Media & Entertainment

Sony and Honda envision an EV that entertains while it takes the wheel • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on October 13, 2022Posted in electric vehicles, honda, Media & Entertainment, Sony, TransportationNo Comments

Sony and Honda have officially launched their joint mobility venture that aims to start delivering premium electric vehicles with automated driving capabilities in the United States in the spring of 2026, followed by Japan in the second half of 2026. The joint venture from hardware, software and entertainment conglomerate Sony and automaker Honda to produce what the companies promise to be a wildly smart vehicle perfectly demonstrates the direction of the auto industry today. As the software-defined vehicle moves beyond car performance and into autonomous territory, cars are not just about transportation anymore — they’re about entertainment and automakers are scrambling to up the ante. The future of premium vehicles will focus less on torque and horsepower and leather seats, and more on what a driver can do to entertain themselves when they take their hands off the steering wheel. Earlier this week, BMW partnered with AirConsole to bring in-car gaming to the BMW 7 series next year, a series that will already be built with Amazon Fire TV for streaming. Volvo is working to integrate Google Home and YouTube into its vehicles. And let’s not even get started on the EVs that promise to mine crypto. The launch of the JV comes a few months after Sony and Honda signed a JV agreement to establish the new software-oriented “mobility tech company,” called simply Sony Honda Mobility Inc. (SHM). The JV will begin taking preorders for their first product in the first half of 2025 and start selling entirely online before the end of the same year, the companies said. The new EV, which will be initially manufactured at Honda’s North America factory, will be developed with Level 3 automated driving capabilities under limited conditions, and with Level 2 advanced driver assistance systems that can handle situations as complex as urban driving, according to the companies. According to SAE, Level 3 autonomy means the car is capable of driving in certain situations, like traffic jams, when automated features are engaged, but the human driver must take over when the system requests it. Sony will provide the sensors and tech for the autonomous capabilities, as well as all of the other software, from cloud-based services to entertainment, that drivers will hopefully be able to enjoy all the better for not having to actually drive the car all the time. The companies didn’t share too much about what the infotainment system would look like, but they did say the metaverse would be involved. “SHM aims to evolve mobility space into entertainment and emotional space, by seamlessly integrating real and virtual worlds, and exploring new entertainment possibilities through digital innovations such as the metaverse,” according to SHM. Neither Sony nor Honda responded to ZebethMedia’s request for more information about how, exactly, they plan to integrate the metaverse into a vehicle, however, it’s possible SHM will integrate augmented reality through safety features, as BMW has done. Part of SHM’s mission is to “create new mobility entertainment” and position mobility as a “mobility experience service.” What exactly does this mean? We don’t have all the facts yet, but it looks like SHM is subscribing to the same feature-bloat newsletter as other luxury brands that want to encourage drivers to interact with the vehicle more than they interact with their phones. Other details missing from the JV announcement include pricing, battery range or even what type of vehicle we’re looking at. Honda has been slow to push out its own electric vehicles, so the JV with Sony is also a move toward embracing not only EVs, but also the idea of the car as a connected device. The Sony Honda EV, if it makes it to market, will also help Honda get a foothold into the luxury vehicle market in the U.S.

Netflix undercuts Disney+ with launch of its $7/month ad-supported plan starting Nov. 3 • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on October 13, 2022Posted in Media & Entertainment, Netflix, streaming serviceNo Comments

The moment has finally come. Today, Netflix hosted a press call to reveal a preview of its new ad-supported tier, “Basic with Ads,” which will launch on November 3 in nine countries, including the U.S., and cost $6.99 per month, $13 less than Netflix’s Premium plan. This aligns with reports that the new plan would be $7-$9. Plus, Nielsen will be Netflix’s audience measurement partner, which is surprising since Nielsen has been criticized for reporting inaccurate streaming data. The cheaper tier will roll out across 12 markets to start. On November 1, Canada and Mexico subscribers are the first to try the new plan. It will then roll out to the U.S., the UK, France, Germany, Italy, Australia, Japan, Korea, and Brazil on November 3. Spain will be the last to experience the cheaper tier when it launches on November 10. The launch dates confirm reports that the ad tier would roll out in 2022, contrary to Netflix’s previous announcement that it would launch in early 2023. The streaming giant will beat rival Disney+ by one month, which is launching its ad-supported plan at $7.99 per month on December 8, in tandem with a price hike of its ad-free plan. Not only will Netflix have a slightly cheaper tier than Disney+–every dollar counts–but all of Netflix’s ad-free plans will remain the same price as well. Image Credits: Netflix In today’s announcement, Netflix wrote, “While it’s still very early days, we’re pleased with the interest from both consumers and the advertising community — and couldn’t be more excited about what’s ahead. As we learn from and improve the experience, we expect to launch in more countries over time.” There are some downsides, though. While subscribers can enjoy various Netflix titles at a lower price while also streaming on multiple simultaneous devices, the company has still not worked out the rights to various shows and movies. “A limited number of movies and TV shows won’t be available due to licensing restrictions, which we’re working on,” the company added. During the press call today, Greg Peters, Chief Operating Officer, Netflix, said that the percentage of unavailable titles varies from country to country. At launch, approximately 5 to 10% of Netflix’s catalog will be missing from the ad-supported plan. “We’ll work to reduce that number over time,” Peters said. Netflix previously told investors that it was renegotiating deals with media companies. Also, Netflix confirmed earlier reports that offline viewing would be unavailable, which is standard for many AVOD (ad-supported video-on-demand) services. Like the Netflix basic plan, the ad-supported tier will have a video resolution of 720p HD, whereas the standard and premium plans have 1080p HD video. Subscribers of the basic tiers also don’t get 4K viewing, which is only available for premium viewers. Image Credits: Netflix Each ad will only be 15 or 30 seconds long, which will play before and during shows and movies. On the bright side, new Netflix movies on the service will get pre-roll ads and not have interruptions. However, older movies will get mid-roll ads as well as pre-roll. There will be a limited ad load to an average of 4-5 minutes of ads per hour, which is Disney+’s plan as well. Jeremi Gorman, Netflix’s president of worldwide advertising, boasted during the call that hundreds of advertisers signed up for the launch and Netflix’s inventory is nearly sold out. Gorman also noted that the streamer will not accept political or policy ads. Netflix agrees to work with Nielsen Marketers will likely be happy that the streamer will have partners other than Microsoft. Nielsen will use its Digital Ad Ratings in the United States and eventually report Netflix ratings through Nielsen ONE Ads. The reporting will begin “sometime in 2023,” Netflix wrote. Nielsen has measured TV audiences on Netflix since 2017, however, the firm has been accused of reporting numbers that are different than Netflix’s own reporting. Netflix also partnered with DoubleVerify and Integral Ad Science to “verify the viewability and traffic validity” of the advertisements, the company added. Yesterday, Netflix signed up with British TV ratings agency Broadcasters Audience Research Board to measure Netflix’s streaming numbers in the UK—a surprising move for a streaming service that is notoriously close-mouthed about its viewership data. Netflix hopes it can earn revenue through advertisements after a rough quarter in July, with the painful loss of 970,000 subscribers. Earlier this week, JP Morgan analyst Doug Anmuth estimated that, in 2023, Netflix could gain 7.5 million subs to its ad-supported tier in U.S. and Canada, which could drive $600 million in advertising sales. By 2026, Anmuth predicted the streamer would increase by 22 million subscribers in the region, along with $2.65 billion in advertising sales. The streamer has also tried other strategies to generate revenue, like several rounds of layoffs and a paid sharing offering set to roll out to all markets next year. While Netflix probably doesn’t want the majority of its 220 million subscribers to downgrade to its ad-supported plan, many consumers will likely opt for the cheaper tier. Comcast found that 80% of viewers would rather subscribe to an ad-supported service over a pricer ad-free service. Technology research group Omdia suggests that almost 60% of global Netflix subscribers will choose the ad-supported tier. If a bulk of current subscribers downgrade to the cheaper tier, the streamer could experience a decrease in subscription revenue. Peters claimed, “We’re not trying to steer people to one plan or the other we really want to take a pro-consumer approach and let them land on the right plan for them. And we think that the revenue model will be fine as a result.” The announcement comes ahead of Netflix’s Q3 earnings results, which will be announced next week on Tuesday, October 18.

VUZ raises $20 million to scale its immersive social app • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on October 13, 2022Posted in Media & Entertainment, Startups, VUZNo Comments

VUZ, a social app that allows users to stream and experience immersive realism in extended reality (XR) and metaverse digital experiences, has raised $20 million in Series B investment. Investors in the round include Caruso Ventures, Vision VC Fund, e& capital, investment pillar of e& (formerly known as Etisalat Group), DFDF (Dubai Future District Fund), WIN (Webit Investment Network), SRMG, Elbert Capital, and Yasta Partners, Faith Capital, Panthera Capital. Seven existing investors participated as well. The Dubai-based VUZ says that this round which has seen it onboard a mix of U.S.- and EMEA-based investors, will be pivotal to its international expansion. Founder and chief executive officer Khaled Zaatarah launched VUZ, formerly 360VUZ, as a platform to bridge the gap between physical and virtual worlds by offering premium immersive content to a global audience. The platform offers over 20,000 hours of content covering entertainment, creators, and sports, and XR, VR, and AR experiences virtually anywhere in the world. According to Zaatarah, VUZ’s vision is to connect people by providing “authentic immersive experiences while removing the constraints of travel, time, and access.” Users can access and engage different content — in addition to the aforementioned, live events, concerts, celebrity interviews and masterclasses, through its 360-degree live streams — by downloading VUZ’s iOS and Android apps. 70% of its content its free and VUZ monetizes through showing ads to users in this category; on the other hand, users are required to pay between $4-8 for its exclusive content. The company is planning to allow users access content via other media: Meta/Oculus headsets, Qualcomm, immersive avatars and a web platform, Zaatarah said to ZebethMedia. The web3 platform claims to have reached over 1 billion screen views from over 10 million users since its launch. 44% of these views come from the Middle East, 32% from the U.S. and 24% from Egypt. VUZ said it aims to reach 3 billion views in 2023 and double its user base 2x yearly. Creators’ immersive content collaborations have also been a core driver for VUZ content, where its top creators get over 100 million views globally. The funds will be used to fuel these plans, including improving its 10% month-on-month recurring revenue growth, investing in content, hiring additional key senior hires, new social features, launching Web3 products and NFT projects and scaling with asset-light operations into 8 new international markets. The investment will also see VUZ scale its Los Angeles office and scale with creators and content in the U.S., Asia, and Europe. “Our plans for the future are 10 times stronger than what we have been building for the past 6 years,” added the chief executive. “We have built the base and are now ready for sustainable scalability and growth at a scale-up stage,” Zaatarah adds. Telecoms are betting on immersive media and see it as one of the most robust use cases for 5G and the future of video streaming. Zaatarah said partnership and integration with 45 telecom operators is the backbone behind the company’s global expansion. Even Dan Caruso, the managing director of Caruso Ventures, said his firm invested in the company because it is uniquely positioned to build a global platform and partner with top telecom operators globally. One such partner is the newly rebranded UAE-based telecom operator, e&; its VC arm, e& capital launched a $250 million fund this week. VUZ, which has raised over $30 million since inception, is one of e& Capital’s maiden investments in the MENA region. The immersive media platform said it will leverage the telecom operators’ infrastructure to expand into countries in the Middle East and Africa. Speaking on the investment, Kushal Shah, the head of venture capital at e& capital said VUZ is in line with e& capital’s commitment “to collaborate with visionary tech businesses that we believe will contribute to building a better and brighter digital future. We will continue to invest into the company’s success, partnering with them to help them achieve growth and enable meaningful progress that moves this digital world forward.” He told ZebethMedia that his firm plans to make 20 investments across Series A and B-stage startups in the MENA region.

Wharton’s Mori Taheripour on how to negotiate the right way • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on October 13, 2022Posted in Commerce, Elon Musk, M&A, Media & Entertainment, negotiation, TwitterNo Comments

Mori Taheripour teaches negotiations at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, where she has taught undergraduates, MBA students and executive MBA students how to have better business conversations. Taheripour has also coached corporate clients, including on behalf of Goldman Sachs and Major League Baseball, about how to feel more confident and comfortable in negotiating, a skill that everyone uses daily but which tends to be seen as a kind of dark art. Amid the backdrop of one of the highest-profile negotiations in recent memory, centered on Elon Musk’s ongoing stop-and-go plans to buy Twitter, and aware that many readers are negotiating on their own behalf right now — for more time, more funding, a better exit package, fewer investor protections — we talked with Taheripour earlier this week to ask where negotiations tend to falter and how to help them succeed. Excerpts from that chat follow edited for length and clarity. TC: You’ve been an expert in dispute resolution and negotiation for more than a decade. You also published a book on the topic during the pandemic that’s been well-received. For people who haven’t yet read it, is the ability to negotiate well somewhat intuitive or entirely learned? It’s something you learn, and I actually think most people are better negotiators than they think they are because we do it so much. It’s only when we see negotiations through the lens of things that are really transactional and maybe conflict ridden that people put negotiations in a category of things people don’t really enjoy or they’re really afraid of or that are really uncomfortable, and they want to put it off. But any parent, anybody who’s in a relationship, anybody who has employees, anybody who has a pet . . . is probably really good at negotiations. What are some of the most common missteps people make when they’re in a business-related negotiation process? At the heart of all negotiations is human connection. That’s where the magic happens. Most negotiations are not transactional. The best negotiations are either fostering relationships that we already have, or creating new ones. And once you look at it that way, then negotiations become a conversation. Some conversations are harder than others. But they shouldn’t be if we open our minds to them with a sense of empathy and wanting to be creative and wanting to not focus on any one solution. Your book is about how to “negotiate fearlessly,” yet there’s a fine line between fearless and overconfident. Any pointers for readers who might be wondering how to straddle that line? A lot of this goes back to negative self talk and self sabotage. You’re not going to be an excellent negotiator just because you’re smarter and have a higher IQ. Being an excellent negotiator really starts with you getting out of your own way. Great negotiators are great storytellers who can see themselves from a place of value and fearlessly self advocate. If you don’t believe in yourself, if you don’t fearlessly understand your own self value, then the goals that you set for yourself are diminished. They become safe. They may even become mediocre. And once your goals are watered down and safe, then what you ask for is going to be reflective of those goals, and you’re not going to get enough. The minute you give up your power – you either back off in order to make the other [party] happy or to avoid conflict – then you can’t stay in the conversation. You have to have the self-confidence that you two are part of this conversation and your space is as important as theirs. It doesn’t mean those two things are mutually exclusive; it means that you seek solutions that are mutually inclusive. For people in an M&A type situation right now, what do you make adages to never take the first offer, to push for 20% more? Are any of these truly relevant? The way I teach is not at all prescriptive. I don’t believe in always, and I don’t believe in never. The older we get, our gut instinct becomes stronger and our intuition and emotional intelligence become stronger. We should be using these to navigate conversations, as opposed to trying to remember what a professor said in class. When you’re boxed in like that, it creates a lot of anxiety, especially because no negotiation is the same, and the person sitting across from you, that audience, is always different. Elon Musk has seemingly been trying to negotiate with Twitter, on Twitter, to either knock down the price or get out of the deal or buy himself some time, who knows. Either way, making the conversation — or part of it — so public is obviously by design and I wonder if this will become a kind of case study for future negotiations. He’s playing by completely different rules. Five or 10 years ago, this would probably be a nightmare for shareholders and companies because you want to hold on to what’s happening until it’s all done and then go public with it. But what’s quite traditional is that he’s controlling his own story and the messaging that comes out is his, no matter how confusing. If you think about it, he has been testing the water for far longer than the six months since he proposed buying Twitter. Every time he says anything about Tesla stock, prices change; people react immediately. So I think he saw the power that he had in literally changing markets [by using Twitter]. Do you think there is a master plan here? Do you see any logic in this chaos? Truth be told, I was incredibly surprised when the deal fell apart — and there was the threat of litigation and things got messy and he tried to step away. I thought that for sure if the deal was to happen [after that], the stock price or deal valuation would be a lot lower at least. When [the

Apple brings more of its services, including iCloud and Apple Music, to Microsoft platforms • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on October 12, 2022Posted in Apple, apple music, apple tv, Apps, Media & Entertainment, Microsoft, windows 11, xboxNo Comments

During a Surface-focused event this morning, Microsoft announced that it’s integrating Apple’s iCloud storage service with the Photos app in Windows 11. After installing the iCloud for Windows app from the Microsoft Store and choosing to sync iCloud, iPhone users with Windows devices will be able to see their iPhone photos and videos within Photos. Windows users participating in Microsoft’s Windows Insiders program can get the latest iCloud for Windows app, which enables the integration, starting today. “For the last few years, Windows customers who have Android phones have experienced that promise with integration across messaging, calling and photos directly to their Windows PC, bringing the two most important devices in their lives closer together,” CNET quoted Microsoft as saying. “We’re making it easier than ever for customers to access their iPhone photos and the entertainment they love from Apple on their Xbox and Windows devices.” An early look at iCloud integration in Windows 11. In a related development, Apple announced that it’s bringing first-party streaming services including Apple Music and Apple TV for more Microsoft platforms. Apple Music will come to Xbox consoles starting today, and Apple Music and the Apple TV app will launch on Windows sometime next year. The new Apple service tie-ins on Windows and Xbox follow the launch of Apple TV on Xbox consoles nearly two years ago. It’s been a long time coming, but hybrid Windows-iOS households will no doubt appreciate the tighter integration.

Netflix signs up with UK TV ratings agency BARB to reveal streaming viewership numbers • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on October 12, 2022Posted in Media & Entertainment, Netflix, streaming serviceNo Comments

After years of being tight-lipped on viewership numbers, Netflix teamed up with British TV ratings agency Broadcasters Audience Research Board or BARB, an organization in the UK that reports broadcast and streaming numbers. Starting in November, the organization will measure Netflix’s daily streaming numbers as well as report on its monthly reach and share of total identified viewing. Last year, BARB introduced streaming numbers to its reporting in the UK. Disney+ is already signed up. According to the announcement, “BARB is the first industry-owned audience currency in the world that Netflix has joined.” Netflix going public with viewing data is significant and points to how much confidence the streamer has regarding the quality of its content. While Netflix has its Top 10 rankings, the company has been criticized for not publicly publishing viewership metrics for all its shows, especially ones that may not be doing well. BARB will finally reveal to the public just how many shows are actually being watched and which titles are total flops — at least in the UK. Reed Hastings, co-CEO of Netflix, said in a statement, “Back in 2019, at the RTS conference in Cambridge, I welcomed the idea of Netflix audiences being measured independently. We’ve kept in touch with BARB since then and are pleased to make a commitment to its trusted measurement of how people watch television in the UK.” In other news, viewers will finally get to watch a Netflix movie in AMC, Regal and Cinemark theaters—another historic announcement for the streaming giant.

Meta and news outlet’s spar deepens India’s trust deficit • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on October 12, 2022Posted in Facebook, india, Media & Entertainment, meta, SocialNo Comments

Tech giants and news organizations sparring over news reporting isn’t new. Companies often complain to journalists about getting nuances wrong and usually air their dismay “off the record.” Journalists usually agree to include the rebuttals provided the companies can offer the same assertions on-record. The companies don’t follow through and the conversation typically ends there and the world never finds out about what is more often than not a very mundane thing. That’s one of the factors that makes Indian news outlet The Wire’s reporting this week on Instagram and Meta’s responses remarkable. Lawmakers and newsrooms in the U.S. and India are closely watching one of the strangest episodes of a newsroom and its subject publicly disputing — and doubling down on their claims. The Wire, an organization known best for holding the ruling party to account in a way that very few do, reported on Monday that Facebook has given governing party BJP’s top digital operative an unchecked ability to remove content from the platform. The report, which relies on what it claims are internal documents, appears to advance WSJ’s reporting of an internal company program called XCheck, where Facebook shields millions of VIP users from the company’s normal enforcement process. Meta insists that the XCheck program “has nothing to do with the ability to report posts” and has publicly called the documents “fabricated.” Andy Stone, Meta’s comms, tweeted: “The posts in question were surfaced for review by automated systems, not humans. And the underlying documentation appears to be fabricated.” The unexpected twist came on Tuesday, when Wire doubled down on its reporting, claiming to include a picture that appeared to show an alleged email Stone sent to internal teams where he is questioning members how the documents leaked. The picture also showed that Facebook maintains a watchlist of journalists. Wire’s response immediately went viral for several hours and most people believed it. In a way that separates it from most other companies, Facebook has earned a reputation where its denials are not really taken on face value. This is the reason why at least two major outlets in India have chosen not to acknowledge Wire’s story — nor Meta’s denials of those reporting, according to two people familiar with the matter. (Though in its credit, Facebook is suing the Indian government over right to users’ privacy.) The matter was considered closed, and it appeared that Facebook, which identifies India as its largest market by users, was trying to mislead again. But the drama’s lifespan has been extended as Meta has since doubled down on its denial, saying Meta’s Stone’s purported email in the story is “fake.” Guy Rosen, the chief security information officer at Meta, said: “The supposed email address from which it was sent isn’t even Stone’s current email address, and the ‘to’ address isn’t one we use here either. There is no such email. That same story makes reference to an internal journalist ‘watchlist.’ There is no such list.” Facebook, like many other companies, does maintain dossiers on journalists. I (Manish) know this because they accidentally sent me the link to one about five years ago. Meta also does maintain email addresses with the fb.com domain. (The generic press contact remains a fb.com email. Though that’s not proof that Stone still actively uses a fb.com email.) Wire is standing by its reporting. However, if Meta is proven right, tricking a reputable outlet into running an explosive story that could’ve been easily refuted by a big megacorp like Meta would damage press credibility across India at a time when the country’s media is increasingly grappling with a series of existential crises. Who would have the least to lose and most to gain here, especially if the goal was to undermine credibility in the press? These documents were triangulated with other elements of the story that we reported. Meta’s strategy is to try and push us in to a corner with its preposterous “fabrication” charge and force us to reveal information which may compromise our sources. This isn’t going to happen! 2/ — Siddharth (@svaradarajan) October 11, 2022

It’s painful how hellbent Mark Zuckerberg is on convincing us that VR is a thing • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on October 11, 2022Posted in mark Zuckerberg metaverse, Media & Entertainment, Meta Connect 2022No Comments

At Meta Connect 2022, the company’s annual developer conference for its VR efforts and Oculus hardware platform, the company announced a lot of stuff — but what it communicated more effectively than anything else was just how incredibly thirsty — one might even say desperate — Mark Zuckerberg is for his metaverse bet to pay off. Before I get ahead of myself, let me be clear that I understand all of these prerecorded presentations given by large tech companies are extended advertisements. No one’s disputing that, but Zuck’s overscripted and overproduced dev event keynote today was easily the hardest sell for not just a product or a platform, but the premise upon which it’s based, I can ever recall seeing in a decade in tech. The presentation basically kicked off with Mark assuring us that VR is bigger than ever, though almost entirely in relative terms. It’d be hard for it not to be, given the pace of its growth to date since its advent (counting either from the days of the first VR headsets or what you might call “the modern era,” when the original Oculus Rift finally made its ways to consumers in 2016. It then went into a series of cherry-picked revenue numbers set up by Facebook CTO Andrew “Boz” Bosworth, a direct appeal to an ecosystem in need of fleshing out. These were mostly individual highlights, however, rather than the cumulative rapidly incrementing ecosystem numbers that Apple used to balloon its own mobile App Store efforts through its early days. The rest of the presentation was basically a series of hand-wavy “announcements” (many reheated versions of prior ones) that aimed to define use cases and domains in which the metaverse and VR would actually be useful to people. Zuck covered all the old stand-bys — social, gaming, fitness and “future of work.” None looked significantly improved or capable of acting as a turning point in terms of mass adoption, and most had either vague or nonexistent ship dates. One of the biggest swings involved a partnership with Microsoft, which was jointly announced by Zuckerberg and Satya Nadella. Basically, Mark is so desperate to get people in the metaverse that he’s allied with an erstwhile competitor, in a move reminiscent of when Steve Jobs welcomed Bill Gates via satellite link during the Macworld Boston keynote in 1997. That worked well, but it’s not yet clear if this will. Nadella himself articulated the main and recurring theme of VR: “it’s early days.” Only around 5,400 people were watching in VR when my colleague Taylor tuned in partway through the presentation, just before Mark switched over to using his new avatar and finally actually presenting in the metaverse itself. The avatar itself was a big improvement from prior iterations; it was a fully animated version of the better-looking version Mark showed off after his much-mocked announcement of Horizon’s expansion to France and Spain. It looked better, yes, but it sure didn’t look like the future.

YouTube to broadly support the @username format with launch of YouTube handles • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on October 11, 2022Posted in Apps, Creators, Media & Entertainment, YouTube, YouTube ShortsNo Comments

YouTube is making it easier for creators to direct viewers to their channels. The company today announced “handles,” a new way for creators to identify their channel with an @username format in order to interact with their viewers across YouTube Shorts, channel pages, in video descriptions, in comments and more. These handles will be made available to everyone on YouTube — you don’t need to be a creator of a certain size or subscriber count to claim your own unique @handle, YouTube says. Handles and @usernames are common across social media, including on sites like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Telegram and others. But YouTube had only offered limited support for the format — allowing creators to mention channels in video titles and descriptions with the @ symbol, or mention other users in YouTube Live chats, for example. But the @username option was not available in other areas and discussions. Instead, you’d have to reply to another YouTube user’s comment in order to tag them. With YouTube’s expansion into TikTok’s territory with YouTube Shorts, however, the company now wants to more closely mimic the way the ByteDance-owned video app encourages users to engage in back-and-forth discussions through their short videos and in the resulting discussions and video responses that come about. To work, that requires the use of @usernames — or @handles as YouTube calls them. YouTube says the new handles will appear on both channel pages and Shorts, making them “instantly and consistently recognizable” across the platform. After handles are fully launched, users will be able to @mention others in the comments, community posts, video descriptions and elsewhere. While these handles won’t replace the channel name itself, they will be unique across YouTube, allowing creators to establish a distinct presence for themselves on the platform. Support for handles will begin to roll out gradually, starting later next week. To protect creators from having their channel name staked by someone else in what’s sure to be one of the biggest username landgrabs on the internet, YouTube notes that channels that already have a personalized URL will see that becoming their default handle unless they choose to change it. The company also indicated that the timing of the rollout of handles has been designed in a way to ensure that established creators will gain access to the feature first, as YouTube plans to utilize factors — like the creator’s overall YouTube presence, subscriber count and whether the channel is active or inactive — when determining when to offer a creator the ability to set up their own handle. After a handle is established, YouTube will additionally create a matching URL in the format of youtube.com/@handle, which would allow the creator to market their handle elsewhere on the web or in other media. And if the channel already had a personalized URL it was using for a similar purpose, they won’t need to update their links — that URL will automatically redirect to the new handle-based URL instead. Everyone on YouTube will be able to grab a handle for themselves at some point. YouTube says creators should look for a notification to arrive over the next month.

Nigerian data and intelligence company Stears raises $3.3M, backed by Mac VC and Serena Ventures • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on October 11, 2022Posted in Media & Entertainment, StartupsNo Comments

While studying at the London School of Economics and the University of Oxford, a group of graduates noticed how difficult it was to get data and information on Africa’s largest economy and their home country, Nigeria. Each had different yet complementary skills — Michael Famoroti, an economist; Bode Ogunlana, a software engineer; Abdul Abdulrahim, a data scientist; and Preston Ideh, a corporate lawyer — and in 2017, they launched a media startup to address the dearth of information and data-driven insights in the West African country. Five years on, this startup, Stears, is announcing a $3.3 million seed round led by MaC Venture Capital. Serena Ventures, Omidyar Group’s Luminate Fund, Melo 7 Tech Partners and Cascador (Empowering Economic Growth Foundation) participated. This news is coming two years after Stears raised $650,000 in pre-seed funding. Last month, it was one of the 60 startups to get accepted into the Google for Startups Black Founders Fund 2022 cohort, which included some non-dilutive funding. Stears started as a media publication focused on financial news and insights in Nigeria. Its flagship subscription insights product, Stears Premium, contains content ranging from news and opinion pieces to investigative pieces and deep dives, educating the general public on issues around business and finance, economy, government and policy in Nigeria. The $100-a-year product witnessed significant usage among consumers, particularly employees working in various finance-related institutions across the country. And because these institutions have more spending power, Stears subsequently tailored the product to businesses who wanted to subscribe on behalf of their teams. Some of its subscribers include financial institutions like Sterling Bank, and fintechs like Sparkle, PiggyVest and Paystack. The company says its userbase has grown mainly organically at around 6.5% month-on-month, doubling its total number of users over the last year. “We have a strong understanding of the kind of information people need. So our focus is on standardizing information dissemination and building with the customer in mind,” Ideh told ZebethMedia in an interview. “An essential part of our business model is pushing out high-value subscription data products, for instance, proprietary forecast models. Conversely, the low-value end will be news, so customers’ willingness to spend changes as they go along the spectrum.” The iteration of Stears Premium, alongside the introduction of other products Stears Pro and Stears Advisory, has seen Stears morph into a data and intelligence company. Macro trends and topics like GDP and inflation drive content on Stears Premium. Stears Pro, on the other hand, provides more bespoke content around specific issues such as market entry, country analysis and digital economy for international organizations such as the United Nations Development Programme, the Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office and the knowledge workers—people need a great deal of data for their work, which may include roles such as analysts, portfolio managers, researchers and economists—that work in them. But in a bid to support its transition from an insights company to a data company and buoyed by this new investment, Stears is planning a strategy modification for the Pro product. According to the company’s COO and data scientist Abdulrahim, the data outfit is working with international development institutions and financial institutions to produce proprietary and exclusive datasets that don’t exist anywhere else. Therefore, instead of reporting insights from the data it sources, Stears wants to collate data, engage in deep data analytics and present it to its business customers in various formats. “An essential part of our business model is pushing out high-value subscription data products. And as we advance, we’ll do less custom work for this set of customers and focus more on overall data around the same sector,” added Ideh, on the direction Stears is taking with its Pro product. “So the difference in output is such that in the past, we put out reports, but in the future, we’re probably going to put out data feeds. So less text-heavy way of publishing and more of forecast and prediction around sectors that matter to knowledge workers and their organizations.” Stears Advisory — the product where Stears wears its consultancy hat and takes on third-party projects around its core coverage — is taking a rear seat as the company intends to double down on Pro and Premium. CEO Ideh explained that while the Advisory product, which he likens to a research and development (R&D) arm sponsored by different partners, allows Stears to experiment with data collection and analysis and provides the bedrock to carve out further insights, it’s not scalable and lacks the sort of recurring revenue that venture-backed businesses need. Image Credits: Stears So far, the company’s strategy seems to be paying off. Enterprise customers now contribute over 75% of revenues generated, up from 45% in 2021. It also expects revenues to double from last year as half-year revenues for 2022 have already surpassed full-year revenues for 2021. This is compared to the 80% revenue growth between FY 2021 and FY 2020. As a data and intelligence company, Stears finds itself in a sweet spot where it is incentivized to pursue political projects that would draw attention if it were a media or tech company. In 2019, the company embarked on one such project as it developed Nigeria’s first real-time election database. Over 2 million Nigerians used it to monitor the general elections. Ideh said his company intends to relaunch the election data site, this time with more datasets and functionalities, in anticipation of Nigeria’s 2023 elections. “Bloomberg, at its core, is a data company; we love how they approach elections and our approach in 2019 was driven by them,” said Ideh, who has always been vocal about Stears building the Bloomberg of Africa. “This is a big open data effort for us and we are also excited about polling because it is a very important form of data verification currently missing in Nigeria. And so over the election period, we will run and push out statistically representative polls on Nigeria, using strong data mindsets, to get a sense of public opinion issues and achieve more