By Meg James July 9, 2019 | WarnerMedia is looking for a little help from its “Friends” to launch the company’s upcoming HBO Max streaming service. The AT&T-owned business said Tuesday its new service, which will launch next spring, would have exclusive rights to all 236 episodes of “Friends,” which was produced by Warner Bros. Television and has been one of...
LOS ANGELES (July 8, 2019): DEG: The Digital Entertainment Group is pleased to announce it will present its third annual "Hedy Lamarr Award for Innovation in Entertainment Technology” to Willow Bay, Dean of the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism. DEG created the Innovation Award to recognize female executives in the fields of entertainment and technology who have made...
By Kyle Buchanan July 1, 2019 | Big studios are gobbling each other up as smaller movies struggle and even name-brand titles tank at the box office. Netflix is revolutionizing the way people watch films, while major new streaming services from Apple, Disney, Warner Bros. and other deep-pocketed studios are coming soon. And every aspect of the movie industry — from...
June 28, 2019 | As worldwide TV household penetration is quite saturated, the flat panel TV market has been driven by consumer adoption of TVs with higher resolution, larger screen size, and connected and integrated applications and services, notes tech market advisory firm ABI Research. While flat panel TV makers have announced 8K TV sets, it is the 4K TV market...
By Brooks Barnes [caption id="attachment_7638" align="alignright" width="254"] Ann Sarnoff[/caption] June 24, 2019 | AT&T on Monday chose a Hollywood outsider, Ann Sarnoff, to run its recently acquired Warner Bros. movie and television studio, which will play a major role in the conglomerate’s coming streaming service. Ms. Sarnoff, a New Yorker whose career has included leadership roles at Nickelodeon, the Women’s National Basketball Association, Dow Jones...
By Dade Hayes June 22, 2019 | Netflix content chief Ted Sarandos, in a lengthy sit-down with Liberty Global CEO Mike Fries, covered a host of topics, including talent agencies producing content, Disney’s streaming outlook and Netflix’s M&A future. The pair spoke onstage Friday night at SeriesFest in Denver, an emerging TV-focused festival. The hour-and-10-minute discussion (see video clip below), which included an unusually comprehensive audience Q&A, found both executives opening up...
By Beejoli Shah and Jessica Toonkel June 21, 2019 | In a sign of how Hulu’s programming decisions have shifted since Disney took control of the streaming service, Hulu executives have begun telling outside studios that Disney will likely have partial ownership in most shows Hulu buys, according to multiple studio executives and Hollywood agents. In recent weeks, Hulu executives have told outside studios that...
By Todd Spangler June 17, 2019 | IMDb has dumped Freedive as the name for the service it launched in January — rebranding it as “IMDb TV” (somewhat confusingly, as it includes movies as well). Over the next few months, IMDb will add “thousands” of new titles to IMDb TV, which it claims will triple the number of movies and TV shows available to watch...
By Jessica Toonkel and Tom Dotan June 14, 2019 | As companies like WarnerMedia and Apple prepare to market new video services to consumers, they are racing to develop hit shows. But as vital as good programming is, figuring out how to sign up and keep subscribers is just as important. To do so, media companies are tapping new types of executives...
By Todd Spangler June 12, 2019 | Row8, a fledgling digital movie service, is looking to take on transactional VOD players like Apple and Amazon with a focus on movies — and a few pricing twists. The L.A.-based startup has inked licensing deals with four major studios — Paramount Pictures, Sony Pictures Entertainment, Universal Pictures, and Warner Bros. — for rights to...
