The next time you have to trek across down during the big game, you might not have to worry about missing any extraordinary plays: Uber and AT&T have struck a deal to stream college football games in some of the vehicles operated through the ride-hailing service. [More]
streaming
Amazon Reportedly In Talks To Create Live Pay-TV Service
By 10.8.15
Amazon already offers users a variety of ways to get on-demand television programing: Amazon Prime Video allows Prime subscription members the ability to download or stream a number of shows and movies for free. Now, the company is reportedly in talks to expand its video offerings with a live online pay-TV service. [More]
Amazon Shuts Down Music Importer Program
By 10.7.15
Now that Amazon’s music streaming service – Prime Music – has been up and running for more than a year, the e-commerce giant is apparently cleaning house in the music department by ditching a three-year-old application that allowed users to upload previously purchased music into their Amazon Music library. [More]
Amazon To Prohibit The Sale Of Apple TV, Google Chromecast
By 10.1.15
Amazon appears to be taking a page out of Apple’s playbook by removing competitors’ products from its virtual shelves. The e-commerce giant said today that would prohibit the sale of video-streaming devices from rivals Google and Apple that aren’t compatible with its own Prime video service. [More]
HBO Now Adds Chromecast Support
By 8.6.15
Last month, HBO Now crossed the tech dividing line, making its way to Android devices after months of being exclusively available to Apple device users. Today, the standalone streaming service announced it was taking things a bit farther by adding support for Google Chromecast. [More]
Apple Music Changes Its Tune, Will Pay Artists During 3-Month Free Trial
By 6.22.15
Breaking news: It appears that musicians would like to be paid for their work. After Apple announced it’d be giving customers a free three-month trial of its new streaming Music service, artists and others who contribute to making music weren’t too pleased to find out they’d be receiving royalties of 70% of nothing for that time period. The company has now changed its tune, and says it will pay musicians after all. [More]
HBO Now Reportedly Coming To A Google Or Android Device Near You… Soon
By 5.28.15
When HBO (kind of) cut the cord and announced it would finally launch a long-awaited standalone streaming service earlier this year, many Android users were left on the sidelines as it was revealed that HBO Now would start as an Apple exclusive. Now those once disconnected consumers can rejoice (if they so choose) because the service will soon be available on Google devices and Chromecast. [More]
Here Are The Most Ridiculously Long Binge-Watches Available For Anyone With 200+ Hours To Kill
By 4.20.15
If you’re like us, you like your TV. Sure you do! But let’s say you’ve been busy: you’re all caught up on the big prestige dramas. There are no secrets or spoilers left for you in Breaking Bad, Game of Thrones, or Orphan Black. There’s a TV-shaped void in your life to fill, and endless reruns on cable just aren’t cutting it. You need something that can really occupy your time. Not just a few hours, but days. Weeks. You have months to kill, and you need something to binge-watch right now. And lots of it. [More]
Don’t Hold Your Breath Waiting For A Streaming Option From DirecTV
By 2.20.15
The future may be online, but satellite pay-TV company DirecTV isn’t exactly rushing to embrace that future with open arms. The CEO of DirecTV this week admitted that the company is investigating the option of starting their own streaming service, but he was less than enthusiastic about the idea, seeing it as unlikely to be profitable. [More]
Some ESPN Customers Missed First Hour Of Streaming Rose Bowl Coverage Because Of Server Problems
By 1.2.15
If you were one of the people left wondering what was going on during the first hour of the Rose Bowl while the WatchESPN app wasn’t working, you weren’t alone. ESPN is now blaming what it calls a “technical issue” with its servers for the streaming outage, which lasted at least an hour for some folks and persisted longer than that into the college playoff game for others. [More]
Why Are The Netflix Episodes Of ‘Friends’ Shorter Than Those Included In My DVD Set?
By 1.2.15
As we hit the afternoon of second day of the new year, many Friends fans might already be eyeballs deep streaming the entire series after its Jan. 1 release on Netflix. But with the super fans come super powers of observation, including a discrepancy noticed by a Consumerist reader we’ll call Gunther. He wondered why the Netflix episodes seemed to be shorter by about three minutes on average than the episodes included in his complete DVD set, noting that the originally aired episodes would’ve been closer to the length of the Netflix episodes. [More]
These Are The End Times For The Gaming Console
By 6.11.14
The newest, fastest, shiniest, next generation of video game consoles — Microsoft’s Xbox One and Sony’s PlayStation 4 — launched to great fanfare last fall. They are both generally well-received and have sold in respectable numbers. Both companies have declared success, and not without reason. And yet, in spite of all the indicators of a thriving console business, this is almost certainly the last generation of set-top video game consoles we will ever see. [More]
Competitive Gaming: The Next Big Spectator Sport That You Probably Don’t Know About
By 6.10.14
In October of 2013, 19.2 million viewers tuned in live to watch the Red Sox clinch a World Series title, soundly routing the Cardinals in game six. That same month, 32 million viewers tuned in to watch SK Telecom T1 trounce Royal Club, 3 games to 0 to take home the Summoner’s Cup. Nearly all of us know that the first sport is baseball. Many fewer can identify the second as League of Legends, a competitive online multiplayer video game. And yet maybe we should. [More]
With PlayStation TV and PlayStation Now, Sony Takes More Steps Away From Traditional Consoles
By 6.10.14
Sony made a couple of interesting announcements at their annual E3 press conference last night. One was for a streaming program and one was for a device — but both point toward a future that takes the PlayStation out of “PlayStation games” altogether. [More]
Stuck With Offensive Movies No More: Ultraviolet Will Let Consumers Delete Content
By 2.18.14
Last March, a reader contacted us about a free movie automatically added to his Flixster account that he didn’t even want to look at. He didn’t ask for the movie or download it on purpose, and he wanted it to go away. For some baffling reason, this was not possible. [More]
No Big Surprise: TV Watchers Fleeing Premium Channels For Streaming
By 1.20.14
With more and more options in premium television popping up, consumer subscription habits are evolving. So it comes as no surprise that subscription video-on-demand services are on the rise, while premium TV channel subscriptions have declined. [More]
If You’ve Been Waiting To Stream ‘Street Fighter’ On Netflix, You Better Do It Before January 1
By 12.30.13
Sometimes it seems to go that you don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone. And by then it’s too late and you’re smacking yourself in the head for putting off that Killer Klowns From Outer Space theme party because it’s no longer streaming on Netflix and there’s no Blockbuster around so you’re out of luck. That and a whole slew of other movies will be unstreamable in the New Year. [More]
Piece Of SOPA Could Rise Again To Make It A Felony To Stream Cover Songs On YouTube
By 8.6.13
Like some kind of anti-piracy zombie, a piece of the previously slain Stop Online Piracy Act — or SOPA — has risen from the grave it was shoved into in 2012 to once more shamble about creating trouble. Instead of gnawing on people’s limbs, however, the Department of Commerce’s Internet Police Task Force wants a little bit of it to simply live on and make streaming copyright works a felony. [More]
