Billboard reports: “Vevo announced on Thursday it will “phase out elements” of its owned and operated platforms — meaning its mobile apps and consumer website — and shift the company’s focus toward growing current and future partnerships. Co-owned by a coalition of major record labels and tech companies, Vevo said it will continue to sell all Vevo-specific advertising across the distribution platforms it works with.”
Gamesindustry.biz reports: “Minecraft has reached over 100 million registered users in China less than 12 months after it launched. The free-to-play version of Mojang’s genre-defining builder was brought to China on PC in August 2017, quickly followed an iOS release in September, and finally an Android version in October; there is no console version available in the region.”
Variety reports: “Sony sees a future in portable gaming, Bloomberg reports, with PlayStation chief John Kodera hinting that the next console may be closely integrated with portable devices, adding that it’s ‘not yet the right stage to discuss specific hardware plans.’ The PlayStation Vita was Sony’s last attempt at a handheld gaming device.”
Venture Beat reports: “Pandora is taking a leaf out of Spotify’s book today with the launch of personalized playlists for its Premium subscribers. The music-streaming company first announced this feature back in March and has been trailing it with a ‘small number’ of Premium users over the past couple of months. Now it’s ready for prime time.”
The Hollywood Reporter reports: “In an era when Disney is aiming to acquire most of 21st Century Fox for $52.4 billion and AT&T is attempting to merge with Time Warner in an $85 billion deal, scale has become the priority for media titans. Yet, presented with the opportunity to lead a combined CBS-Viacom, Leslie Moonves didn’t simply rally the CBS board of directors to support his ‘no merger’ view — he went ‘nuclear’ on National Amusements Inc.”
Variety reports: “A federal judge on Tuesday granted final approval to a settlement on Spotify’s long-running class-action lawsuits. The news was first reported in The Hollywood Reporter. The suits, initially brought separately by musicians David Lowery and Melissa Ferrick and later combined, alleged that the streaming giant had not properly fulfilled payment per compulsory licenses of their song compositions.”
Venture Beat reports: “Lionsgate has teamed up with Russian independent developer and publisher Apps Ministry to release Deploy & Destroy, a new real‐time multiplayer first‐person shooter on iOS and Android. The game shows that one of Hollywood’s big companies continues to invest in mobile games, which amount to about half of the $137.9 billion global revenues in the game industry, according to market researcher Newzoo.”
The Verge reports: “Comcast really wants to own 21st Century Fox. The company announced today that it’s planning and is in the ‘advanced stages of preparing’ an offer for Fox in the hopes that it’ll reject Disney’s existing bid to acquire the company’s entertainment arm. Comcast says: ‘Any offer for Fox would be all-cash and at a premium to the value of the current all-share offer from Disney’.”
Deadline Hollywood reports: “Epix, the premium network launched as a multi-studio effort in 2009 and now fully owned by MGM, has forged a landmark carriage deal with Comcast to expand its reach to 70 million homes and 18 of the top 20 U.S. markets. Starting June 13, Comcast’s Xfinity platforms will offer live and on-demand programming from Epix, including original series and more than 2,000 feature films.”
Tech Crunch reports: “Twitter is shutting down its TV apps on Roku, Android TV and Xbox starting on May 24, the company announced this morning. The news of the apps’ closure comes at a time when Twitter is now trying to steer its users to its first-party mobile apps and its desktop website by killing off apps used by a minority of its user base.”
