Digital

A major piece of legislation aimed at limiting the business conduct of Amazon and other tech platforms cleared the Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday, underscoring a bipartisan desire to curb the influence of major internet companies.

Channels covering Chicago, Philadelphia, Boston and South Florida are available now for free, with additional channels to launch later this year.

Comcast Technology Solutions is expanding the software-as-a-service (SaaS) tool it uses to understand and manage metadata in Comcast’s own streaming video to the broader market. VideoAI is a tool the service provider uses for video understanding tasks such as video segmentation and contextual advertising within in-house platforms including streaming service Peacock, as well as the TV service divisions of Sky and Comcast Cable.

Disney reorganized its global direct-to-consumer streaming organization, including installing Joe Earley, formerly head of Disney Plus marketing and operations, as president of Hulu. As part of the reorg, Disney is creating a new hub for international content creation under the direction of Rebecca Campbell as chairman, international content and operations. She previously held the title of chairman, international operations and direct-to-consumer.

NewsOn, Sinclair Broadcast Group’s local streaming news service, has launched on Samsung smart TVs as part of the Samsung TV Plus platform. The NewsOn app provides viewers with news content from almost 200 TV stations in more than 100 markets.

The all-cash $68.7 billion purchase of the maker of Candy Crush and Call of Duty will turn Microsoft, maker of the Xbox gaming system, into one of the world’s largest video game companies. It will also help it compete with tech rivals such as Meta, formerly Facebook, in creating immersive virtual worlds for both work and play.

Netflix now is expanding to a documentary series on golf, with the PGA Tour and the organizers of the four major championships granting access for a behind-the-scenes look. Among those who have signed up (without pay) to participate are multiple major champions like Jordan Spieth, Brooks Koepka, Dustin Johnson and Collin Morikawa. Also on the list are Max Homa and Joel Dahmen, who have revealed their personalities through various social media.

The Wall Street Journal’s Anthony Galloway (left) has been tapped to lead CBS News’ streaming operations. In addition, CBS News said it has promoted booker Kaci Sokoloff and hired ABC News veteran David Reiter to produce special events at the network and for streaming.

AMG says Google Cloud’s scalable cloud infrastructure will power AMG’s digital evolution, allowing it to build apps faster, make smarter business decisions and connect to its audiences anywhere through data analytics, artificial intelligence and machine learning capabilities.

David Bloom: A study suggests that Netflix has become a must-have utility, and it raised prices not because it needed to … but because it could.

Hear Me Out, a Los Angeles Times feature that spins letters to the editor into video segments, offers a novel example of user-generated content for broadcasters to emulate.

The Association of National Advertisers, Interactive Advertising Bureau, U.S. Chamber of Congress and other business groups are asking lawmakers to pass a privacy law that would override state measures. “A growing patchwork of state laws are emerging which threaten innovation and create consumer and business confusion,” dozens of organizations said in a letter sent to Congress last week.

The number of scripted original series for adults rose 13% in 2021 to a new peak of 559, according to research done by The Walt Disney Co.’s FX Networks unit. The total includes shows on broadcast, cable and streaming services. The previous peak was 532 series in 2019. The total dropped to 493 in 2020 as the COVID-19 pandemic hampered production of TV and movies.

Faced with intensifying competition from digital media, local TV sales organizations need up-to-the-minute data on how, and where, advertisers active in the market are spending. Competitive intelligence, available 24/7 in a dashboard and popular daily reports on the newest activity, offer an edge.

The company said Friday that prices are going up by $1 to $2, depending on the plan. The “standard” plan that most people take is increasing by $1.50, to $15.50. The Canadian version is going up by the same amount in local currency, to $16.50 Canadian dollars. Price increases are becoming more of a regular feature at Netflix, which is facing saturation in the U.S. market. Of Netflix’s 213.5 million subscribers, some 74 million are in the U.S. and Canada. It got an influx of global subscribers early in the pandemic, but is investing in video games as it looks beyond movies and TV for growth.

Telemundo is launching a streaming brand within Peacock that will cater to younger generations of Hispanic audiences who are based in the U.S., the company said on Thursday. The content hub, called Tplus, will include a slew of new scripted and unscripted shows.

The House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol issued subpoenas on Thursday to four major social media companies — Alphabet, Meta, Reddit and Twitter — criticizing them for allowing extremism to spread on their platforms and saying they have failed to cooperate adequately with the inquiry.