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Read our latest daily deep dives, hot takes, and exciting updates about the entertainment world. Check out the latest insight from your favourite analyst, or search by coverage areas - music, entertainment and fandom, creator economy and social.

The Sky Kids App Follows In The Footsteps of DisneyLife & YouTube Kids

Tim Mulligan

30 Mar 2016

Media and Marketing

Tomorrow British pay-TV giant Sky will launch its Sky Kids app , which will be free of charge for its existing subscribers. The app has been designed with parents in mind to create a safe and engaging filter for Sky video content for the children of Sky customers.

4 min read

Don't Write Pandora Off Just Yet

Mark Mulligan

29 Mar 2016

Apple Music iHeart Media Pandora

Pandora has made the news again with founder Tim Westergren stepping up to the role of CEO, replacing Brain McAndrews. These are certainly uncertain times for Pandora, once the stand out success story of digital music, at least from commercial terms if not always from a songwriter’s perspective.

3 min read

Why YouTube Is Getting Into Live Streaming

Tim Mulligan

24 Mar 2016

Facebook Live Meerkat Periscope

Yesterday the news broke on VentureBeat that YouTube has been secretly building a new app for live streaming video. This places the world’s largest video platform into direct competition with Facebook with its Live video broadcasting feature for select A-Listers, and Twitter with its unrestricted ...

4 min read

Could Apple Become ‘What The Doctor Ordered’?

Karol Severin

22 Mar 2016

Apple Apple Special Event CareKit

Besides the anticipated device shrinking , Apple made another important announcement at its Special Event yesterday. After recapping the tremendous success ResearchKit has had with improving medical research, Apple launched CareKit, a new software framework designed to help developers enable people ...

3 min read

Apple Shrinks The Kids

Karol Severin

21 Mar 2016

Apple Apple Special Event iPad Pro

A number of signals were sent by Apple during the Apple Special Event in Cupertino today. Tim Cook started off by sharing that there are now 1 billion Apple devices in use around the world. Furthermore, Apple is now 93% energy renewable, with 100% in the US, China and other 21 countries.

3 min read

Chart Of The Week. Playlists 1, Albums 0 – How Streaming Is Changing Music Listening

Mark Mulligan

21 Mar 2016

albums Chart Of The Week Chart Of The Week

The album has been under assault ever since Napster first gave consumers the ability cherry pick their favourite tracks and leave the filler behind. Apple formalised the process with the iTunes Store and in recent years streaming has hammered the nail in the coffin by supercharging the consumption s...

1 min read

Cover image for Chart Of The Week. Playlists 1, Albums 0 – How Streaming Is Changing Music Listening

Sports Content Comes To Basic Sky Subscription Packages

Tim Mulligan

18 Mar 2016

live sports Online video Pay TV

Today Sky announced that it is making a selection of sports content available to basic package subscribers. A new channel called Sky Sports Mix launching this summer will bring a range of sports content to all its TV customers in the UK and Ireland.

3 min read

Sky Gets Serious About Virtual Reality

Tim Mulligan

17 Mar 2016

Sky sky vr studio Uncategorised

Today Sky announced that it has created an in-house unit dedicated to Virtual Reality (VR) content production called Sky VR Studio. This underlines the importance with which Europe’s largest pay-TV company assigns to the new immersive form of story telling.

3 min read

The Imminent Launch Of Comic-Con HQ Highlights The Trend Towards Online Video Fragmentation

Tim Mulligan

17 Mar 2016

comic-con comic-con hq digital natives

On March 14th, Comic-Con and Lionsgate jointly announced the imminent launch of Comic-Con HQ a new SVOD (Subscription Video On Demand) service. The new platform will allow Beta access on the 7th of May in advance of its official launch in in June.

3 min read

The Chinese Online Video Landscape Is About To Change

Tim Mulligan

15 Mar 2016

Baidu China iQiYi

Last Friday, Baidu, the Chinese tech group mainly known for its leading search engine in the Chinese market, announced that it was effectively spinning off Qiyi (recently rebranded to the domestic market as iQiyi).

4 min read

Bad Data Is The Worm In The Apple For Streaming Music

Mark Mulligan

14 Mar 2016

7Digital Bad Data data

2016 is proving to be tricky year for streaming rights. No sooner did it start to look like artists and labels were beginning to feel comfortable with streaming then along come a veritable flood of songwriter class action suits in the US, against TIDAL , Rhapsody and Spotify , twice .

8 min read

Music Piracy Hasn't Gone, It Has Merely Changed Its Spots

Mark Mulligan

14 Mar 2016

Chart Of The Week Chart Of The Week mobile piracy

While the music industry slowly got its head around the brave new world of digital in the 2000’s piracy used to be the dominant focus of record labels and their trade associations. Now, with so much momentum and scale among legitimate services that focus has understandably lessened.

2 min read

Cover image for Music Piracy Hasn't Gone, It Has Merely Changed Its Spots

Guardian Circle Taps Into The ‘Light Emergency’ Opportunity

Karol Severin

11 Mar 2016

emergency tech Mobile content mobile strategy

Guardian Circle is a new app, which allows you to build groups of ‘guardians’ consisting of personal contacts that you wish to rely on. You cansendalerts to these groups immediately bringing your guardians into an ‘alert room’, where they see your location and can chat with you to figure out...

3 min read

Could Facebook Be About To Get Into Premium Video Content?

Tim Mulligan

9 Mar 2016

Facebook NFL Online video

Last Thursday Variety reported that Facebook is considering bidding for the NFL streaming rights for Thursday night games. The National Football league is auctioning off the digital rights to stream 18 regular season games on OTT services (Non-Traditional-internet based video streaming services.

4 min read

Here's Why Netflix And YouTube Just Parked Tanks On Each Other's Lawns

Mark Mulligan

7 Mar 2016

Chart Of The Week cord cutting cord nevers

Slowly but surely the traditional media industries are waking up to the importance of YouTubers but those taking note most quickly are the subscription video companies, Netflix in particular. As recently illustrated by its commissioning of ‘Haters Back Off’ from YouTuber Colleen Balling-Evans’...

2 min read

Cover image for Here's Why Netflix And YouTube Just Parked Tanks On Each Other's Lawns

Vertical Video Will Rule On The Smartphone - Embrace It

Karol Severin

4 Mar 2016

Video

One of the key changes stemming from the evolution of desk/laptop content consumption to smartphones is that the native operational mode of the latter is vertical. The only reason to turn it sideways is when there’s no way of enjoying the full experience vertically.

4 min read

Quick Take: MTV Trax EE SIM Bundle

Mark Mulligan

3 Mar 2016

EE mtv trax Music

There are two gaping holes in the digital music landscape: 1) a wide range of products for mass market consumers, 2) telco music bundles for pre-pay mobile customers. MusicQubed has just taken a stab at addressing both with a MTV Trax pre-pay SIM bundle with UK mobile carrier EE.

2 min read

What Sony Music's Purchase Of Essential Music Says About The Future Of The Music Industry

Mark Mulligan

2 Mar 2016

AWAL Blockchain consolidation

Independent label services company Essential Music & Marketing is no longer independent, having just been acquired by Sony Musi c and merged with Sony’s label services division Red to create a new entity: Red Essential.

3 min read

Quick Take: BBC Music App

Mark Mulligan

1 Mar 2016

BBC BBC Music BBC Music App

The BBC has launched a music app called, well, BBC Music . Available only in the UK, this native music app is one step on a well considered path for the BBC as it tries to carve out a role for itself in streaming era.

2 min read

Chart Of The Week: Music Subscribers Vs Video Subscribers

Mark Mulligan

29 Feb 2016

Chart Of The Week Music music subscribers

2015 was a big year for streaming music but it was a bigger deal for streaming video, generating $16 billion in revenue compared to $4.5 billion for streaming music. (Both figures are retail values). The contrast between the two streaming markets is pronounced: Streaming Video: Exclusives are a stan...

2 min read

Cover image for Chart Of The Week: Music Subscribers Vs Video Subscribers

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