PARIS and SUNNYVALE, Calif.—Canal+ and Google Cloud have announced a new multi-year deal and partnership focusing on artificial intelligence solutions for content discovery, personalization, production and other features.

Starting in June 2026, Canal+ will deploy Google Cloud's latest generative AI technologies across European and African markets where the Canal+ App is available to create tailor‑made entertainment experiences.

"We are pleased to leverage Google Cloud's most advanced AI technologies to drive Canal+'s technical innovation,” explained Stéphane Baumier, CTO of Canal+. “Building on a long-standing collaboration with Google, this strategic partnership paves the way for limitless possibilities. Content video indexing for Canal+ at scale gives the group a significant edge, notably by enabling us to deliver sharper discovery and truly enhanced personalized journeys on the Canal+ App across all our markets. Creativity is the cornerstone of Canal+'s content production. We are excited to push creative boundaries by providing creators with tools that enable AI-generated video scenes, impossible to produce using traditional methods."

Matt Renner, president, chief revenue officer of Google Cloud added that "the entertainment industry is at a pivotal inflection point where the intersection of creativity and compute power defines market leadership. Our deepened collaboration with Canal+ is a testament to a shared culture of relentless innovation. By leveraging Google Cloud's generative AI technologies, Canal+ is not just adopting tools; they are architecting the future of media and fundamentally transforming the entertainment landscape on a global scale."

Using Google Cloud's technologies, Canal+ will accelerate the content video indexing of its extensive content library. The new content classification will provide the global media and entertainment group with an in-depth multimodal database combining sound, video, and text data.

This increased granularity in content classification, will enable smarter, more personalized content recommendations on the homepage of the Canal+ App, matching each subscriber's preferences according to their viewing habits. This will make it easier than ever for subscribers to discover even more content they love on Canal+.

Canal+'s multimodal database of video-content will also pave the way for a wide range of opportunities, from enhanced content discovery to entirely new business models, the two companies reported.

In addition, Canal+ will also use Veo3, Google's new genAI video technology, to provide its production partners and creative teams with tools that will unlock the creative ambitions of their talent, for instance, previsualizing a scene before shooting it or recreating historical moments from a single archival photo.

The partnership guarantees a very secure technical environment, where rights, assets ownership are deeply protected. Using these tools & platform, Canal+'s partners will have full control of their production and editorial decision, with opportunities to try new approaches while ensuring cost control, thanks to significantly shorter experimentation cycles. This secure technical platform and tools will be made available to production who wish to use it in films supported by Canal+.

PORTSMOUTH, N.H.—As the number of outlets and platforms airing sports proliferates, sports fans not only have more ways to watch their favorite teams and leagues. They are also finding that following their favorite teams and sports is becoming increasingly complex and frustrating.

New data from Hub Entertainment Research’s “Evolution of Sports: What’s the Score?” Wave 5 study, which tracks how sports fans are adjusting to this changing landscape, finds that as sports rights spread across more services (broadcast, cable and streaming), just finding the game they want to watch has become a challenge for fans – one that is taking a toll on their overall experience.

It found that the vast majority of sports fans (87%) say it’s at least somewhat frustrating to figure out where to watch the sports they follow today, and almost a quarter saying they feel “very frustrated.”

“Fans will go to great lengths to watch the sports they care about—but that doesn’t mean they enjoy hunting across multiple apps to find them,” said Jon Giegengack, principal at Hub and one of the study authors. “Services that simplify the experience of watching sports—whether through discovery tools or by consolidating rights to an entire sport—are delivering more value to fans. And more value means more satisfied users and lower churn.”

The study noted that some companies have already recognized this problem and rolled out features to make sports simpler to find. In the survey, Hub described two aggregator tools and asked fans if they would improve the viewing experience.

The results were positive. About 70% said that ESPN’s “Where to Watch” feature – which tells viewers where to find any game, even if it’s not on ESPN – would make their sports viewing experience easier. In addition, 60% said the same about Roku’s “Sports Zone” — an area of the Roku interface that gathers content about a particular sport into one place, so fans can easily find all of it across platforms.

The data also showed that "All-inclusive” rights attract subscribers and drive satisfaction.

Fragmentation is increasing the appeal of platforms that consolidate rights to an entire sport. Three in five fans (60%) say they’re more likely to sign up for a service that carries *all* the rights to a sport they follow (and 30% are “much more likely”).

Among avid fans, the results are even more pronounced: almost 40% are “much more likely” to sign up.

Exclusive rights can drive both acquisition and retention, the researchers also noted.

In an increasingly crowded ecosystem, investing in all-inclusive rights is a differentiator that makes a big difference. For example, Hub asked UFC fans about the organization’s new rights deal, which will place all UFC events—including numbered events—across Paramount’s networks and streaming platforms.

The vast majority (89%) of avid UFC fans say the new deal makes a Paramount+ subscription more valuable (and a third say it’s “extremely” more valuable). In addition, 93% of avid UFC fans that already have Paramount+ say the new deal makes them more likely to keep their subscription (and 71% say it makes them “much more likely”).

Among avid UFC fans who "don’t" have Paramount+ already, 72% say they’re more likely to sign up (and almost a third % said they would “definitely” sign up).

These findings come from Hub’s “Evolution of Sports: What’s the Score?” Wave 5 report, based on a survey of 3,733 U.S. sports fans conducted in December 2025 – January 2026.

Since 2013, Hub Entertainment Research has measured and tracked how technology changes the ways consumers discover, choose and consume entertainment content. More information is available here: hubintel.substack.com.

SAN JOSE, Calif.—Roku has announced plans to launch “Roklue,” a new on-platform game designed to immerse users in major culture events of the moment, such as the awards season, and help them discover new entertainment.

Accessible via the Roku Home Screen, each “Roklue” experience tests players on the movies and TV shows that everyone is talking about, as well as the beloved favorites they want to watch again and again. Through this creative interactive experience, Roku users will be able to discover titles in an engaging, unique, and seamless way, with all of Roku’s content at their fingertips.

The inaugural experience, “Roklue: Awards Season,” will be available on March 7 and features clues inspired by Hollywood’s biggest award show moments and celebrated films. Anyone can join the fun by clicking in from the Home Screen, with no downloads or complex setup required. “Roklue” will evolve throughout the year with editions tied to other major cultural moments.

“At Roku, we’re creating experiences you can’t get anywhere else — streaming that is interactive, fun, and powered by the full breadth of content on the platform,” said Lisa Holme, head of content, Roku Media.“Roklue will connect streamers to shows and movies in a way that makes discovery feel less like work and more like play.”

The launch of Roklue underscores Roku’s continued investment in engagement-driven experiences, building on the momentum of the recently introduced “Live from Roku City,” an initiative that transforms the iconic screensaver into a dynamic stage for original programming. Past iterations include Demi Lovato’s headline performance and a celebration of “Wicked: For Good” launched earlier this year.

“Roklue: Awards Season” is produced by B17 Entertainment, a part of Sony Pictures Television. Brien Meagher, Rhett Bachner, and Chris Lesinski serve as executive producers. Chris Lesinski serves as showrunner.

PORTSMOUTH, N.H.—TV viewers continue to find it challenging to find relevant programs in the fragmented universe of streaming content, according to new findings from Hub Entertainment Research.

The findings, laid out in the researcher’s annual “Conquering Content” study, show that although the public values having an abundance of choices, streamers still have work to do in helping viewers find relevant programs.

While viewers continue to seek out new shows, the study found, the operative word is “new.” What is regarded as “new to me” doesn’t necessarily mean watching a newly released program.

The research found 60% of “new favorite shows” discovered by viewers over the past year were older shows that already have multiple seasons, giving viewers a deep well of episodes to watch. Sixty-five percent of viewers age 16-34 are even more likely to be watching a favorite show that first came out before 2025.

The study also revealed that new shows remain hard to find and streamer recommendations are falling short. Editorial and algorithmic recommendations coming from streamers are far less effective at helping viewers find new favorites than personal recommendations, trailers, clips or traditional ads or promos.

The research found 46% percent of viewers say streamer recommendations deliver shows they like, while 54% say streamer recommendations are simply promoting new shows, regardless of their viewing preferences.

Viewers who can’t find something to watch turn to YouTube, the survey found. Nearly eight out of 10 YouTube users say they frequently or sometimes turn to YouTube when they can’t find something else to watch. Among viewers 16-34, the percentage is 90%.

“With so many choices, matching viewers to programs that fit their taste and mood continues to be one of the toughest tasks for TV providers,” said Jason Platt Zolov, study author and senior consultant at Hub. “But viewers love having tons of options and lean into old favorites as a way to keep watching until a new hit breaks through. Streamers that deliver a balance of those old gems with well-timed exclusive new content will breed the strongest loyalties from viewers.”

Findings are based on a survey conducted among 1,600 U.S. consumers age 16-74. Interviews were completed in October.

An excerpt of the new study is available here.

BRUSSELS—Mediagenix has announced that it has joined the Amazon Web Services (AWS) Independent Software Vendor (ISV) Accelerate Program (ISV). This acceptance follows the successful completion of the AWS Foundational Technical Review (FTR) across Mediagenix platforms that underpin the company’s Content Strategy and Budgeting, Content Value Management for title and rights metadata, and Content Scheduling solutions.

“Joining the AWS ISV Accelerate Program connects Mediagenix to the AWS sales organization, and enables frictionless procurement of our solutions through the AWS Marketplace,” said Emmanuel Müller, CPO, Mediagenix.“Successfully completing the AWS Foundational Technical Review is a powerful validation of our platforms and business. Together, these achievements reinforce our commitment to delivering secure, reliable, and innovative solutions while expanding opportunities to work more closely with AWS to serve customers worldwide.”

The AWS ISV Accelerate Program connects independent software vendors directly with AWS field teams, enabling streamlined engagement with customers worldwide. Mediagenix will be able to simplify procurement through AWS Marketplace, align more closely with AWS go-to-market initiatives, and accelerate the delivery of its solutions to enterprise customers, the company reported.

Passing the AWS FTR validates Mediagenix platforms for their adherence to AWS Well-Architected best practices in areas like security and reliability. The process requires proactive risk analysis and mitigation, ensuring Mediagenix solutions are designed to perform at scale in alignment with AWS standards, the company explained.

Building on the integration of Spideo personalization and recommendations technology and the introduction of the Self-Optimizing Content Monetization Flywheel, Mediagenix also reported that it continues to expand the intelligence across its solutions and bring value to its customers.

With recent high marks in security credentials, including SOC 2 Type II compliance and the recertification of ISO 27001, Mediagenix further demonstrates its dedication to safeguarding customer trust. Achieving AWS FTR and joining the AWS ISV Accelerate Program underscores Mediagenix’s commitment to technical excellence while enhancing opportunities to deepen customer engagement, the company said.

Mediagenix’s Humanized Semantic Search was recently awarded IBC2025 Best of Show by TV Tech, while its Scheduling Automation solution captured two IBC2025 Best of Show honors, one from TV Tech and one from TVBEurope.

NEW YORK—Gracenote, the content data business unit of Nielsen, has launched Gracenote On Sports, a new solution designed to make it easier for viewers to find sports content.

The solution aims to fix common consumer complaints about the difficulty of finding sports content by providing streaming and linear video platforms with an easy-to-implement metadata solution that connects the entire sports video ecosystem, Gracenote said.

Gracenote will showcase new live sports discovery experiences made possible by On Sports at CES in Las Vegas from Jan. 7-9, 2025.

The launch is notable because sports has become a key driver of viewing and advertising on linear and streaming platforms but the movement of more sports to streaming services has made it harder for consumers to find the sports they want to watch.

For example, of the 2,430 Major League Baseball games played during the 2024 regular season, only 150 were carried nationally on traditional broadcast or streaming channels. With 93% of games spread across regional sports networks, local channels, streaming services and league-developed direct-to-consumer offerings, many baseball fans faced difficulty finding out where to watch games.

“Sports programming has the unique ability to attract large and passionate audiences making it invaluable to video providers seeking to drive engagement and time spent with their services,” Gracenote Chief Product Officer Bill Michels said. “With Gracenote’s new solution, customers can now deliver innovative discovery experiences leveraging sports content and win the competition for viewers and their attention.”

The new Gracenote on Sports allows video services to use a single API to access Gracenote sports data covering 150-plus leagues and competitions connected to Gracenote video data, including imagery and content IDs. The enriched sports data, live sports schedules and team and league data can then be used to power next-generation universal search capabilities and unique sports experiences to attract and retain viewers. Future product enhancements will enable display of real-time game scores and standings as well as athlete appearances in other entertainment content, Gracenote said.

More specifically, On Sports offers video providers these capabilities:

• Personalize the sports experience by providing tailored recommendations for live games based on preferences and viewing history.
• Create a comprehensive sports hub that aggregates live events and related content across different platforms.,
• Enhance pregame engagement by helping fans discover upcoming live games across multiple channels and streaming platforms.
• Elevate the live game experience by displaying real-time scores and league standings in the user interface.
• Enrich postgame content by presenting related viewing options such as recap shows, highlights and postgame analysis.

On Sports covers more than 150 of the world’s most popular sports leagues and competitions including the NFL, NBA, Premier League and Formula 1 in more than 50 countries globally. As the entertainment industry continues its evolution, Gracenote is transforming its offerings in step to ensure customers can effectively leverage programming to maximize engagement and monetization. Learn more at https://gracenote.com/on-sports/.

CARSON CITY, Nevada—ShowSeeker, the ad-tech firm behind the Pilot cloud-based campaign and order management platform, said it promoted Nick Anaclerio to senior vice president of product strategy.

Originally the provider of the ShowSeeker Plus content discovery system, the tech vendor has grown to provide a single-order management platform for both pay TV providers and broadcasters. The company also said it plans to launch a Predictive Programming platform later this year, followed by predictive ratings algorithms in early 2025.

During Anaclerio’s seven years with ShowSeeker, the company expanded from 10 employees in 2017 to more than 75, including more than three dozen software engineers, seven quality assurance professionals and four project managers.

“Nick has been a key member of our leadership team since day one of joining the company in November 2017,” ShowSeeker CEO Dave Hardy said in a statement. “Over the past seven years, under Nick’s guidance, our product offerings have grown exponentially and we are thrilled with the dedication and tireless effort Nick brings to solving the biggest issues facing the ad tech landscape. Nick is truly a brilliant strategist and frequently sees a clear path of resolution to challenges our clients encounter. “

ShowSeeker said its products simplify the ad sales buying and planning process for providers via a cloud-based platform that facilitates each step from proposal generation to campaign performance tracking. It offers tools to optimize and improve monetization by automating tasks, reducing manual workloads and increasing operational efficiencies, the company said. ShowSeeker’s integrated data insights ensure ad buys are targeted, effective and highly customizable, driving better return on investment, it said.

NEW YORK—Just over half of U.S. viewers are frustrated over their ability to be able to find content to watch on TV according to Comcast. 

In its report titled, “Content Discovery in a Multiscreen TV World: Surfing and Scrolling in a Sea of Content,” Comcast analyzed trends of how consumers navigate and discover TV content across traditional and streaming in the U.S. and Europe. Based on a survey of 2,500 consumers 18 and over in the U.S., U.K., and Europe, only 25% of respondents said they could access all of their content in one place. 

Nearly two-thirds of the viewers said they spend more than 6 minutes searching for  something to watch, with 51% stating that the difficulty in finding new content can get frustrating.

“In today’s unbundled world of TV, consumers face a lot of challenges when it comes to discovering content. The goal of TV, whether traditional or streaming, has always been to make audiences feel entertained, not frustrated or overwhelmed,” said Travis Flood, Executive Director of Insights, Comcast Advertising. “This research provides actionable insights into the process so that content owners and streaming platforms can improve their offerings to enhance the content discovery experience and provide more value to their viewers.”

The results are of particular importance to Comcast, which partnered with Charter to launched its Xumo streaming platform in 2022, including a “What to Watch” channel.  

“With so much great TV dispersed across an unprecedented number of connected platforms and services, watching TV has become burdensome for consumers,” said Marcien Jenckes, President, Xumo and Managing Director, Comcast Advertising. “Xumo’s goal is to remove this burden and make TV simple again. Our devices run on Comcast’s Entertainment OS, which makes watching TV easy through features like AI and human-driven show recommendations, FAST channel integration in our grid guide experience, and an unparalleled voice search capability.”

The report also indicated that social media is an important component to helping viewers choose, with 55% of U.S. viewers saying they receive recommendations from friends, family, and colleagues. The vast majority—94%—of U.S. viewers said they choose programming based on genre. 

The survey also showed promise for linear TV, perhaps invigorated by the popularity of FAST channels, with 62% of Americans saying they channel surf or scroll through a program guide or app to find what they want to watch.

With Amazon Prime and Roku now launching show previews when viewers fire up their Fire TV or Roku devices, individual platforms are increasing their importance in how viewers choose content. According to Comcast's survey, 51% of U.S. viewers have found and watched content recommended on their home screen and 85% of U.S. viewers are likely to be influenced by ads or show trailers. 

To read the full report, Content Discovery in a Multiscreen TV World, click here.

PORTSMOUTH, NH—Despite the turmoil in media and entertainment in 2023, with the writers/actors strikes resulting in a dearth of new scripted TV shows, Americans remain grateful for the era of “peak TV,” even if managing all their choices is a challenge. 

That’s according to this year’s edition of Hub’s annual “Conquering Content” report which notes that appreciation for having “so many TV shows to watch” has increased significantly this year and is up by nearly half since 2020.

Hub said that with so much to choose from, platforms that make discovery easy have a big advantage. The volume of content on streaming platforms, coupled with an increase of cross-licensing popular shows across services, make all of this content more difficult to use, prompting more than 60% of consumers saying they’re more likely to choose platforms with better search, discovery and recommendation tools—up from 56% in 2022.

Hub also found that nearly two thirds of viewers say their current favorite show is an older show that’s been on for several seasons—up from 54% in 2021.  In fact, one of the most mentioned favorites was Suits, a show which was cancelled in 2019 and hasn’t had a new episode in four years.

“While the pipeline for new shows has slowed due to this year’s historic Hollywood strikes, consumers' loyalties to streaming services can remain stable, provided those services match them with the right content,” said Jason Platt Zolov, one of the report’s authors. “As studios return to licensing quality shows outside of their owned services, consumers are responding positively to the abundance of things to watch, whether ‘new’ or just ‘new to them.’”

“Peak TV has created a huge number of quality shows that many people just didn’t have time to watch when they were new,” said Jon Giegengack, founder and principal at Hub. “But they’re happy to watch them, and this backlog will maintain engagement while production gets back under way.  It also bodes well for licensing of exclusive shows to new services with audiences that haven’t seen them yet.”

Hub's findings in its latest report are based on a survey conducted among 1,600 U.S. consumers with broadband, age 16-74, who watch at least one hour of TV per week. Interviews were conducted in October 2023 and explored how consumers discover new shows across different platforms and providers.  A free excerpt of the findings is available on Hub’s website. 

NEW YORK—A new report highlights the frustration many consumers face in an increasingly fragmented streaming landscape with the finding that streaming viewers are spending a record 10.5 minutes per session deciding what to watch. 

The 2023 State of Play report on the fast-evolving streaming video landscape from Nielsen’s Gracenote  found that that there were 1.9 million video titles available to viewers in the U.S., U.K., Canada, Mexico and Germany in July 2021, a number that had swelled to 2.7 million titles by June 2023. 

Of the total count, a whopping 86.7% were available on streaming services. Compounding complexity, many popular shows now appear in multiple streaming catalogs, as the industry pivots from offering content exclusivity to broad distribution strategies that companies hope will balance massive streaming loses, the report noted. 

The Gracenote analysis also found that audiences now have nearly 40,000 individual FAST channels, streaming providers and aggregators to choose from. 

The complexity and fragmentation of the streaming landscape has become a particularly thorny problem given that new Nielsen data from The Gauge revealed that streaming accounted for 38.7% of total TV usage in July, a new record high. That same month, traditional TV viewing across broadcast and cable dropped below 50% for the first time.

Other data also highlights ongoing consumer frustration with streaming services. Recently Parks reported that nearly half (47%) of consumers churn in and out of services on an annual basis. 

"As it was during the age of broadcast television, content is the lifeblood of the digital, streaming-first media ecosystem," said Filiz Bahmanpour, vice president of product at Nielsen’s Gracenote, the content solutions business unit of Nielsen providing entertainment metadata, content IDs and related offerings to the world's leading creators, distributors and platforms.  "So a clear understanding of content – where it's available, what it's about and whom it's attracting – is more critical than ever."

The full report along with recommendations of how companies can improve content discovery and retain streaming subscribers can be accessed here. 

Content discovery is one of the most crucial aspects of your streaming user experience. Making it as easy as possible for your audience to find something they want to watch requires an intuitive user experience, but also the curation of your content into attractive collections. Whether you call them “rails,” “rows,” or “carousels,” you’ll want your app to be stacked with groupings of video assets that tempt users and help them find more of the content you’ve invested in. 

Getting users to take a deeper dive into your library is essential to growing AVOD or FAST revenues, and for tackling SVOD churn. If users sign-up to watch one flagship show and then leave, you’ve wasted your significant subscriber acquisition costs. Getting that user to discover and taste a wider range of the shows you have on offer is crucial to keeping them long-term. 

When it Comes to SVOD Churn Reduction, Three is the Magic Number
Analysis of our customers with subscription-based streaming services suggests that getting subscribers to try more than three content brands (for example watching at least some episodes of Friends, Seinfeld, Cheers and The Office) within the first 14 days of their subscription is key. Data suggests this magic number of more than three brands results in a user being 55% less likely to churn. In other words, variety matters.

How do you make that magic happen? If you’ve only got a small content library, it may feel like it’s relatively easy to curate it manually. But streaming success depends on a constant flow of fresh content and making the very best use of everything in your catalog. 

Whether you’re staving off subscriber churn or encouraging repeat visits to drive up ad-revenue, your goals will be easier to reach if you’re exposing users to as much of your video as possible and keeping the selection looking fresh on every visit. Fully manual curation is no longer an option. Especially with operational budgets always under pressure. 

Automatically Better
With automated playlists, you can set parameters that are then used by your CMS to automatically pull in matching content. When content reaches the end of its availability window, it’s immediately removed from all playlists without human intervention. When choosing a playlisting solution, look for a CMS that enables you to mix and match criteria in imaginative ways. 

Rather than sticking to genre-based groupings, you can then choose configurations like genre + release year, so you can offer a collection of “80s Romantic Comedies” or “70s horror films.” Ideally, you’ll also want the ability to combine criteria such as genre or mood with availability window information to create a sense of urgency, such as “comedy shows to catch before they’re gone.” 

The more parameters you can apply in an automatic playlist builder, the more creative ways you can find to promote your content without spending hours manually scrolling through your library.

Personalization: the Ultimate Content Automation
While editorial curation is a great way to promote your content library in new and interesting ways, everyone has their own personal tastes. No matter how niche your streaming service may be, you can’t ever create a single selection of content that’s perfect for everyone. 

So it’s no wonder that personalization has become so popular for streaming services that want to make it as easy as possible for each individual user to find and watch content they love. 

Personalization is really good for business. Data from companies that use our 24iQ personalization platform suggests users who interact with content that’s recommended to them specifically based on their viewing habits will go on to watch almost twice as much content (44.7%) as those who don’t interact with recommendations. Imagine what “twice as much content viewed” would do to your AVOD or FAST revenue, or your SVOD churn rate? 

Personalization is More Than Just 'Recommended for You'
Increasingly, we’re seeing services personalizing the UX in different ways - from adjusting the order of rails in the app based on the user’s previous viewing, to personalized content recommendations in marketing emails that encourage repeat visits. 

It can also be really effective to add personalization as a layer on top of manual curation. In this scenario, the editorial team might choose 10 assets for the “featured” rail in an app, but an algorithm then decides the order in which those 10 are shown to each individual user. 

This means the app automatically prioritizes the assets that are similar to the individual user’s proven viewing habits, moving them to the front of the rail in the most prominent position. And it de-prioritizes those assets that they’ve already watched or are less likely to be interested in, moving these assets to the end of the rail. This is a great user experience and boosts the chances of viewers discovering something new they want to watch. 

You can find more tips on building adaptability into your streaming technology platform with The Flex Factor e-guide. 

NEW ROCHELLE, N.Y.—As consumers struggle to find content in an increasingly increasingly fragmented streaming ecosystem, streamers are increasingly turning to curated collections and hubs as a way to find relevant programming, a new study from Horowitz Research has found. 

The Horowitz study found that most streamers say they value having these curated collections/hubs as part of their streaming services. More than eight in ten streamers watch content from a collection or hub at least occasionally, the Horowitz survey reported. 

The new State of Media, Entertainment and Tech: Viewing Behaviors 2023 report from Horowitz Research, a division of M/A/R/C Research, found that multicultural audiences were particularly engaged with these collections and hubs. 

“Until the industry works collaboratively to deliver a truly integrated search and discovery experience that comprises content from all possible streaming sources, consumers will continue to struggle to find what to watch” notes Adriana Waterston, insights and strategy lead for Horowitz Research. “Professional curation, such as these hubs or collections, are playing an increasingly relevant role in easing some of those struggles' consumers are facing. These are particularly useful for diverse audiences, who are relying on hubs or collections to more easily identify culturally resonant content which is still very much in-demand and yet not always easy to find.”

Black streamers are especially engaged, with eight in ten (80%) reporting using Black content collections/hubs at least occasionally (similar by age). 

Among Asian streamers, nearly two-thirds (65%) watch Asian content collections/hubs, higher among less acculturated Asian streamers (77%). 

Similarly, almost six in ten (59%) Latinx streamers report using Latinx content collections/hubs, with nearly eight in ten (78%) less acculturated Latinx reporting doing so.

Among LGBTQIA+ consumers, over half (52%) of streamers report using LGBTQIA+ content collections/hubs.

The study found that consumers were not just turning to culturally relevant collections/hubs. About eight in ten streamers have used collections or hubs for new, just released content; popular/most watched content; and content based on viewing history. Additionally, over half of streamers (53%) have watched holiday content collection/hubs, the researchers said. 

The full State of Media, Entertainment, and Tech Volume II: Viewing Behaviors 2023 report explores the services consumers are using and how they divide up their share of viewing per platform, their sources of show discovery, the kind of content they’re consuming on different platforms, which services they feel do the best job at delivering the content they seek, and how they feel the streaming experience could be improved. The survey was published in April 2023 among 2,200 TV content viewers 18+. 

More information is available here.  

IRVINE, Calif.—Vizio is rolling out a reimagined design of its home screen experience that the smart TV maker said will improve the way consumers discover and stream entertainment. 

“The Vizio Home Screen is the next step in our evolution to bring our consumers the best entertainment experience. Our goal is to make it easy for our consumers to experience our latest innovations as soon as they are available, even on older Vizio Smart TVs” said Kaitlyn Collins, vice president of product marketing at Vizio. “The rollout and availability of the new Vizio Home Screen is another manifestation of the idea that, even after consumers purchase a TV from us, we’ll continue to offer value, support, and innovation to their viewing experience.”

The new home screen offers a number of new built-in features and ways to customize the user experience. Those include:

• Intuitive Design: revamped menus, settings, and navigation features make browsing easier than ever, and a redesigned virtual keyboard and genre pages improve the ease and speed of searching for content.
• Seamless Content Discovery: easily find your next favorite movie or show right from the Home Screen, with built-in recommendations and valuable information like Common Sense Media parental guidance and Rotten Tomatoes scores.
• Customization: personalize the App Row with your favorites, and centralize movies and shows from different apps in one place with My Watchlist.

LONDON, U.K.—With researchers reporting increased frustration by streamers trying to find content in an increasingly fragmented media landscape, London tech start-up,  www.moveme.tv is trying to solve that problem with the launch of a free platform that uses AI and neuroscience to offer a unique emotion-led approach to discovering content. 

The platform is designed to help users to discover the perfect movie to watch by having them describe their desired emotional state using emotive words - or emojis. 

This approach, the start-up said, will speed up the search process and bring people closer to content they’ll love in under two minutes. 

“Watching movies is an emotional experience,” explained founder and CEO of Moveme.tv, Ben Polkinghorne. “Discovering them should be too. Existing streaming platforms are infuriating their customers with arguably ancient, flawed and unsophisticated recommendations that often fail to connect people to the content they crave.”

With the global competition for subscribers, the amount of available video content has jumped 18% in the last three years, making content discovery increasingly difficult, the start-up explained. In December 2022, an annual global study of 6,000 streaming consumers by Accenture found a staggering 72% get frustrated trying to find something to watch, up 9% year on year. More than one-quarter (26%) say it can take them more than 10 minutes to choose something, up 53% year on year. And more than one-third (35%) unsubscribed from at least one of the top five streaming video-on-demand services in the last 12 months.

Existing streaming platforms typically rely on two main recommendation systems - content based and collaborative filtering. Both date back to the 1990s. 

What they fail to take into account is that emotions influence nearly every decision people make, the company believes. 

Funded by a grant from Innovate UK, the start-up began examining the role of emotions with research by leading neuroscientists Dr. Kathrin Kadosh and Dr. Philip Dean at the University of Surrey. Based on that research, the company was then able to develop a pioneering emotion-led algorithm that has now analyzed 676,906 films.

“By measuring brain activity as people watch movies, we begin to understand the neural signatures of emotional processing,” Dr. Dean explained. “This raw emotional data can then feed an algorithm to automatically predict how a movie will make someone feel.”

Today, moveme.tv says its proprietary AI system can accurately match film content with a specific emotional journey, enabling users to rapidly discover the content that’s relevant for them, right now.

To achieve that goal, the platform has users select or input their desired mood using any emotive words or emojis, such as "Warm fuzzies", "🤘😎🤘" or “Awe 🪐”. Recommendations can then be further filtered based on ratings, release date, what can be watched for free, or what can be watched with any existing paid streaming subscription.

Moveme.tv launches today, June 1, in 118 countries, with a catalog spanning all 516 streaming services. It is free to users and has plans to engage with content platforms to license its patent-pending technology while continuing to develop its public service.

“By tapping into our emotions, stimulating our senses, and creating a deep emotional bond with the characters and storylines, movies can significantly impact our moods,” said Moveme.tv founder and CEO, Ben Polkinghorne, said, So, by simplifying how we find movies, we’re also effortlessly helping people to change their mood.”

More information is available at www.moveme.tv. 

IRVINE, Calif.—Vizio has announced a suite of updates to its TV user interface and mobile app to take on perhaps viewers’ number one gripe about the ever-expanding streaming universe: Discovering and managing content. 

The company has launched Vizio AutoUpdate and redesigned its Vizio Mobile app, which it says will give Vizio customers faster access to their favorite apps, movies, and free streaming options.

The AutoUpdate of 2023 provides shortcuts for select Vizio TV owners with a new Quick Menu, WatchFree+ Mini Guide, and Recent Apps row, while the redesigned Vizio Mobile app for iOS and Android extends the time-saving features to smartphones, with quick access to voice controls, simple content discovery features, one-button access to WatchFree+, and streamlined subscription-management tools through Vizio Account.

Viewers can now simply press the Menu or Gear Icon button on their Vizio remote to get what the company describes as its “cleanest, fastest menu ever.” The button will also allow viewers to adjust picture settings, pair Bluetooth headphones for private listening on compatible models, activate or disable closed captioning subtitles, and access a full menu of in-depth settings in a slick, modern, and intuitive interface.

While watching Vizio WatchFree+, viewers can click left on their Vizio remote which will then bring up the new WatchFree+ Mini Guide on the left-hand side. The Mini Guide allows viewers to scroll through programming on other WatchFree+ channels without interrupting the viewing experience. Vizio WatchFree+ provides access to more than 260 free channels and over free 6,000 movies and shows

A new addition to the “Apps and Inputs” row on the Vizio Smart TV home screen will give viewers faster access to their favorite apps, while the newly redesigned Vizio Mobile app provides an easier way to subscribe to popular streaming services, get special offers, browse favorite apps, and discover movies and shows  in one place.

New features to Vizio Mobile now bring push to talk Voice Control on the app remote screen; one-click access to entertainment discovery features such as promoted premieres, streaming apps, free content, and seasonal programs directly on the mobile remote; the ability to open apps on a viewer’s device to display on the TV screen and create personalized app lists to launch favorites channels. 

Viewers can also now use the mobile app to control their Vizio devices and manage subscriptions.  

Vizio Mobile is available for download free on Google Play and in the App Store.

NEW YORK—As media companies plot their strategies for 2023 in what promises to be a challenging market for streamers and broadcasters, new consumer research from Accenture suggests that one major opportunity will be solutions that address widespread consumer complaints about the hassle of navigating through many different apps and streaming platforms. 

According to “Reinvent for growth,” a new report from Accenture, six in seven consumers globally (86%) say they want an all-in-one platform to simplify their entertainment experiences with video streaming, fantasy sports, social media, ecommerce and more. 

As part of its second annual global entertainment study, Accenture surveyed 6,000 consumers to understand their preferences and behaviors regarding their online entertainment experiences. Four in 10 respondents (41%) said they would pay for an all-in-one platform for their entertainment services. In addition, three in five (61%) want the ability to share their streaming profiles across platforms to allow for better personalization of content, the survey found. 

“Standalone streaming services are running up against some simple facts: There are limits to what consumers will pay for and only a certain amount of complexity and options that they are prepared to deal with,” said John Peters, a managing director in Accenture’s Media & Entertainment industry practice. “It is time to reimagine entertainment ecosystems so that media companies can move to profitable growth by helping consumers get everything they need and want.”

Other findings from the report further highlight the need for media organizations to reconsider their operational and content strategies:

• More than one-third (35%) of consumers unsubscribed from at least one of the top five streaming video-on-demand services in the last 12 months, and 26% said that they plan to cut one or more in the next 12 months.
• More than seven in 10 consumers (72%) reported frustration at finding something to watch, up 6 percentage points from last year.
• More than half (55%) of consumers said they are overwhelmed by the number of streaming services to choose from, with 26% saying it can take them more than 10 minutes to settle on a streaming choice (up from 17% last year).

Accenture’s report also highlights three emerging roles for entertainment companies hoping to better compete for consumers’ time, attention and money: 

• Audience aggregators are platform companies with a diversified business model that monetize attention and engagement directly and indirectly by tying multiple entertainment and other services together in one place.
• Audience cultivators will create and efficiently monetize entertainment in one or multiple forms (e.g., video, music, gaming etc.) by knowing their core audience, focusing on content/cost efficiency, and ensuring that they’re included in audience aggregator platforms and bundles.
• Content merchants will focus on making the best possible content without needing to monetize the engagement their content achieves.

“The future of the media industry is moving toward aggregated platforms,” said Imran Shah, a managing director with Accenture’s Communications, Media & Technology industry group. “These platforms will achieve two crucial outcomes — creating inclusive, lower churn services and bundles that will drive revenue for media companies, while delivering experiences that enable consumers to easily find and access content.”

Additional insights and findings from the report are available here.

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. and LENEXA, Kan.—In a deal that’s being termed “landmark,” the National Content & Technology Cooperative (NCTC), a consortium of more than 700 independent North American broadband providers, has signed a deal that will make the MyBundle.TV content management software available to its member providers and subscribers.   

The MyBundle.TV agreement with the NCTC—whose members serve more than one-third of all U.S. households—will give the cooperative's members the ability to deploy a wide range of tools that simplify the increasingly complicated world of streaming TV, they said. 

The MyBundle.TV platform offers free and easy-to-use tools to help consumers discover and manage their streaming service subscriptions, watch free live TV, and find content to watch across their services. It currently incorporates more than 150 streaming services and partners with approximately 115 broadband providers serving 9.1 million customers nationwide.

The MyBundle.TV platform will work in conjunction with NCTC members' own video offerings or as a standalone broadband solution, offering subscribers a simple way to manage and make the most of the vast streaming TV landscape, they said.

Formerly the National Cable Television Cooperative, the NCTC rebranded itself last summer as the National Content & Technology Cooperative. 

"Entering into a strategic partnership with the recently rebranded NCTC is a landmark agreement in the growth and evolution for MyBundle.TV," said Jason Cohen, Co-Founder and CEO of MyBundle.TV. "We applaud the NCTC's rebrand and commitment to drive new revenue generating opportunities for its members. The MyBundle.TV platform will provide NCTC members with cost-effective tools to grow, retain and delight their customers." 

"In a short period of time, we have seen MyBundle.TV have great success in working with broadband companies to fortify their businesses. The NCTC is very pleased to enter into a comprehensive agreement with MyBundle.TV that will bring its array of tools to all of our members nationwide," said Lou Borrelli, CEO, NCTC. "We look forward to working with Jason and his team in the years ahead helping our members deploy an array of innovative options that not only help their end customers save money, but also enhance their current broadband and video experiences."

MOUNTAIN VIEW, CA – March 26, 2019 – At NAB 2019 TVU Networks, the global technology and innovation leader in live IP solutions, will announce the new MediaMind Appliance, a metadata generation and search engine that speeds production performance and content reuse within an existing broadcast media supply chain. The system uses a combination of time-code and AI-based facial and speech recognition to generate metadata. And an open API lets users connect directly with MAM and NLE systems. TVU Networks will exhibit in booth #C1707 during the NAB Show in Las Vegas next month.

“TV stations and news agencies have considerable media assets, but how can they be considered assets if they can’t be reused and repurposed?” said Paul Shen, CEO, TVU Networks. “While there are many ways to measure the value of content in the media industry, there are ultimately only two: who gets to the audience first and what content is viewed and reused the most? The faster the content spreads, the more it is reused and repurposed, the greater the value of the content and the lower the production cost. That’s what’s driven the creation of the TVU MediaMind appliance and the entire MediaMind workflow.”

Because the MediaMind appliance utilizes both AI and time code to generate search results, it can convert audio and video into structured data in real-time. It’s capable of searching a raw asset at any stage of production – from assignment through to on-air. With the help of TVU’s AI engine, real-time speech recognition lets users find text results even faster than they would searching for images alone. Users simply type in what they’re looking for and the appropriate section of a time code appears. The real-time content search engine uses time code to identify each asset with a unique ID.

Clips can be marked and saved for immediate use. There’s no need to wait for pre-production to finish or for the video file to be entered into the MAM system. With the reporter still on scene, the clip is ready to go online or on-air.

The TVU MediaMind appliance is part of a TVU SaaS model that uses the TVU MediaMind server (dual-channel VS3500/VS3100 models) as the edge server. The servers can receive video signals from any TVU Networks’ transmission device as well as process IP streams of standard transmission protocol, SDI video, and store files in any MAM system. They are professional video hardware decoders designed for the centralized viewing, control and distribution of live video content.

In addition to the MediaMind appliance, the MediaMind ecosystem includes the following cloud-based products: TVU Producer for multi-camera live video production; TVU Remote Production System (RPS) for remote production using a broadcaster’s existing studio control room and a public Internet connection from the field; TVU CAS (Contribution Automation Solution) for the identification of all video acquisition resources on a given story at acquisition; TVU Grid - an IP-based video switching, routing and distribution solution; and TVU Grid Market, a central source for content owners to contribute and pull video enabling assets to be shared and sold on a global scale. 

Most content owners would agree that manual tagging and cataloging of assets is a time consuming and expensive activity that can stymy the usefulness and profitability of media assets. Today however, audio-visual content can be transformed into dynamic assets using metadata enriched with a combination of Artificial Intelligence (AI) techniques and manual processes.

Beyond basic tags that allow for different variations of the same word (e.g. singular and plural) or multiple tags for the same concept, automated AI technology offers more powerful and faster capabilities that can aid content discovery for easy re-use and greater productivity. For example, content can be auto-tagged using Object Recognition as well as Face/Location Recognition technology to further enrich metadata. AI metadata can also be used to discover specific areas where compliance issues have been spotted. Improvements in Speech-to-text and Image Recognition algorithms are further automating parts of the metadata process, making it increasingly useful for both new and legacy content use cases.

AI-ENABLED MEDIA ASSET MANAGEMENT

Here is an example of how AI technologies are already starting to become an integral part of commercially available products and services. AI functionality has recently been integrated into CLEAR, a cloud-based Media Asset Management (MAM) solution by Prime Focus Technologies. It helps Media & Entertainment (M&E) enterprises leverage both AI-generated and manually logged metadata to maximize content discovery. This makes it faster and easier for users to sort, locate, and re-use their assets for creating compelling stories from a vast content repository.

Importantly, CLEAR empowers users with the freedom to access the entire galaxy of AI/machine learning capabilities (AWS, Azure, Google, IBM Watson to name a few), as appropriate for their downstream use case.

Useful functions for AI-driven visual analysis include character identification as well as recognition of objects and actions. Ideally, AI video analysis should also recognize text within the image, such as street signs, advertisements, and products. The video AI functionality in CLEAR, for example, includes the capability to recognize human faces, their genders and approximate ages. It also recognizes brands and logos, along with well-known landmarks, and presently, to some degree, other objects at a level that includes phones, tables, vehicles, and animals, for example. Additionally, the system can also recognize basic interactions between these objects, such as a human running, dancing, or smoking as examples, and can detect the general facial emotions of people and events, such as being able to tell the difference between a festive party and an intense group discussion.

While all AI-based functionalities at present require human review and quality control, one of the key characteristics of AI is its ability to learn and improve over time, so we expect these functions to continue to evolve going forward.

METADATA IMPLICATIONS

If a collection of media assets could be compared to a file cabinet full of important papers, then metadata would be the labels on the folders. While it is true that the papers themselves are important and valuable, it is the labels that make it possible to locate the particular paper you presently need quickly and effectively.

In a similar way, as content is analyzed and then augmented with metadata, value is added because the ability to locate the desired content and understand important features of that content is enhanced. The value of metadata in our current time is even further enhanced because the quantity of content that already exists, along with what is now being created, is so extensive. If AI techniques can be used to help human evaluators review new or existing content and create valuable metadata, then it can help organizations unlock additional value in these assets.

There are several ways that using AI to improve metadata processes can help an organizational business case. Making the most of digital content often requires M&E enterprises to move beyond basic asset management and embrace new-age, Cloud-based MAM solutions. Such solutions, with extensive data models and built-in tools for cataloging and metadata tagging, help organize content in useful ways, make it easily accessible, and open up new avenues to monetize assets. Ultimately, they streamline and improve the overall efficiency of digital content creation, boost monetization, and drive creative enablement.

Here is a recent example of how more detailed and accurate metadata gave some content providers an advantage when broadcast content regulations changed. Whenever such regulations change, there is a time consuming and stressful burden placed on the M&E industry to quickly come into compliance. In this case, it was legislated in India that all smoking scenes must be prefaced with a warning message about the hazards of smoking. When this regulation came into effect, detailed and accurate metadata let some content providers quickly identify every scene that included smoking. Armed with this information, broadcasters could then choose to either remove the scene, or add the required warning message.

Looking at content from another angle, content creators can also depend on the use of metadata to locate existing materials for new projects. Documentary film makers, news organizations, and investigative reporters are just a few of the kinds of content creators in this category that frequently look for content relating to specific themes, public figures, locations, and similar categories. When a famous or influential person passes, or a current event warrants a special report, detailed and accurate metadata describing existing footage and media about the topic can make the search for this material far faster and more effective.

CONCLUSION

The integration of MAM solutions with metadata management tools, extensive data models and AI-based functionalities, hand-in-hand with human quality control and judgment, will help organizations achieve the effective labeling of vast quantities of existing and new content. And, the improved accuracy and efficiency will deliver, in turn, improved business efficiencies and results across cataloging, editing and mastering operations. By making it possible to find content faster, easier, and more accurately, AI-enhanced systems will create new revenue opportunities.

T Shobhana is Vice President and Head of Global Marketing & Communications for Prime Focus Technologies.