Tech

Harnessing storytelling abilities and moving away from top-down control will benefit not only the development in technology and content creation, but also society as a whole, said speakers on the opening day of the Taiwan Creative Content Fest. Star speakers at the fair’s opening panel “Post-Pandemic Era: Human Touch” included Taiwan’s iconic Digital Minister Audrey

Taiwan is committed to making the content industry one of its economic pillars by attracting international investment and talent to the self-governed island, says the agency responsible for industry development. Ting Hsiao-Ching, chair of Taiwan Creative Content Agency (TAICCA), says the agency has spent its first 18 months of existence building the framework and realigning

Taiwan has achieved many firsts in recent years — the first place in Asia to legalize same-sex marriage, the first to successfully contain the coronavirus pandemic, and the first to have an openly transgender cabinet member to lead the island’s digital and social innovation as well as fighting the coronavirus. Enter Audrey Tang, a child

An exhibition offering visitors the opportunity to experience the process of content development will be staged during the inaugural edition of the Taiwan Creative Content Fest (TCCF) to explore the future possibilities of content convergence. “There are many possibilities for a story. It can become a product, a video game, a card game, or it

YouTube claims to be the world’s biggest jukebox — and now it wants to wring more ad dollars from the platform’s music fans. The video giant is launching 15-second audio ads, the first format designed to reach YouTube users who listen to music or podcasts ambiently (i.e., in the background). YouTube also is introducing the

Shazam, the music app for identifying songs, has unveiled its all-time 100 most Shazamed songs, and at the top of the list is Tones & I’s “Dance Monkey.” The top 10 chart for the app, which surpassed 200 million monthly active users, is below, and the full 100 list can be viewed here. Tones and

Now you’ll be able to post stuff on Twitter without worrying that your spur-of-the-moment reactions and ripostes will come back to haunt you. Twitter is launching Fleets — as in “fleeting thoughts” — to users globally starting this week. Fleets disappear from the platform after 24 hours. It’s already a time-tested concept in the social

Baidu, China Internet search and AI giant, has agreed to pay $3.6 billion in cash for the Chinese live-streaming business of JOYY. The deal may help Baidu catch up in the fast-growing live and short video sectors, where it trails TikTok-owner Bytedance and social media leader Tencent. Driven by changes in consumer behavior that were

Like clockwork, Hulu is again raising rates on its live TV streaming bundles — one year after the Disney-controlled company last hiked prices. The new prices are $10 per month higher than Hulu’s current fees and will go into effect Dec. 18, 2020. The higher rates apply to both current and new subscribers. Hulu began

Microsoft-owned Minecraft is bringing the Star Wars universe to the game — in what it says is its biggest downloadable content mashup to date. Available in the Minecraft Marketplace, the pack features characters and locations from Lucasfilm’s original Star Wars trilogy (Episode 4-6) and “The Mandalorian” TV series on Disney Plus, including the ever-popular Baby

This year’s Game Awards, for the first time, has carved out one category — Most Anticipated Game — to be exclusively decided by fan votes on Twitter. Fans will have the opportunity to vote for the 2020 Game Awards’ Most Anticipated Game via Twitter DMs and share the vote to their timelines. The nominees will

Almost six months after HBO Max’s launch, the WarnerMedia streaming service will finally be landing on Amazon Fire TV and Fire tablets. The HBO Max app for Amazon’s devices will be available Tuesday, Nov. 17. The launch will bring WarnerMedia’s flagship direct-to-consumer product to Amazon’s estimated 40 million-plus active Fire TV users as well as

Keegan-Michael Key will dole out a broad historical review of sketch comedy going back hundreds of years — through the lens of his experience as a performer — in a new audio series produced exclusively for Audible. The actor-comedian-producer will write and perform “The History of Sketch Comedy” for Audible, directed and co-written by his

SpaceX successfully sent four astronauts on a six-month journey to the International Space Station on Sunday night, in the company’s second crewed mission for NASA. After the mission was delayed yesterday due to poor weather, a Crew Dragon spacecraft called “Resilience” launched from Cape Canaveral, Fla., on top of a Falcon 9 rocket at 7:27

The new generation of consoles is finally here — and it’s not just Microsoft and Sony hustling to get the new hardware to fans, with the Xbox Series X and PlayStation 5 both debuting this week. The development side is certainly feeling the strain as well, especially amid a pandemic, which has both increased demand

Westbrook Media, the digital studio arm of Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith’s media company, has tapped three veteran execs for senior roles. Longtime producer Sterling Milan (above left) joins the company full time as head of original content, after recently operating as an in-house executive producer, showrunning and directing series and specials for Westbrook

Netflix’s announcement last week that it’s trialing a traditional linear offering for subscribers in France took many by surprise, but there’s some sound reasoning behind the move, analysts tell Variety. “Though Netflix has forecast the death of linear for decades I expected them to eventually introduce the approach,” Colin Dixon, chief analyst and founder of

A powerful new ad campaign for Beats By Dr. Dre launched on Thursday featuring tennis champ Naomi Osaka, rapper Lil Baby and newcomer Bubba Wallace. “Queen and Slim” director Melina Matsoukas helms the visual, while Grammy winner Solange Knowles provides the score. The narration was provided by independent artist Tobe Nwigwe. Also appearing is activist Janaya

“The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air Reunion” will premiere next week on HBO Max, Will Smith told fans Friday, also announcing the release of the trailer for the special, which brings the Banks family back together 30 years after the sitcom’s debut. The reunion special will debut Thursday, Nov. 19, on WarnerMedia’s HBO Max, the exclusive

The Department of Commerce announced that it would not seek to shut down TikTok on Thursday, and would abide by a court order blocking the move. The shutdown had been scheduled to go into effect on Thursday. But a U.S. district judge in Philadelphia issued an injunction on Oct. 30, granting a request from three

T-Mobile’s hyped move to “un-cable” the pay-TV bundle has run into the buzz saw of the cable industry’s distribution contracts. And now the wireless carrier is being forced to rethink the pricing and packaging strategy of its low-cost TVision streaming play. On Nov. 1, it launched three new TVision “skinny bundles” aimed at cord-cutters, initially

YouTube will not produce its annual YouTube Rewind celebratory recap video this year — with the video giant saying it doesn’t feel appropriate, given the chaos of 2020. YouTube announced the decision to scrap Rewind in a statement on Twitter. “Since 2010, we’ve ended the year with Rewind: a look back at the year’s most

Bustle Digital Group has voluntarily recognized the Writers Guild of America East for the purpose of collective bargaining after an “overwhelming” majority of employees in that unit signed authorization cards. BDG’s bargaining unit will include approximately 200 editorial, video, design and social staffers from Bustle, Elite Daily, Input, Inverse, Mic, Nylon, Romper and The Zoe

Amazon Prime Video has signed a pact with leading French telco group Orange to launch the Prime Video app on Orange TV. Under the deal, Orange TV customers will gain access to Amazon Prime Video on their set-up boxes within the next few weeks and will be able to enjoy a large library of TV

UPDATED: YouTube users in multiple regions around the world encountered issues in playing videos on the site Wednesday for more than an hour. The platform’s TeamYouTube account acknowledged the problems in a Twitter post. “If you’re having trouble watching videos on YouTube right now, you’re not alone — our team is aware of the issue

Google is teaming with Netflix on a new Chromecast bundle — giving customers six months of the streamer’s standard HD plan for half price — in hopes of cranking up sales of its recently released streaming dongle and grabbing share from Roku and Amazon’s Fire TV. For a bundled price of $89.99, customers who purchase

Twitch, after getting blasted by major music-industry orgs for turning a blind eye to the use of unlicensed songs on its service — and frustrating and confusing Twitch creators for deleting their videos for copyright violations — is vowing to do better. In what appears to be its first official guidance on the issue, Twitch

Nearly six months after HBO Max’s launch, Roku still doesn’t have a deal to distribute the WarnerMedia streamer. But now Roku has added a feature to many of its 4K devices that provides a new workaround to watch HBO Max. Roku is releasing the OS 9.4 update for select 4K-enabled models of its streaming devices,

Billie Eilish’s chart-topping “Bad Guy,” which dethroned “Old Town Road” on the Billboard Hot 100 last year, surpassed one billion views on YouTube on Wednesday morning. The song becomes the latest addition to the billion views club, reaching the mark just over a year-and-a-half after the video’s release. “Bad Guy” is the singer’s first track

TikTok, staring down the Trump administration’s Nov. 12 deadline for parent company ByteDance to sell its U.S. assets, asked a federal appeals court to invalidate and “set aside” the government’s divestiture order to give TikTok and ByteDance time to work with officials on addressing security concerns. President Trump in August ordered Beijing-based ByteDance to sell