Friday 5: Dream streams - five things to watch (out for) in broadcast and streaming

Welcome to the first of Velvet’s ‘Friday 5s’, a round-up of themed news stories that have caught our attention in recent weeks. This time Velvet’s resident streaming aficionada — but let’s face it who isn’t during lockdown #3…? — Andy Riley casts his eye over what’s been happening in broadcast and streaming.

We’ll discover why Netflix should be looking over its shoulder: why the BBC is going back to linear to court youth audiences (even though most of them aren’t there?!); why YouTubers are looking beyond, well, YouTube; how it’s within all our means to become a briefcase wanker; and finally, how the tech giants plan to stamp out fake news.

Find out more below…

1. Disney’s kingdom expands: The House of Mouse’s streaming service hit a significant milestone this week, it’s amassed 100 million global subscribers in under a year and a half. That’s way in advance of the business’ projections to reach 60–90 million subs by 2024.

Why should I care?

To put that figure into context, Netflix has around 204 million subscribers, but it launched its streaming service in 2007 and operates in 190 countries. Disney + is available in just 36 markets at present, if it continues on this growth trajectory Netflix and Amazon have some serious competition on their hands.

Given the number of potential markets it is yet to expand into and the launch of its grown-up sub-brand Star, the future looks rosy for Disney. It’s good for viewers too given we’re likely to be treated to a smorgasbord of fresh premium content as the streaming players vie for supremacy.

So, over a year when Disney could have taken a battering thanks to the forced closure of its theme parks and cinemas, the parent company’s share price has doubled. Perhaps the time has come for Disney to replace its mascot with Baby Yoda?

2. BBC Three goes linear (again): The BBC’s younger (18–34) adult focused channel BBC Three moved ‘permanently’ onto the iPlayer streaming service six years again. It all made sense on paper — linear TV viewing has been falling year-on-year and a generation of kids is growing up having never had to grapple with the (ever-changing) Electronic Programming Guide. Crossover hits like Fleabag and Normal People got their time in the sun on BBC2 — and occasionally even made it to BBC1 — so what wasn’t to like?

The Beeb’s rationale for taking Three offline back in March 2016 was that it was a cost-cutting exercise: why have a linear platform when VOD is how younger audiences prefer to consume content? However, BBC Three will be back on UK EPGs again from next year.

Why should I care?

The reason Three has come back to linear probably lies in the license fee. The BBC needs to convince Ofcom that it is inclusive of all audiences. The fact is, some younger people still watch linear TV and it’s a sad fact that, although iPlayer is free to license payers, there are still parts of the country where high-speed broadband or cellular services aren’t yet available. Equally, not every family can afford broadband — digital poverty is still poverty and the BBC’s move is a welcome backtrack.

3. YouTubers are forsaking YouTube: You read that right. A growing number of high-profile vloggers are leaving the YouTube platform — at least as a first-run window for their content.

Why should I care?

Tensions around issues like ad revenue, copyright and recommendations — especially when related to hate speech and disinformation — are bubbling over, leading some YouTubers to reconsider their relationship with Google.

Linus Sebastian, a popular gaming vlogger, has launched his own streaming platform called Floatplane and is encouraging other YouTubers to join him.

The advantages are two-fold: first, the platform offers an additional revenue stream — fans can access the latest videos before they are uploaded to YouTube by paying a small monthly subscription to the vlogger’s channel on Floatplane; no less significant is the fact the platform offers an opportunity for all concerned to get away from the unbridled toxicity — and outright bullying — that plagues YouTube’s comments sections.

4. Star platform: Cameo, the online marketplace where us muggles can buy personalised video messages from an array of stars — and yes there are some bone fide stars on there, including John Cleese, Richard Dreyfus and Snoop Dogg — has come into its own during the pandemic.

Why should I care?

(For a fee) anyone can script a short (250 character) message from their star of choice. Some of the talent are even willing to do promotional messages for business, however the final video is watermarked to make it clear it is paid-for and not an endorsement.

One enterprising clothing firm, Gorilla Garms, has worked the system to its advantage, using actor James Buckley (aka Jay from The Inbetweeners) to tell customers they can get a 20% discount on their order by quoting “Briefcase Wanker”.

While the platform has been around for several years, it picked up another 10 thousand celebs last year — mainly micro-influencers and ‘resting’ actors. Some have made this a very lucrative side-line: the 150 most successful Cameo stars made over $100k apiece last year.

5. Fake news begone: A group of six tech giants including the BBC, Microsoft and Adobe have come together to form the, snappily named, Coalition for Content Provenance and Authenticity (C2PA).

Why should I care?

The group will develop open standards designed to certify the origins of media content including video, images, audio and documents in a bid to reduce online content fraud. This will trace certified content right back to the device it was captured on and highlight if there’s any evidence of that content being tampered with before it hits users’ screens.

In the wake of widespread misinformation and ever-more convincing deep fakes this is a positive step towards restoring (much-needed) trust in online sources. Consumers are becoming savvier in demanding greater transparency on provenance across multiple sectors — notably the food industry — so it makes absolute sense that similar thinking should be applied to web content.