Digital

Roku posted another strong quarter of results, but its shares fell 9% in after-hours trading due to factors like a dip in streaming hours and flattening growth trajectory of its active accounts. The streaming provider said net revenue grew 81% year-over-year to $645 million, ahead of Wall Street forecasts. Operating income reached $69.1 million, compared with a loss of $42.2 million in the year-earlier quarter.

Facebook has disabled the personal accounts of researchers at New York University who have been studying political ads on the social media platform. In addition, Facebook has shut down the pages associated with the research, and researchers’ access to the Facebook APIs needed to share Facebook data to other apps.

A federal judge has officially dismissed a class-action complaint accusing YouTube and other companies of violating children’s privacy, paving the way for an appellate court to intervene in the matter. The legal battle began in 2019, when California resident Nicole Hubbard sued YouTube and various companies that had channels on the video platform — including Hasbro, the Cartoon Network, Mattel, and DreamWorks — for allegedly tracking her 5-year-old child in order to serve targeted ads.

AT&T has completed the spinoff of DirecTV into a new entity part-owned by private equity firm TPG, capping a costly six-year adventure in the satellite TV business. The new entity, whose financials will no longer be included on the AT&T balance sheet, unveiled new branding and a new home for its internet-delivered TV packages. Later this month, DirecTV Stream will become the umbrella for streaming offerings like the one formerly known as AT&T TV Now (originally DirecTV Now).

Competing economic incentives are leading NBCUniversal, Disney and WarnerMedia to make difficult decisions about how to program their streaming services. The tension between how to balance streaming video, theatrical release and linear TV is leading to some peculiar choices bound to confuse consumers in what’s becoming an increasingly jumbled landscape.

“He’s our future,” one CBS Studios executive said of Alex Kurtzman, who has a lucrative contract to expand the Star Trek universe — and with it the streaming service’s audience.

Thanks to searingly modern platforms like Twitch and Pluto TV, the late painter and public TV personality Bob Ross has become a mainstay of the digital universe — particularly during the pandemic, when the popularity of a new Bob Ross channel skyrocketed as people trapped at home turned to their televisions for therapy. Ross provides a reductio ad absurdum for a quiet digital-age truth: A sprinkling of coveted intellectual property can allow a shrewd company to punch well above its weight.

The appointments come as the Spanish-language service prepares to launch a two-tier streaming service upon the close of the Televisa-Univision merger.

Manifest‘s big run on Netflix continued in the week of June 28-July 4, as the canceled NBC series again topped the overall streaming rankings from Nielsen. Loki also rebounded in its fourth week, claiming the No. 1 spot among original streaming shows.

The film star says the decision to release the film simultaneously on Disney Plus and in theaters cost her $50 million.

NBCUniversal has a growing and somewhat serious early makegoods issue for the Olympics — due to underdelivery of expected viewers, now five days in for the event. The company believes streaming and digital inventory time can lessen the blow. But with viewing numbers down around 35% to 40% or more versus the 2016 Rio Summer Olympics, the near term doesn’t look good — especially on the linear TV side of things, according to media-buying executives.

HBO Max, Roku, Sinclair, Tubi, Univision, ViacomCBS streaming among companies already confirmed to speak at the third annual NATPE Streaming Plus in L.A. on Sept. 14.

It will feature 24 hours of continuous daily programming, dedicated to all things weather, including extreme and natural events, global forecasts, climate and weather-related long- and short-form documentaries from across the U.S. and around the world.

After a failed reboot attempt two years ago, the site that helped set the tone for digital journalism is back.

Revenue jumped 56% to $28.58 billion from $18.32 billion. Analysts, on average, were expecting earnings of $3.04 per share and revenue of $24.85 billion, according to a poll by FactSet.