Spotify Cutting Off Apple In-App Payment for Premium Subscribers Who Were Paying Through the App Store

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor For the first time since Peacock debuted in 2020, NBCUniversal is hiking the monthly prices on the streaming service. Starting at midnight ET Monday evening, NBCU will notify existing Peacock customers that their rates will be increasing as of next month. Effective Aug. 17, for existing users on their next billing cycle and immediately for new customers, the price of Peacock Premium (with ads) will increase by $1, to $5.99 per month, and Peacock Premium Plus (which is mostly commercial-free) will rise $2, to $11.99 per month. In the three years since Peacock’s launch, the platform has added more than 80,000 hours of content, and will reach nearly 100,000 hours total over the coming year, according to NBCU. That includes exclusive pay-1 window movies from Universal Filmed Entertainment Group; NBC and Bravo episodes next-day; streaming channels from Hallmark and Reelz; and daily mornings news from CNBC and MSNBC.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Anjali Sud is taking over as CEO of Tubi, Fox Corp.’s free, ad-supported streaming TV service, after she stepped down as chief exec of video-hosting platform Vimeo. Sud will officially start as Tubi’s CEO on Sept. 1, 2023, succeeding founder Farhad Massoudi. Sud reports to Paul Cheesbrough, CEO of Tubi Media Group, which Fox formed this spring to house its digital businesses including Tubi (acquired in 2020) and Blockchain Creative Labs. Sud spent nine years at New York-based Vimeo, originally serving as VP of global marketing before assuming oversight of the creator business unit and getting promoted to CEO in 2017. Under Sud, Vimeo has undertaken employee layoffs and made other cost-cutting moves to improve its financial profile.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor The FTC is looking into whether OpenAI, the developer of the artificial-intelligence chatbot ChatGPT, “engaged in unfair or deceptive privacy or data security practices or engaged in unfair or deceptive practices relating to risks of harm to consumers, including reputational harm,” according to a letter the regulatory body sent to the company. The agency’s probe into OpenAI was first reported by the Washington Post, which shared a redacted copy of the letter to the company (at this link). The time period for the FTC’s information requests to San Francisco-based OpenAI date from June 1, 2020, “until the date of full and complete compliance” with the investigation, which is technically called a “civil investigative demand” (CID).

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Elon Musk’s Twitter has been accused of failing to pay hundreds of millions of dollars in severance to laid-off workers. Now, under a new ad-revenue sharing program, the company just doled out millions to high-profile Twitter users, including controversial right-wing figure Andrew Tate and left-leaning twin brothers Ed and Brian Krassenstein. Twitter announced the ad-revenue sharing program for creators, initially on an invitation-only basis, on Thursday. The company said eligible creators will be paid a share of ad revenue starting in the replies to their posts. “This is part of our effort to help people earn a living directly on Twitter,” the company said in a blog post about the program.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor The 11 remaining dates on Colleen Ballinger’s Miranda Sings live tour have been canceled, and the “Oversharing” podcast she co-hosted with YouTube creator Trisha Paytas has come to an end. The cancellations come after Ballinger, the YouTuber and performer who rose to fame with the awkward, lipstick-smeared Miranda Sings character, has faced accusations that she engaged in inappropriate conduct with young fans several years ago. Ballinger last month responded to the allegations that she formed improper relationships with teenagers, denying that she had “groomed” fans who were children. In a June 28 video, she denied the “lies” and “gossip” about her partly in song, while accompanying herself on a ukulele. “The only thing I’ve ever groomed is my two Persian cats / I’m not a groomer, just a loser / who didn’t understand I shouldn’t respond to fans / and I’m not a predator even a lot of you think so / because five years ago I made a fart joke,” Ballinger sang in the video.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Roku is getting its first voice-activated game: a version of enduring TV hit “Jeopardy!” The game was developed by Volley, a creator of voice-enabled AI games, for the Roku platform. To play the “Jeopardy!” game on Roku, players respond to clues with their voice — just like the actual contestants on the game show. It’s available in single-player mode in which you compete against answers submitted by other real players that have been prerecorded. A leaderboard at the end of each session shows how you stack up against other players. “Jeopardy!” is available now on all Roku devices; a version of the game also is available for Amazon Alexa. Users will be able to play for one week for free; after that, they must buy a $9.99/month subscription to the Volley app on Roku. Initially, “Jeopardy!” is the only game in the Volley app on Roku; the company says it has several additional titles in development but declined to name them.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor The majority of Americans — about 59% — say TikTok a threat to the national security of the United States, according to a recent survey of U.S. adults. The findings from Pew Research Center’s survey of U.S. adults come as TikTok, the popular short-form video app owned by Chinese internet conglomerate ByteDance, continues to be targeted by American lawmakers wary over its ties to China and how TikTok handles user data. Just 17% of Americans say the platform is not a threat to national security, while 23% say they are unsure, per the Pew survey. Opinions about the national security threat posed by TikTok differ by political affiliation and age. Roughly 70% of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents say TikTok is either a minor or major threat to national security in the U.S., compared with 53% of Democrats and Democratic leaners. The perception of TikTok as a threat also varies by age: Just 13% of adults 18-29 say TikTok is a “major” threat; that rises to 24% among those 30-49, 35% among those 50-64; and 46% among Americans 65 and older.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Not a joke: Comedian and author Sarah Silverman is one of the lead plaintiffs in a pair of lawsuits against Meta and OpenAI accusing the tech companies of illegally using copyrighted works to train their artificial-intelligence systems. The books cited in the lawsuits include Silverman’s 2010 best­selling memoir “The Bedwetter: Stories of Courage, Redemption and Pee.” The federal lawsuits, filed Friday, July 7, allege that OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Meta’s LLaMA both ingested text from “The Bedwetter” and other works to train their large language models (LLMs) — without the consent of (or compensation to) authors such as Silverman.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor The first major game centered on Marvel’s Black Panther will let you unfurl your claws and assume the mantle of Wakanda’s superhero protector… in a few years. Electronic Arts announced Cliffhanger Games, its new triple-A development studio based in Seattle, is working on a third-person, single-player Black Panther game in collaboration with Marvel Games. EA doesn’t have an expected release date for the title at this point, saying “we’re still early in development with a long road ahead.” “If you’re looking to take on an incredible next career move, we invite you to join our team, which we will be building over the next few years,” EA said in a blog post announcing Cliffhanger.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor The battle between Elon Musk’s Twitter and Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta over the launch of Instagram’s Twitter rival Threads has taken a legal turn. On Wednesday, Meta’s Instagram debuted Threads, a text-focused social app designed to piggyback off Instagram’s infrastructure and user base. The app had more than 30 million sign-ups as of Thursday morning, according to Zuckerberg. In a July 5 cease-and-desist letter addressed to Meta CEO Zuckerberg, a lawyer representing Twitter said that Musk’s company had “serious concerns” that Meta “has engaged in systematic, willful and unlawful misappropriation of Twitter’s trade secrets and other intellectual property.” The letter said that “Twitter intends to strictly enforce its intellectual property rights, and demands that Meta take immediate steps to stop using any Twitter trade secrets or other highly confidential information.”

In the early days of her career, Heather Locklear was the platonic ideal of a blonde bombshell, idolized by fans real and fictional.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Internet pay-TV provider Fubo named Dan Sormaz, a 10-year Spotify veteran, to lead its product design operations as senior VP. Sormaz joins Fubo this week, based out of the company’s New York headquarters, reporting to chief product officer Mike Berkley (who is also a Spotify alum). Sormaz brings to Fubo 20 years of experience as a user-experience design exec at companies including Spotify, Sorare, Boxee (acquired by Samsung), News Corp and AOL. At Fubo, he’s tasked with leading the design organization, which is responsible for how customers interact with and experience its live TV streaming products.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Should you ditch Twitter in favor of Instagram’s Threads — which looks quite a lot like a clone of Twitter? Meta launched Threads, a “conversational” text-centric app tied to Instagram, on Wednesday, a day earlier than expected. The internet giant sees an opportunity to take on Twitter, controlled by tech mogul Elon Musk, which has been beset by various technical and business issues since he acquired the company. “I think there should be a public conversations app with 1 billion+ people on it,” Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg wrote in a Threads post. “Twitter has had the opportunity to do this but hasn’t nailed it. Hopefully we will.”

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor One clear advantage of MLB’s virtual ballpark: no lines for the bathroom or beer. In a first for a pro sports league, Major League Baseball unveiled a new virtual ballpark designed to give baseball fans a simulated experience of what it’s like visit an MLB stadium — all without spending hundreds of dollars on tickets. MLB’s virtual ballpark will open to fans on Saturday, July 8, with a special online watch party for the MLB All-Star Celebrity Softball Game presented on the virtual ballpark’s videoboard. The lineup of participating celebrities includes social media star JoJo Siwa, actors Adam Devine and Skylar Astin, Olympic athlete Chloe Kim, and more — and will include exclusive celebrity interviews available only in the virtual ballpark. According to the league, the digital viewing party is the first of multiple events planned for the virtual ballpark in 2023.

Justin Bieber has had periods of closeness — and times of estrangement — with his mom, Pattie Mallette, and dad, Jeremy Bieber.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor On Friday, Twitter — without notice — suddenly blocked access to the website for anyone who isn’t signed in as a registered user. Many people were confused about the change, wondering whether it was a glitch or a purposeful move on the part of Twitter, which is under the control of mega-billionaire Elon Musk. Previously, you could search Twitter and view tweets without needing a registered account. But now, visiting any Twitter page displays a log-in prompt instead. Musk, in a post Friday afternoon, claimed that Twitter took the step to improve performance on the platform after third-party companies were “scraping” data and overloading its systems. “Temporary emergency measure,” he tweeted. “We were getting data pillaged so much that it was degrading service for normal users!”

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor YouTube removed a video comedy podcast in which Roseanne Barr — attempting to make a sarcastic point about internet platforms enforcing disinformation policies — made extremely offensive comments about the Holocaust. YouTube determined that the video violated its policies prohibiting hate speech. On the June 14 episode of comedian Theo Von’s “This Weekend” show, Barr discussed how online platforms like YouTube have “de-platformed” people who spread lies. As an example, Barr said, “the real truth” was that President Biden won the 2020 election and said she was glad such policies were in place to remove content posted by election deniers. (Actually, YouTube earlier this month reversed its policy prohibiting misinformation about the 2020 election.)

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Snapchat is pinking out loud for Greta Gerwig’s “Barbie.” Warner Bros. Pictures is launching a “Barbie” AR Lens ad campaign exclusively on the social and messaging app — meaning Snapchat is the only place where you can dress up to look like Margot Robbie’s Barbie or Ryan Gosling’s Ken in fashions based on the film. The studio’s paid campaign on Snapchat launches Friday (June 30), three weeks ahead of the movie’s wide opening on July 21. Snapchat users can access the virtual Barbie wardrobe from the app’s Lens Carousel or by scanning the QR code (left). With the debut of the new Barbie Wardrobe AR Lens, Snapchatters can see themselves wearing different outfits and accessories inspired by costumes in the upcoming film. You can share the resulting pics or videos in a Snap message or a Snapchat Story (or save it to your camera roll to share via text or on other social platforms).

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Canva, the software company that hosts an “all-in-one visual communication platform,” announced partnerships with Warner Music Group and Merlin to let Canva customers use music clips in their designs. With the deals, Canva will become the first visual design platform to add commercially released music clips at the point of creation for content that can be shared across multiple platforms. Starting this fall, the libraries of Warner Music Group (including Warner Recorded Music and Warner Chappell Music) and Merlin will be available for Canva Pro, Canva for Education and Canva for Nonprofit customers to add music clips to their designs, with small teams using Canva for Teams to follow.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor NBCUniversal is cracking open its TV and movie archives to launch around four dozen free, ad-supported streaming TV (FAST) channels — significantly expanding its footprint in the free streaming space. In July, the company said, it will launch the new portfolio of FAST linear channels, with content from across the NBCU Television & Streaming and the NBCUniversal Global Distribution library, on Amazon Freevee and Xumo Play (the streaming platform operated as a joint venture between Comcast and Charter). The lineup includes dedicated free streaming channels for “Saturday Night Live,” “The Real Housewives” franchises, “Top Chef” and “Keeping Up With the Kardashians,” along with Spanish-language entertainment and news from Telemundo including “Historias de Amor,” “Lo Mejor de Telemundo” and “Telemundo al Día.” NBCU’s FAST channels also include those for older TV series “Little House on the Prairie,” “Murder, She Wrote,” “Saved by the Bell” and “The Lone Ranger,” plus genre-based channels for sitcoms, action, crime, Westerns and monster movies. (See list below.)