Paramount Skydance Favorite for WBD but Don’t Rule Out a Saudi Bid

The fate of Warner Bros. Discovery is complicated by a politically motivated regulator but whatever happens, streaming is about to get shaken up again.

Losing the Feed, but Owning the Story

For decades, broadcasters were the heartbeat of live sport. They owned the feed, shaped the story, and set the standard. But today, that control is slipping, not because audiences have abandoned them, but because the definition of "live" has changed.

AWS GM of M&E Samira Panah Bakhtiar Talks Gen AI and Interactive Sport Streaming

In this Q&A, Samira Panah Bakhtiar, Amazon Web Services (AWS) general manager of me­­dia, entertainment, games, and sport, talks about how AWS and agentic AI are changing the ways streaming workflows are executed. In her interview, she spoke both to the business side of the house and the underlying tech.

ICYMI: Streaming Media 2025's VOD Archive is Live

Streaming Media 2025, which rolled into sunny Santa Monica last week, featured speakers from Netflix, Roku, Paramount, BET, Google, Warner Bros. Discovery, Televisa Univision, and many more. Check out a playlist featuring the complete Streaming Media 25 program on Streaming Media's YouTube channel to catch the sessions you missed and revel in the ones you want to relive through the magic of VOD.

AI helps InterDigital reach beyond VVC in race to develop next-gen codec

Candidates for H.267 already significantly outperform VVC as the hunt for a new video compression standard gets underway

Closing the Anti-Piracy Loop: A Q&A With Friend MTS

Anti-piracy provider Friend MTS (aka FMTS) recently launched a Piracy Investigation Services solution at IBC 2025. These "covert intelligence services" "locate those responsible for illicit streaming services and equip content owners with the necessary information to take appropriate action." To dig into exactly what Piracy Investigation Services does, I interviewed Dave Gilmore, VP of intelligence at FMTS.

Video entertainment resilient to economic distress

Price inflation and wage squeeze are not putting a dampener on "TV" as consumers ratchet up their spend and their time spent on home video entertainment, according to the latest 2025 Video Trends Report from TiVo. The average number of services used by consumers is up too with the average number of FAST channels watched by viewers almost doubling year on year but SVOD churn has increased.

Fans in the feed: mining the untapped gold of fan-created sport content

Today every sport fan has a camera in their pocket. Every goal, reaction and celebration can be clipped, shared and spread within seconds. In many ways, these moments feel more authentic than the broadcast itself. But here is the problem: most of that content never makes it into the official feed. It lives on social, disconnected from the live coverage, even though it is what fans are already watching, sharing and talking about.

Worldpanel's Dominic Sunnebo Discusses New Data on Live Sport Streaming and New Subscriber Growth

Is live sport streaming driving new subscription growth on major platforms like Netflix, Prime, and Disney+? In this exclusive interview with Streaming Media's Jan Ozer, Worldpanel by Numerator's Dominic Sunnebo discusses new data from Q2 2025 exploring the impact of premium live sport and localised content on new customer acquisition on subscription and hybrid ad-tiered platforms across the paid CTV ecosystem.

Kiswe and Joe Hand Productions Talk New D2C App, Future of OOH Sports Streaming

Interactive D2C app developer Kiswe has partnered with Joe Hand Promotions, a provider of out-of-home live sports and entertainment distribution to bars and restaurants to develop the Joe Hands Promotion App, a new OOH D2C streaming designed to set "a new standard for how venues market and operationalize live sports, and how fans gather to experience them together." To gain more insight into the specifics of what this app delivers, how it leverages both Joe Hand Promotions' distribution networks and Kiswe's expertise in interactive streaming, and current and emerging challenges and opportunities for OOH live sports streaming, I spoke with Kiswe CMO & Co-Founder Wim Sweldens and Joe Hand Promotions President Joe Hand, Jr.

SM 2025 Sneak Preview: Monetizing Niche Audiences: Strategies for Targeted Growth

There are riches in streaming's niches, and one key to monetizing those niches is, of course, serving them. On October 7 at Streaming Media 2025 in Santa Monica, Rashaun Hall of Fuse Media, Shamroc Peterson of Diverseego, Rebecca Avery of Integration Therapy, and Terrence Thames of Cocoa Creative will take a deep dive into the latest strategies for maximizing revenue in smaller, passionate communities.

SM 2025: Streaming Veteran & Live Ops Expert Bhavesh Upadhyaya Talks AI & Content Authenticity

Streaming Media 2025 Conference Chair Andy Beach sits down with SVTA Subject Matter Expert Bhavesh Upadhyaya for an advance look at Bhavesh's AI & Live Streaming and Content Authenticity panels at Streaming Media 2025, coming up October 6-8 in Santa Monica.

YouTube, TikTok attacked for control of audience

Social media are essential to monetization but leaves content owners vulnerable, said Candle Media CEO Kevin Mayer; while UK government threatens to force YouTube to promote BBC and ITV news content to prop up social cohesion.

IBC2025: 5G finally winning for live sports

Rewind to last year and 5G was still more proof of concept than real world scenario. Not any more. "5G is here and real," said Brad Cheney, VP, Field Operations & Engineering, Fox Sports at the IBC2025 trade event in the Netherlands.

IBC2025: Creators taking over the industry

"We consider broadcasters as creators," YouTube told an audience of traditional media at IBC in Amsterdam this week but it is far from clear if broadcasters fully understand the implications. At IBC, a trade show for technology that underpins the business of TV, the rise of YouTube, the growing professionalisation of content creators, and the attempts by vendors to court them was a notable trend.

IBC2025: Supply chain efficiencies won’t save sinking legacy media

One word dominated conversations at broadcast equipment show IBC this week - and it wasn't AI. Efficiency is on everyone's lips. With little genuine tech innovation around the legacy media business and the vendors who supply it are battling to survive by stripping cost and speeding processes. Applying artificial intelligence to pretty much everything seems to offer the only hope for broadcasters needing to balance the books before their audience is vaporised by streamers, social media and YouTube.

AI and adtech in operation

With an eye to providing more insight into real-world deployments and the operational side, online adtech firm Magnite volunteered to give me insight into how AI fits into their current operational processes.

Streaming Media 2025 Chair Andy Beach and DTNS's Tom Merritt talk creator track takeaways at SM 2025

Award-winning tech podcaster Tom Merritt, co-host of the Daily Tech News Show, will moderate three key sessions at Streaming Media 2025, the streaming industry's premier event coming up October 6-8 in Santa Monica. In this interview with conference chair Andy Beach, Merritt discusses his sessions' focus on how creators and studios alike can hone their creative processes and create content more efficiently.

Streams that Sell: Strategies for shoppable sport streams

Shoppable sport streaming is not about turning sport into a shopping channel. It is about extending the fan experience without breaking it. Get it wrong and you cheapen the match. Get it right and you unlock a new layer of value broadcast never could.

Cleeng unveils first-ever free D2C subscription platform that can launch in less than an hour

Cleeng Pro delivers a proven, enterprise-grade technology stack curated for creators, agencies,developers and digital entrepreneurs looking to accelerate fast and with ease