#quibi turnstyle

[dualredundancy]

In this week's episode David, John and Kyle discuss the results of The Ringer's Best TV Character of the Century bracket (1:45) and how likely Americans will return to theaters once they reopen post quarantine (9:55). We also discuss how some film festivals like SXSW will stream for free on Amazon (14:35) and the possible "work from home" show coming from the producers of The Office (19:25). Next we look at the launch of Quibi (the short-form video platform), how their Turnstyle feature works and review some of their new programs like Chrissy's Court (23:00). Finally, we discuss the popular Netflix miniseries Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem & Madness (50:10).

[ajayuikey]

‘Wireless’ shows off Quibi’s Turnstyle technology – TechCrunch “Wireless” is probably the best showcase so far for Quibi’s Turnstyle technology. That’s the technology that allows the streaming video app to…

[isfeed]

Finally, some good news for Quibi

Finally, some good news for Quibi

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Quibi’s zombie may finally be able to rest its weary head. The company’s successor has settled an ongoing feud with eternal thorn-in-its-side Eko. Eko, an interactive video company, and Quibi’s successor QBI Holdings announced today that they’d reached a settlement in the legal battle over Quibi’s perspective-shifting Turnstyle feature, which Eko alleged…

[mikegranich87]

Quibi will transfer its video tech to another company to settle lawsuit

The ghost of Quibi is giving up the Turnstyle rotating video tech that let users watch its short-form content in either landscape or portrait mode on phones. A company called Eko filed a lawsuit over the feature a month before Quibi's ill-fated launch. Eko accused Quibi of patent infringement and claimed it used stolen trade secrets to build the tech.

The companies have settled their legal claims against each other, and Quibi is transferring the Turnstyle tech and intellectual property to Eko. The financial terms of their settlement haven't been disclosed, as Variety notes. Eko sought over $100 million in damages from Quibi.

“We are satisfied with the outcome of this litigation, and proud of the independently created contributions of Quibi and its engineering team to content presentation technology,” Quibi founder Jeffrey Katzenberg said.

Eko filed its suit in March 2020. That July, a court ruled that Quibi could keep using Turnstyle pending the outcome of the lawsuit. As it turns out, the case lasted far longer than Quibi's streaming service — the app shut down last December, less than eight months after it debuted.

Quibi sold its content library to Roku, which won an Emmy for one of those series this past weekend. After selling its shows, a Quibi holding company called QBI Holdings was formed as the legal battle played out.

The settlement is another nail in the coffin for a big, expensive, failure of a bet on mobile streaming. Quibi was designed for on-the-go viewing, but it launched in the midst of a pandemic, when most people weren't moving around. Still, at least we'll always have memories of "The Golden Arm."

from Mike Granich https://www.engadget.com/quibi-turnstyle-phone-rotating-video-tech-eko-174531610.html?src=rss

[podcastcoach]

You Can't Buy An Audience If Your Podcast Sucks

Today we talk about the 1.7 billion dollar mistake that was Quibi and how we can learn from their mistake. We also take a look at the power of follow up questions, and the best place to buy gear. 

Table of Contents

01:22 Your Favorite Podcast - Send in Your Answer 02:56 Now That's A Good Question: Howard Stern and Wolfgang Van Halen 06:35 Join the School of Podcasting 07:33 Lessons From Quibi 13:24 They Blew Their Launch 16:12 Big Name Celebrities 19:02 Make It Easy To Share Your Content 21:05 It's Not the Tech 23:28 Clueless About the Competition 29:49 Who is the Audience? 33:29 The Best Place to Buy Gear: Sweetwater 36:07 Your Audience Awaits Exercise

How to Avoid the 1.7 Billion Dollar Mistake that Was Quibi

Quibi is an over-the-top American short-form streaming platform that generates content for viewing on mobile devices. It was founded in Los Angeles in August 2018 as NewTV by Jeffrey Katzenberg (chairman of Walt Disney Studios from 1984 to 1994) and is led by Meg Whitman ( She is a board member of Procter & Gamble and Dropbox. Whitman was previously president and CEO of Hewlett Packard Enterprise), its CEO.

In 2019 Variety reported that Quibi had secured 100 million dollars in advertising before the service had even launched.

On February 2, 2020, they spent $5.6 million for 30 seconds on an ad in the Super Bowl that was seen by a reported 99.9 million viewers.  That is $18 per person if you round up. This for a service where subscribers can get the service for $5 per month with ads, or $8 per month without them.  That $5.6 million was a drop in the bucket.

The commercial was really stupid and didn't really answer or explain what the heck it was. You just knew it was less than 10 minutes. They explained what is was, but not so much why it was or how you would benefit.

It raised $1.75 billion from investors. It had a variety of shows featuring originals with Jennifer Lopez, Chrissy Teigen, Chance the Rapper, Liam Hemsworth, Sophie Turner, Lena Waithe, Nicole Richie, Reese Witherspoon. Quibi offered a 90-day free trial to those who sign up on its website before April 6. Overall, it plans to release 175 original shows and 8,500 episodes in the first year.

Their lineup has a ton of stars, celebrities, etc

It launched on April 6, 2020. It is set to shut down "on or about" December 1, 2020. December 1 is 239 days. That is $7,322,175.73 a day. Here is my thoughts on why this was such an epic fail.

They Blew Their Launch

When you spend $5.6 million dollars on a Super Bowl ad, they should have an idea what you do and what is in it for them. In the event, the ad inspired people to check out the service (it didn't), you should be able to go check it out and not have to wait four months. Yes, you can build buzz, but for me, I never heard from quibi again.

Putting All Their Faith in Celebrities

Here are some of the names that appear on shows: Jennifer Lopez, Kristen Bell, Nick Jonas, Tracy Morgan, Aaron Rodgers, Yara Shahidi, Gabriel Iglesias, Anthony Davis, Kevin Hart and Karlie Kloss. Cardi B, Chance the Rapper, Dapper Dan, Jay Leno, and Wolfgang Puck (and that's just some).

The people involved had experience Phil Abraham has directed the Sopranos, Madmen, Daredevil, Ozark.

No Compelling Content

Yet, there was no breakout show that inspired the people who had found Quibi to tell a friend about Quibi. Nobody was compelled to tell a friend. They did recaps of the previous days news or sports updates. WOW what revolutionary content!

They Made it Hard To Share

According to Media Analyst Josh Consine there was no sharing capability (no screenshots) which limited your ability to go viral. When it first launched you could only watch it on your phone. There were no apps, not Fire TV, Chromecast. They made it "hard" to consume. They took away choices from the consumer.

They Put Their Faith in the Tech

One thing that set them apart was a feature called Turnstyle. This meant that if you rotate the phone horizontal to verticle, you would get a different camera angle. Neat? Sure. Something so cool I had to tell my friends? Apparently not as I had never heard of it until I started researching how you blow 1.7 billion and lose. In a nutshell, Turnstyle served you two video streams simultaneously and “stitches them together” with a single audio track.

Since we're talking about the Tech, a company sued Quibi shortly after their launch company called Eko alleged that Quibi stole the technology after Eko demoed it to employees of the company, including founder and chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg. Even when you have billions in funding, lawsuits are expensive.

Clueless About the Competition

They were charging $5/$8 a month for new content. Look at Disney, Netflix, Hul. While they have original content, they all have old favorites as well. They also have a way to add more than one person under your account (so when your kids login under your account your recommendations don't all turn into cartoons). This was not the case to Quibi. It figured each person was watching on their phone. One person per account. This gets expensive and now anyone who wants to see what you're talking about has to use your phone.

It is reported that CEO Whitman repeatedly said "We're not competing with Netflix." Think about that one for a minute. That's like a radio station saying, "All of our songs are under four minutes long. We don't compete with other stations."

Lack Of Focus Group?

In one article that was published right after they launched it stated, "Quibi’s executives have hinted that the company will deliver on a TV experience if customer feedback and data warrant it. " Well they did add support for Apple's airplay and Chromecast, but at the expense of the Turnstyle technology. They did release an app for Roku and Fire TV - the day before they announced were closing down.

It seemed like they didn't understand how people used their phones or consumed content.

Did they think that because the average length of a YouTube video is 11 minutes that making "short" videos would be the key? Meanwhile, TikTok was taking off with all sorts of celebrities making their own channels. TikTok is free. Did Quibi follow the Facebook strategy and buy them or "borrow features" and add them to their platform? No. They were doing something different and nobody cared.

They Didn't Answer the Number Question: WHO IS YOUR AUDIENCE

The idea was people could watch these short clips while waiting in line, or on the bus. When you think of people consuming content on their phone you might think it would be younger people. Yet you're trying to attract those people with Steven Spielberg and Jay Leno? Sure Cardi B appeared in an episode, but they needed to define. If the content is for busy people, who are the busy people and what do they want to watch?

According to an article in Forbes, Katzenberg and Whitman said, "We created a new form of mobile-first premium storytelling."

They did. But the stories weren't any good.

Now That's a Good Question

02:56  Today we listen to Howard Stern ask a great follow-up question to Wolfgang Van Halen. While he started off with a yes/no question, but then asked a few follow-up questions lead to the information you can't get anyplace else, and listen to how Howard shuts up and lets Wolfgang wrestle with a potentially uncomfortable topic. 

Sweetwater is My New Favorite Place to Order Gear

33:29 My co-host for Ask the Podcast Coach Jim Collison ordered something from Sweetwater and told me about their INSANE customer service. I recently saw where they were one of the few people to have the new Zoom Podtrak P4 IN STOCK and I see what he means. I was called to let me know my order had shipped, and to let me know if I had any issues I could call them. So here is why I think they are the best:

Prices are just as good (and in some cases better) than Amazon

Free shipping (even on small stuff)

Built-in two-year warranty 

Free tech support 

Payment plans available if needed.

My goal is to build more of a relationship with Sweetwater (as I have a dedicated rep) which should keep me in touch with podcasting technology going forward. In full disclosure, I earn a referral reward (but that's why I ordered something as I wanted to see for myself) 

Your Audience Awaits Exercise

I'm listening to the book Unhackable: The 30-Day Elixir for Creating Flawless Ideas, Leveraging Superhuman Focus, and Achieving Optimal Performance Through Flow its a very interesting book that you can listen/read to one chapter per day. The one exercise was to write yourself an email from your future audience as is these people who are waiting for you to start your show. SO MANY TIMES I hear people worried about having trolls or people say negative things. I say, What about ALL THE POSITIVE that could happen?

Think of going to your inbox and see an email with the title, "Just wanted to say Thank you." You open it and it starts, "Hello, I just wanted to reach out. You may not believe this but due to your podcast.... 

and the listener explains how you made them feel. How they no longer felt alone. How they were taken to a place where the stress of work, life, and more melted away. 

This could happen. But your podcast can't help people if you don't start your podcast. You can't update a show that doesn't exist. Please let me help you, as your audience is waiting. 

Check out this episode!

[dualredundancy]

In this week's episode David, John and Kyle discuss the results of The Ringer's Best TV Character of the Century bracket (1:45) and how likely Americans will return to theaters once they reopen post quarantine (9:55). We also discuss how some film festivals like SXSW will stream for free on Amazon (14:35) and the possible "work from home" show coming from the producers of The Office (19:25). Next we look at the launch of Quibi (the short-form video platform), how their Turnstyle feature works and review some of their new programs like Chrissy's Court (23:00). Finally, we discuss the popular Netflix miniseries Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem & Madness (50:10).

http://www.dualredundancy.com/2020/04/podcast-episode-288-launch-of-quibi-and.html

[technicalsolutions88]

Companies send out conflicting messages about the TikTok deal, Microsoft acquires a gaming giant and the WeChat ban is temporarily blocked. This is your Daily Crunch for September 21, 2020.

The big story: This TikTok deal is pretty confusing

This keeps getting more confusing. Apparently TikTok’s parent company ByteDance has reached a deal with Walmart and Oracle that will allow the Chinese social media app to continue operating in the United States, and the deal has been approved by Donald Trump. But it’s hard to tell exactly what this agreement entails.

ByteDance said it would retain 80% control of TikTok, while selling 20% of the company to Walmart and Oracle as “commercial partner” and “trusted technology partner,” respectively. However, Oracle released a seemingly conflicting statement, claiming that Americans will have majority ownership and “ByteDance will have no ownership in TikTok Global.”

So what’s going on here? We’re trying to figure it out.

The tech giants

Microsoft set to acquire Bethesda parent ZeniMax for $7.5B — ZeniMax owns some of the biggest publishers in gaming, including Bethesda Game Studios, id Software, ZeniMax Online Studios, Arkane, MachineGames, Tango Gameworks, Alpha Dog and Roundhouse Studios.

Trump administration’s WeChat ban is blocked by US district court — More news about the Trump administration’s efforts to ban some high-profile Chinese apps: A district court judge in San Francisco has temporarily stayed the nationwide ban on WeChat.

Nikola’s chairman steps down, stock crashes following allegations of fraud — This comes in the wake of a report from a noted short-seller accusing the electric truck company of fraud.

Startups, funding and venture capital

With $100M in funding, Playco is already a mobile gaming unicorn — Playco is a new mobile gaming startup created by Game Closure co-founder Michael Carter and Zynga co-founder Justin Waldron.

Indian mobile gaming platform Mobile Premier League raises $90 million — Mobile Premier League operates a pure-play gaming platform that hosts a range of tournaments.

A meeting room of one’s own: Three VCs discuss breaking out of big firms to start their own gigs — We talked to Construct Capital’s Dayna Grayson, Renegade Partners’ Renata Quintini and Plexo Capital’s Lo Toney.

Advice and analysis from Extra Crunch

Edtech investors are panning for gold — At Disrupt, investors told us how they separate the gold from the dust.

Despite slowdowns, pandemic accelerates shifts in hardware manufacturing — China continues to be the dominant global force, but the price of labor and political uncertainty has led many companies to begin looking elsewhere.

The Peloton effect — Alex Wilhelm examines the latest VC activity in connected fitness.

(Reminder: Extra Crunch is our subscription membership program, which aims to democratize information about startups. You can sign up here.)

Everything else

Ireland’s data watchdog slammed for letting adtech carry on ‘biggest breach of all time’ — The Irish Council for Civil Liberties is putting more pressure on the country’s data watchdog to take enforcement action.

Pandemic accelerated cord cutting, making 2020 the worst-ever year for pay TV — According to new research from eMarketer, the cable, satellite and telecom TV industry is on track to lose the most subscribers ever.

Original Content podcast: ‘Wireless’ shows off Quibi’s Turnstyle technology — I interviewed the director of the new Quibi series.

The Daily Crunch is TechCrunch’s roundup of our biggest and most important stories. If you’d like to get this delivered to your inbox every day at around 3pm Pacific, you can subscribe here.

from Social – TechCrunch https://ift.tt/33UhHZ0 Original Content From: https://techcrunch.com

[shamelessmoondetective]

Original Content podcast: ‘Wireless’ shows off Quibi’s Turnstyle technology

https://ift.tt/32OGE8J

[bloggerjoedoe]

“Wireless” is probably the best showcase so far for Quibi’s Turnstyle technology.

That’s the technology that allows the streaming video app to switch seamlessly between landscape and portrait mode depending on the orientation of your phone. With other Quibi shows, you’re essentially getting two views of the same footage — but with “Wireless” (which is executive produced by Steven Soderbergh), you’re switching between traditional cinematic footage (in landscape) and a view of the protagonist’s phone (in portrait).

In this bonus episode of the Original Content podcast, director Zach Wechter told me that he and his co-writer Jack Seidman wrote the initial script — about a college student played by Tye Sheridan who gets trapped in the snow after a car crash, with only his iPhone to save him — before they decided on the phone-centric format. But when they heard about Turnstyle, “It just felt like a match made in heaven that would allow us to facilitate this idea.”

I wondered whether that required going back and adding a bunch of phone interactions to the story, but said Wechter said, “It was quite the opposite. One thing we found in testing was when the phone plot moved really fast, it would be hard, because there are these two perspectives happening at once.”

So that actually meant “reducing some fo the intriacy of the plot happening on the phone” to ensure that viewers didn’t get lost.

And if you’re wondering which mode to focus on as you watch, Wechter has some simple advice: “Go with your gut.” He said he had a “roadmap” for when he was hoping to nudge viewers to turn their phones — like when there’s a notification sound or Sheridan focuses on his phone — “but I think the most important part of the experience is that we’re not indicating when our viewers turn, that it becomes this sort of passive-but-active viewing experience.”

Wechter described making the show — essentially a feature length film divided into episodes of 10 minutes or less — as shooting “two films that had to dance together” in just 19 days. And he made things even more challenging by insisting that all the phone/FaceTime calls and even the text messages be filmed live, rather than just recording both ends separately.

“When I think about directing and my job, really the most fundamental part of it to me is making the actorss comfortable, and I think that having a scene partner is paramount,” he said. “It was a long conversation about why we couldn’t just have them act off of a recording and shoot it separately — because it took a lot of logistical effort and resources to do it — but it really makes the scenes feel very alive and realistic.”

You can listen to the full interview in the player below, subscribe using Apple Podcasts or find us in your podcast player of choice. If you like the show, please let us know by leaving a review on Apple. You can also follow us on Twitter or send us feedback directly. (Or suggest shows and movies for us to review!)

Source: Tech Crunch

[technicalsolutions88]

Companies send out conflicting messages about the TikTok deal, Microsoft acquires a gaming giant and the WeChat ban is temporarily blocked. This is your Daily Crunch for September 21, 2020.

The big story: This TikTok deal is pretty confusing

This keeps getting more confusing. Apparently TikTok’s parent company ByteDance has reached a deal with Walmart and Oracle that will allow the Chinese social media app to continue operating in the United States, and the deal has been approved by Donald Trump. But it’s hard to tell exactly what this agreement entails.

ByteDance said it would retain 80% control of TikTok, while selling 20% of the company to Walmart and Oracle as “commercial partner” and “trusted technology partner,” respectively. However, Oracle released a seemingly conflicting statement, claiming that Americans will have majority ownership and “ByteDance will have no ownership in TikTok Global.”

So what’s going on here? We’re trying to figure it out.

The tech giants

Microsoft set to acquire Bethesda parent ZeniMax for $7.5B — ZeniMax owns some of the biggest publishers in gaming, including Bethesda Game Studios, id Software, ZeniMax Online Studios, Arkane, MachineGames, Tango Gameworks, Alpha Dog and Roundhouse Studios.

Trump administration’s WeChat ban is blocked by US district court — More news about the Trump administration’s efforts to ban some high-profile Chinese apps: A district court judge in San Francisco has temporarily stayed the nationwide ban on WeChat.

Nikola’s chairman steps down, stock crashes following allegations of fraud — This comes in the wake of a report from a noted short-seller accusing the electric truck company of fraud.

Startups, funding and venture capital

With $100M in funding, Playco is already a mobile gaming unicorn — Playco is a new mobile gaming startup created by Game Closure co-founder Michael Carter and Zynga co-founder Justin Waldron.

Indian mobile gaming platform Mobile Premier League raises $90 million — Mobile Premier League operates a pure-play gaming platform that hosts a range of tournaments.

A meeting room of one’s own: Three VCs discuss breaking out of big firms to start their own gigs — We talked to Construct Capital’s Dayna Grayson, Renegade Partners’ Renata Quintini and Plexo Capital’s Lo Toney.

Advice and analysis from Extra Crunch

Edtech investors are panning for gold — At Disrupt, investors told us how they separate the gold from the dust.

Despite slowdowns, pandemic accelerates shifts in hardware manufacturing — China continues to be the dominant global force, but the price of labor and political uncertainty has led many companies to begin looking elsewhere.

The Peloton effect — Alex Wilhelm examines the latest VC activity in connected fitness.

(Reminder: Extra Crunch is our subscription membership program, which aims to democratize information about startups. You can sign up here.)

Everything else

Ireland’s data watchdog slammed for letting adtech carry on ‘biggest breach of all time’ — The Irish Council for Civil Liberties is putting more pressure on the country’s data watchdog to take enforcement action.

Pandemic accelerated cord cutting, making 2020 the worst-ever year for pay TV — According to new research from eMarketer, the cable, satellite and telecom TV industry is on track to lose the most subscribers ever.

Original Content podcast: ‘Wireless’ shows off Quibi’s Turnstyle technology — I interviewed the director of the new Quibi series.

The Daily Crunch is TechCrunch’s roundup of our biggest and most important stories. If you’d like to get this delivered to your inbox every day at around 3pm Pacific, you can subscribe here.

from Mobile – TechCrunch https://ift.tt/33UhHZ0 ORIGINAL CONTENT FROM: https://techcrunch.com/

[un-enfant-immature]

Daily Crunch: This TikTok deal is pretty confusing

Companies send out conflicting messages about the TikTok deal, Microsoft acquires a gaming giant and the WeChat ban is temporarily blocked. This is your Daily Crunch for September 21, 2020.

The big story: This TikTok deal is pretty confusing

This keeps getting more confusing. Apparently TikTok’s parent company ByteDance has reached a deal with Walmart and Oracle that will allow the Chinese social media app to continue operating in the United States, and the deal has been approved by Donald Trump. But it’s hard to tell exactly what this agreement entails.

ByteDance said it would retain 80% control of TikTok, while selling 20% of the company to Walmart and Oracle as “commercial partner” and “trusted technology partner,” respectively. However, Oracle released a seemingly conflicting statement, claiming that Americans will have majority ownership and “ByteDance will have no ownership in TikTok Global.”

So what’s going on here? We’re trying to figure it out.

The tech giants

Microsoft set to acquire Bethesda parent ZeniMax for $7.5B — ZeniMax owns some of the biggest publishers in gaming, including Bethesda Game Studios, id Software, ZeniMax Online Studios, Arkane, MachineGames, Tango Gameworks, Alpha Dog and Roundhouse Studios.

Trump administration’s WeChat ban is blocked by US district court — More news about the Trump administration’s efforts to ban some high-profile Chinese apps: A district court judge in San Francisco has temporarily stayed the nationwide ban on WeChat.

Nikola’s chairman steps down, stock crashes following allegations of fraud — This comes in the wake of a report from a noted short-seller accusing the electric truck company of fraud.

Startups, funding and venture capital

With $100M in funding, Playco is already a mobile gaming unicorn — Playco is a new mobile gaming startup created by Game Closure co-founder Michael Carter and Zynga co-founder Justin Waldron.

Indian mobile gaming platform Mobile Premier League raises $90 million — Mobile Premier League operates a pure-play gaming platform that hosts a range of tournaments.

A meeting room of one’s own: Three VCs discuss breaking out of big firms to start their own gigs — We talked to Construct Capital’s Dayna Grayson, Renegade Partners’ Renata Quintini and Plexo Capital’s Lo Toney.

Advice and analysis from Extra Crunch

Edtech investors are panning for gold — At Disrupt, investors told us how they separate the gold from the dust.

Despite slowdowns, pandemic accelerates shifts in hardware manufacturing — China continues to be the dominant global force, but the price of labor and political uncertainty has led many companies to begin looking elsewhere.

The Peloton effect — Alex Wilhelm examines the latest VC activity in connected fitness.

(Reminder: Extra Crunch is our subscription membership program, which aims to democratize information about startups. You can sign up here.)

Everything else

Ireland’s data watchdog slammed for letting adtech carry on ‘biggest breach of all time’ — The Irish Council for Civil Liberties is putting more pressure on the country’s data watchdog to take enforcement action.

Pandemic accelerated cord cutting, making 2020 the worst-ever year for pay TV — According to new research from eMarketer, the cable, satellite and telecom TV industry is on track to lose the most subscribers ever.

Original Content podcast: ‘Wireless’ shows off Quibi’s Turnstyle technology — I interviewed the director of the new Quibi series.

The Daily Crunch is TechCrunch’s roundup of our biggest and most important stories. If you’d like to get this delivered to your inbox every day at around 3pm Pacific, you can subscribe here.

[wavemstudios]

How ‘The Stranger’ Director Veena Sud Prepped for Using Quibi’s Turnstyle Technology http://dlvr.it/RfPc8V