chief financial officers. After observing what’s worked for some streaming companies and other types of entertainment services, such as social media and video games, there are three ideas the industry should explore:
? Incorporate ads to keep subscription fees low — but do so in new, inventive ways that are less intrusive than long stretches of commercial time;
? Reintroduce content and internet bundles to alleviate some of the cost and inconvenience of managing multiple subscriptions, which would discourage customers from canceling;
? Make streaming-video apps more of a social community akin to Instagram and TikTok in order to promote more usage.
-Oscars Will Consider Films That Didn’t Play in Theaters as Part of New Academy Rules: The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has tweaked its Oscar eligibility rules in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic. During a meeting on Tuesday, the board of governors approved a temporary hold on the requirement that a film needs a seven-day theatrical run in a commercial theater in Los Angeles County to qualify for the Oscars. Instead, films will be allowed to be released digitally without playing in theaters. However, that doesn’t mean any movie premiering on a streaming service is eligible for Oscar gold. To be considered, the streamed film must have already had a planned theatrical release. The film must also be made available on the Academy Screening Room member-only streaming site within 60 days of the film’s streaming or VOD release. “The Academy firmly believes there is no greater way to experience the magic of movies than to see them in a theater,” Academy president David Rubin and CEO Dawn Hudson said in a statement. “Our commitment to that is unchanged and unwavering. Nonetheless, the historically tragic COVID-19 pandemic necessitates this temporary exception to our awards eligibility rules. The Academy supports our members and colleagues during this time of uncertainty. We recognize the importance of their work being seen and also celebrated, especially now, when audiences appreciate movies more than ever.”
https://variety.com/2020/film/awards/new-oscar-rules-movies-not-in-theaters-1234591702/
-Can AI Change How Hollywood Structures Stories? Corto.ai is Launching to Find Out: Having watched his reputation flourish upon a foundation of self-spun fabrications, then crumble into a heap of infamy that led him to change his name, Yves Bergquist knows a thing or two about stories. As detailed in a November 2019 story in The Hollywood Reporter, Bergquist, who leads artificial intelligence (AI) projects at USC's Entertainment Technology Center (ETC), was formerly a national security analyst and ABC News consultant named Alexis Debat. Once his lies were exposed, he left Washington D.C. in 2007, shrouded in shame. Now, Bergquist is set to go public with Corto, his previously stealth-mode startup that uses AI to help storytellers in the entertainment industry better understand their content, their operations, and their audiences. Since 2016, Corto has worked symbiotically with the ETC, a think tank founded in 1993 by Star Wars creator George Lucas to support cooperative technological advancement in Hollywood. As the THR story conveyed, Bergquist seems genuinely contrite. He has embraced working extra hard to overcome his tarnished past and salvage his integrity. "This is a very sensitive thing for me," he told dot.LA. ? Twelve years later it's still haunting." With the coronavirus indefinitely shutting down production and threatening to erode disposable incomes, Bergquist's comeback may be just in time to help Tinseltown recover from a looming downfall of its own.Essential to Corto is its database of stories that it has thoroughly analyzed using several AI techniques. Like a submarine, Corto probes the depths of a story at a level and speed that a human brain cannot, and extracts the extent to which the story contains certain features, including dozens of "emotional tonalities" like melancholy, power, and generosity. Soon, Bergquist says, Corto will be able to extract additional deep features, like those related to specific characters and the story’s structure. For now, Corto’s value starts with what it can tell a user about a script that's not in its database.
https://dot.la/a-stealthy-startup-leaves-the-shadows-with-hopes-of-saving-hollywood-2645709837.html
-Peacock TV Hopes It’s Found the Right Business Model to Weather the Pandemic: Bring on the bird puns! On Wednesday, Comcast subsidiary NBCUniversal's streaming service, Peacock, takes flight. Initially available to a subset of Comcast cable and broadband subscribers, Peacock will reportedly spread its wings across Comcast’s footprint by the end of April before expanding on July 15 to other cable company customers and web and streaming platforms. The new service will hatch with up to 15,000 hours' worth of content. Peacock's library will include a flock of NBC favorites like Parks & Recreation, 30 Rock and Law & Order: SVU; movies from Universal Pictures and Dreamworks Animation such as Jurassic Park, E.T. and Shrek; and news segments, talk shows, original series and content from Telemundo. Peacock will also offer a selection of live sports (once those migrate back), and in 2021 will have exclusive rights to The Office. Pricing will be tiered. Comcast customers will have full access with ads for free, or ad-free for $5/month. The behemoth has already forged a deal with Cox, another communications company, to provide their customers preferential access to Peacock, and is reportedly negotiating terms with others. Non-Comcast customers will have three options: limited content feathered with advertisements will be free; double the content with ads for $5/month; or no ads for $10/month. Peacock will find itself perched alongside feisty competition. Yet whereas most of its streaming market competitors have zigged toward offering subscription-based video on-demand (SVOD), Peacock’s advertising-based (AVOD) platform represents a bit of a zag. ? One thing that helps Peacock stand out is that it will feature some content for free, ? said Ross Benes, analyst at eMarketer. In such a crowded field, Peacock’s relatively strong content slate should help, too.
https://dot.la/nbc-peacock-streaming-service-2645721883.html
-‘Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker’ to Hit Disney Plus Two Months Early: “Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker” will begin streaming on Disney Plus two months earlier than previously scheduled. The final installment of the original Star Wars movie series will debut on the streaming service — when else? — on May 4, colloquially known as “Star Wars Day” among fans of the galactic movie franchise. With the addition to Disney Plus, for the first time ever, fans will be able to stream all nine films in George Lucas’s Skywalker saga all in one place. Other content Disney Plus has teed up for May the 4th are eight-episode docuseries “Disney Gallery: The Mandalorian,” and the series finale of the animated “Star Wars: The Clone Wars.”With theaters shuttered nationwide during the COVID-19 pandemic, Disney is leaning more heavily than ever on Disney Plus as an outlet for its premium entertainment product. The company previously moved up the release of “Frozen 2” on the subscription-video service, and set June 12 as the direct-to-streaming premiere date for Kenneth Branagh’s “Artemis Fowl” live-action sci-fi fantasy. Stay-at-home quarantines have likely helped boost Disney Plus signups.
https://variety.com/2020/digital/news/star-wars-rise-of-skywalker-streaming-disney-plus-1234590532/
-YouTube to Host Free Virtual Film Festival With 20 Partners Including Cannes, Tribeca, Sundance: With COVID-19 shuttering film fests worldwide, YouTube has stepped in to launch a 10-day digital film festival this spring with 20 partners — streaming free to cinema fans everywhere. We Are One: A Global Film Festival is being produced and organized by New York’s Tribeca Enterprises. The YouTube-hosted event will feature programming from 20 top film festivals including the Cannes Film Festival, Toronto International Film Festival, Sundance Film Festival, Berlin International Film Festival, Tribeca Film Festival and Venice Film Festival. The online festival is set to run from May 29-June 7, 2020, and will be available at youtube.com/weareone. The free-to-watch programming, which will not include any ads, is to include feature films, shorts, documentaries, music, comedy and panel discussions. For now, organizers aren’t identifying specific films expected to be screened in the We Are One fest. They said a full schedule will be available in the coming weeks. Viewers will be asked to make donations for COVID-19 relief, which YouTube and Tribeca said will benefit the World Health Organization and local orgs in regions globally.
https://variety.com/2020/digital/news/youtube-free-film-festival-cannes-tribeca-sundance-1234590501/
-Google’s Surprising New Decision Helps Every Business But Amazon: you may not even remember when the change happened. Once, any company could advertise on Google’s Product search pages without paying. One day, Google realized some of these listings may not be offering true customer satisfaction. How could the company, after all, vouch for the product or service being advertised? So in 2012, Product Search became Google Shopping and began to charge for listings. Logically, any company that now advertised with Google had more at stake. Things have changed, so last week Google announced it's making those product listings free again. After all, Google has much deeper means — just think of all the data now in its possession -- of seeing whether a listing is legitimate or not. Oh, and there’s also the existence of Amazon. Jeff Bezos's company began to realize it could not only make money out of retail, but out of ads for that retail. Why, last year Amazon made $14.1 billion just from advertising. Its method is to charge businesses for featuring in more prominent positions -- and, of course, to enjoy a percentage share of their sales. Google surely envied that.Now, then, every struggling business, smaller or larger, can try and sell to precisely the customers that need its products, but may not be immediately aware of those products. The caustic will, of course, only see the direct strike at Amazon. Google’s been somewhat passive in the shopping arena, while Amazon has coldly reaped the customer attention that flows to its pages. But even if the motive for this new move appears purely mercenary, Google is cleverly helping retailers at precisely the time they need it most.
-HBO Max Will Be Available on Apple Devices at Launch: WarnerMedia announced that HBO Max will be available on Apple devices when it launches on May 27, 2020. The app will be fully integrated with the Apple TV app on iPhone, iPad, iPod touch and Apple TV. At launch, customers will be able to access HBO Max on iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, Apple TV 4K and Apple TV HD. Those with older version of devices will be able to stream content from HBO Max with AirPlay. Those with an HBO Now subscription will be able to login with their current credentials, while new HBO Max subscribers will also have the option of subscribing within the Apple TV app. “As we prepare for the launch of HBO Max, our focus remains on making it as widely available as possible for customers seeking out this best-in-class streaming experience,” said Rich Warren, president of WarnerMedia Distribution. “The availability to HBO Max across Apple devices is a great addition to our distribution offering and will provide seamless access for millions of customers.” HBO Max will launch with over 10,000 hours of content including a slate of originals, with more to come. South Park, Gossip Girl, The West Wing, and more will be added within the first year, along with over 2,000 feature films including Casablanca, The Wizard of Oz, and The Lord of the Rings.
https://www.cordcuttersnews.com/hbo-max-will-be-available-on-apple-devices-at-launch/
-With Sky-High Stakes, What Can Studios Do to Fight Piracy? The entertainment industry is navigating choppy waters in a sea of uncertainty that is evidently filled with pirates. Content pipelines have been crimped due to shooting moratoria and the suspension of live events. Advertising revenues are plummeting. Although streaming consumption is up, many viewers will soon face tough choices about how to spend their money amid an economic downturn. Competition continues to grow. And ongoing health concerns stemming from the coronavirus may put an irreversible dent in businesses that require congregating in close quarters, like movie theaters and theme parks. Speculation of consolidation and bankruptcy is bubbling. Given such headwinds, anti-piracy has arguably never been more important. Protecting revenues has taken on more urgency in these turbulent times. Yet new analyses suggest that anti-piracy measures are failing. Muso, a British anti-piracy firm, recently found that film piracy in the U.S. was up an ? unprecedented" 41% in the final week of March compared to the final week of February. Reports have suggested that all the unreleased episodes of The Last Dance, a Netflix-ESPN collaboration about the Michael Jordan-era Chicago Bulls that has been a lifeline to starved sports fans, are available for unsanctioned viewing. And an analysis exclusively shared this week with dot.LA found that four major studios lost $100 million in 23 days due to pirating across six major releases made available on streaming platforms from March 20 - April 11. The finding comes from Videocites, a video analytics firm founded in 2014 with offices in Israel and Beverly Hills. Videocites did not wish to disclose specific titles or studios. In 2019, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce found that TV and film piracy costs the industry up to $71 billion annually. When sports are included, that number climbs to nearly $230 billion. While determining an exact dollar figure is ripe for miscalculation because of the uncertainty over whether pirate consumers would have otherwise bought the title legally, three things about piracy are clear, said Mike Smith, professor of marketing at Carnegie Mellon and co-author of a report on digital piracy recently presented to the U.S. Patent & Trade Office. One is that piracy hurts sales. For some time the question was unclear, since theoretically piracy can provide promotional benefits. But after 29 out of 33 peer-reviewed articles reached the same conclusion, ? it's not an interesting debate anymore," Smith told dot.LA.
https://dot.la/movie-piracy-studios-2645859218.html
-UPS and CVS will use drones to deliver prescriptions in Florida: UPS and CVS are teaming up to deliver prescription medicine via drone to residents of The Villages retirement community in Florida. The service, which will use Matternet’s M2 drones, is being conducted with authorization from the Federal Aviation Administration. The drone deliveries will begin in early May. The first flights will be less than half a mile and will be delivered to a pickup location near the retirement community. Initially, a UPS ground vehicle will complete the delivery to the resident’s door. The prescriptions will be delivered from one CVS store, with two additional stores joining at a later date. UPS, which has been conducting limited drone delivery experiments in North Carolina, said it is expanding its drone service to help people who are sheltering in place due to the novel coronavirus pandemic. “Our new drone delivery service will help CVS provide safe and efficient deliveries of medicines to this large retirement community, enabling residents to receive medications without leaving their homes,” said Scott Price, UPS chief strategy and transformation officer, in a statement. “UPS is committed to playing its part in fighting COVID-19, and this is another way we can support our healthcare customers and individuals with innovative solutions.” These aren’t the first drone deliveries that have been made in the US, nor are they even the first from UPS specifically. Google offshoot Wing launched a drone delivery service of its own last year in Virginia, which delivers over-the-counter medicines and other health and wellness items.
https://www.theverge.com/2020/4/27/21238196/ups-cvs-drone-delivery-medicine-florida-coronavirus
-ESL and DreamHack enter three-year broadcast deal with Twitch: Tournament organisers ESL and DreamHack have entered a three-year broadcast partnership with live streaming platform Twitch. From 2021, the English streams for “major” ESL and DreamHack events will be exclusively broadcast on the platform. The deal sees Twitch named as the global digital media partner of ESL and DreamHack events on a non-exclusive basis in 2020, before exclusivity comes into play through to 2022. The agreement includes all ESL Pro Tour tournaments for CS:GO, StarCraft II, and Warcraft II, as well as ESL Pro League, IEM, DreamHack Masters, and DreamHack Open. Benjamin Vallat, SVP of Alliances and Corporate Development at Twitch, commented on the deal in a release: “ESL and Twitch have been key players in the history of esports as we know it. The continuation of our partnership will strengthen not only the content offerings for fans, but also the greater esports community that ESL, Dreamhack, and Twitch have cultivated over the years.” Twitch will become a “centralised hub” for ESL and DreamHack broadcasts, working with the tournament organisers for integrations and sponsorships for the duration of the agreement.
https://esportsinsider.com/2020/04/esl-dreamhack-twitch-partnership/
-Amazon Renews NFL ‘Thursday Night Football’ Through 2022, Scores Exclusive Game per Season: Amazon Prime Video is ready for some more football — and the NFL, for now, expects to be hitting the field this fall. Amazon is set to stream a dozen NFL games worldwide for the next three seasons on both Prime and the Twitch live-streaming platform, under a renewal of its pact with the league for rights to “Thursday Night Football” games through 2022. And Amazon has secured an additional carve-out: Under the new deal with the NFL, it will have exclusive global rights to one late-season game globally on Prime Video and Twitch each of the next three seasons. Terms of the renewed deal weren’t disclosed. Amazon has held the “TNF” streaming rights for the past three seasons (starting in 2017) and clearly it has found value through delivering NFL games to its more than 150 million Prime members around the world. Amazon had been paying about $65 million annually for the package of Thursday games under its 2018 two-year renewal — and sources said it is paying more under the new deal. “Amazon has become a trusted and valued partner of the NFL,” said Brian Rolapp, the league’s chief media and business officer, in a statement. “Extending this partnership around ‘Thursday Night Football’ continues our critical mission of delivering NFL games to as many fans in as many ways as possible both in the United States and around the world.” For each of the next three seasons, Amazon Prime Video and Twitch will stream Fox’s broadcast of the 11 “Thursday Night Football” games in over 200 countries and territories. All “TNF” games will continue to be distributed under the league’s “tri-cast” model: on broadcast (Fox), cable (NFL Network, Fox Deportes), and digital (Prime Video and Twitch). For the 2020 season — again, assuming the NFL is ready to play ball — Amazon will have exclusive streaming rights to one Saturday game in the second half of the regular season, produced by CBS. Amazon also has exclusive rights to one game for each of the 2021 and 2022 seasons but the date, day of the week and matchup will likely change year to year. (Amazon has global exclusivity to those games with the exception of their expected availability on free, over-the-air TV stations in the participating teams’ home markets, under the NFL’s longstanding business practice to make games available on local broadcast television; however, the deals with local TV affiliates have not been done yet.)
-Feature Spotlight: Watch TV & Chat with Friends, Family & Fans on Vidgo: We’ve seen the stats about the rise of Zoom, HouseParty, and Google Hangouts since stay at home orders started. Vidgo is taking virtual hangouts to a new level with Social TV. With the social TV feature, any Vidgo subscriber can join Hangs. Hangs are virtual rooms where users can watch the same content and interact in real time. Chat, post polls, and react with GIFs to keep the conversation going as you watch. Be sure to check out Vidgo’s schedule of Watch Parties to watch shows live and chat with other fans. Recently, Vidgo had a Watch Party for 90 Day Fiancé, hosted by one of the stars of the show, Lisa. Another Watch Party for the virtual edition of the 2020 draft had football fans from across the country watching together, trash talking their rivals, and cheering on their teams. f you’re in the mood to socialize, but want to keep it personal, you can also create private watch parties. Making your own Hang will let you watch TV and interact with only the people who have been invited to join the party. Vidgo is available on Android and iOS devices, Amazon Fire TV, Android TV, and Roku. Start with a 72 hour “sneak peek” account to try the app out with no credit card required. Vidgo has a 7 day free trial. A subscription costs $39.99, but Vidgo is offering a deal for $10 off right now, bringing the price down to just $29.99 for 60+ live TV channels.
https://www.cordcuttersnews.com/feature-spotlight-watch-tv-chat-with-friends-family-fans-on-vidgo/
-AT&T to Combine Xandr Ad-Tech Business With WarnerMedia: AT&T said it would fold its stand-alone Xandr ad-tech unit into WarnerMedia, just weeks after the CEO of Xandr abruptly departed. Gerhard Zeiler, who was named chief revenue officer of WarnerMedia last year, and oversees advertising, distribution and international operations, will supervise all ad-sales outreach across AT&T going forward, the company said. Kirk McDonald, chief business officer of Xandr, will continue to lead the unit, reporting to Zeiler. The Xandr team will operate separately from WarnerMedia’s ad-sales efforts, but the two units have been working more closely in recent months. The move represents a reversal of hopes for Xandr, which was formed as a separate business in 2017 just as AT&T was pursuing its $85.4 billion purchase of the media conglomerate previously known as Time Warner. AT&T hired Brian Lesser, a top executive at WPP’s large GroupM media-buying operation, to build a business aimed at helping advertisers use data to place marketing pitches more precisely and create new commercial formats that could be used in streaming video and broadband venues.
https://variety.com/2020/tv/news/xandr-warnermedia-combine-att-1234594145/
-NBCUniversal Chief Says Premium VOD for Some Movies Will Be ‘Complementary’ to Theatrical Distribution: NBCUniversal chief Jeff Shell is not backing down from Universal’s flap with top exhibitors over the studio’s premium VOD release of “Trolls World Tour.” The NBCU CEO told investors Thursday during Comcast’s quarterly earnings call that premium VOD releases for some titles will be a “complementary element” to traditional theatrical distribution for the studio. Shell emphasized that he sees theatrical distribution as rebounding from the COVID-19 shutdowns. But he also stressed that the reality for many consumers is that movies are watched in the home, and studios would be foolish to ignore that fact. “The question is, when we come out of this, what is going to be the model? I would expect that consumers will return to theaters and we will be part of that,” Shell said. “I also would expect PVOD is going be part of that offering in some way. It’s not going to be a replacement, but it will be a complimentary element and we’re just going to have to see how long that takes and where it takes us.” Universal has been in a war of words this week with AMC Theatres, the nation’s largest exhibition chain, and the National Association of Theatre Owners after AMC vowed to not play Universal movies in the wake of the decision to release “Trolls World Tour” as a premium VOD offering. “Trolls World Tour” was set for a theatrical release on April 10, but the studio shifted to a $19.99 premium VOD release plan after the coronavirus outbreak shuttered theaters around the world. Earlier this week, Shell was quoted in the Wall Street Journal as saying that the experiment had generated nearly $100 million in revenue so far since the movie’s March 11 debut and that the studio would pursue more such PVOD releases. Shell’s comments sparked AMC to announce it would no longer book Universal titles in its theaters in protest of the studio’s move. Exhibitors typically demand a 90-day window of exclusivity for theatrical titles in theaters before a title is released as a home entertainment offering. NATO also weighed in with a lengthy statement questioning whether the unusual circumstances of social distancing and the fact that Universal had spent heavily on traditional film marketing influenced their decision.
-Facebook launched new Zoom-like video messaging and livestreaming features across its platforms: Facebook launched a slew of new video messaging and livestreaming features across its platforms as it looks to take advantage of surging usage of such tools, per a company blog post. The move advances multiple prongs of Facebook’s growth strategy, from boosting engagement across the platform to creating cross-company integration. In particular, Facebook's new Room group video chat feature will allow it to capitalize on soaring user demand while also integrating its family of apps. The new multi-person Zoom competitor dubbed ? Messenger Rooms" will allow users to launch a call from either Messenger or Facebook and invite up to 50 people to a chat — even those without Facebook accounts. Facebook is also working to integrate the Rooms feature into WhatsApp, Instagram Direct, and even Portal, in line with the vision CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced in 2019. Rooms also introduces some unique features, in particular, "open hangouts": If a Facebook Group or Event has a video chat happening, other users within the group will be shown the chat within their News Feed, allowing them to jump onto the call if they wish. The features could help Facebook capture an even larger chunk of the skyrocketing engagement with video chatting platforms. For context, the company already reported that it's seeing 700 million accounts engaging in video calls every day across its platforms during the pandemic. While that engagement will surely subside when the pandemic does, eMarketer senior analyst Jasmine Enberg says that "some media behaviors adopted by consumers to cope with the coronavirus pandemic may stick in the longer term, and Facebook's expansion of its video services, including Rooms, will help it meet any future demand." More broadly, Facebook has been working to build out features that emphasize community — and these features are another step in that direction. This is a particularly heady time to work on encouraging more intentional use of the platform, but it could help Facebook to appeal more widely even to those who may have previously shied away, or ignored, the platform altogether.