Tech

Kids’ television industry vet Cyma Zarghami’s MiMo Studios has launched a new preschool series aimed at preparing young children for consuming content and games in the Metaverse, Variety has learned exclusively. Titled “@HippoPark,” the animated kids’ series is described as “a place where you can splash, climb, run, slide and play with your friends all

Multinational sportswear group Nike said on Wednesday that will cease to operate its Nike Run Club app in China from early next month. The group said that it plans to launch a local equivalent in the future. Nike joins an expanding list of international media and tech companies that are pulling out of China, where

AT&T has quietly dropped HBO Max as a bundled perk for new customers on its highest-tier unlimited wireless plan. The telco’s move comes two months after AT&T spun off WarnerMedia and sold it to Discovery, to form Warner Bros. Discovery. Previously, HBO Max had been available for no extra charge with the AT&T Unlimited Elite

Russia, in retaliation for economic sanctions the U.S. has imposed over the country’s attack on Ukraine, announced that it has added 61 Americans to its own blacklist — including Netflix co-CEO Reed Hastings. Hastings and the other U.S. nationals on Russia’s blacklist are “banned indefinitely from entering the Russian Federation,” according to a notice published

TikTok is making its metaverse play — taking a page from rivals like Apple and Snap with the launch of TikTok Avatars. TikTok Avatars is “yet another way for people to showcase their individuality” on the popular short-form video app, the company said in announcing the new feature. Users can customize their avatar from an

A second season of the Lupita Nyong’o’s popular YouTube Originals series “Super Sema” is coming soon and Variety has your first look. YouTube Originals Kids & Family and the educational entertainment company Kukua have released the official trailer for new episodes of the NAACP Image Award-nominated digital series, with Academy Award-winning actor and New York

Netflix has either reached or surpassed the required 30% local content quotas in major markets in Europe, ranking ahead of its global streaming rivals, according to a new study by Ampere Analysis. The programming quota applies to all streamers operating in Europe and is part of the Audiovisual Media Services Directive of the European Commission.

In a letter shared with the BTS “Army” earlier today (Monday, June 6), the group announced the #MyBTStory challenge in partnership with YouTube, starting on Friday and running through July 9, exclusively on YouTube Shorts. In celebration of their new album, “Proof,” dropping on Friday, the group is inviting the Army and all music fans

The Upside Down continued to trend across Twitter following the Season 4 return of “Stranger Things.” The Netflix series placed first on Variety’s Trending TV Chart for the week of May 30 to June 5, adding another million engagements to last week’s chart-topping numbers.  The series dropped the first seven chapters of its fourth season

The Washington Post suspended political reporter Dave Weigel without pay for 30 days after he retweeted a sexist joke last week and touched off a public fight on Twitter among staffers at the Jeff Bezos-owned paper. A spokesperson for the Post declined to comment. Weigel did not respond to emails seeking comment. An autoreply from

Apple on Monday took the wraps off iOS 16, its next major smartphone operating system release, detailing a slew of new features and enhancements. The upcoming iOS 16 — which will be generally released this fall for iPhone 8 models and later — includes a new privacy tool: Safety Check, which Apple said is designed

Sarah Cooper, the comedian who rose to fame with her satirical TikTok lip-sync videos of Donald Trump, was — unexpectedly — inspired by Dale Carnegie for her next project. Her new podcast series, “Let’s Catch Up Soon: How I Won Friends and Influenced People Against My Will,” is scheduled to premiere June 23 exclusively on

Religion of Sports, the sports media production company founded by Tom Brady, Michael Strahan and Gotham Chopra, announced $50 million in Series B funding. With the new investment, which brings the company to about $63 million raised to date, Religion of Sports plans to develop new intellectual property — including expanding into areas beyond sports

Dubai-based MBC Group’s Shahid VIP streaming service has forged a partnership with Arabic animation studio Barajoun Entertainment to co-produce five local-language animation features over the next three years. These Arabic animation pics will stream exclusively on Shahid VIP as Shahid originals. Details on the animation projects in the pipeline are being kept under wraps, but

Tribeca Festival is entering the metaverse. Under a partnership with Meta, 20 titles from Tribeca’s shorts program will be available for the first time on the Meta Quest 2 virtual-reality headset as well as the Tribeca page on Facebook. All of the shorts will stream for free during the festival’s run. The curated shorts collection

Elon Musk slammed Twitter as “actively resisting and thwarting his information rights (and the company’s corresponding obligations)” under the billionaire’s $44 billion deal to acquire the company, because the social network is refusing to provide data backing up its claims about fake and spam accounts. Musk, who launched his takeover bid for Twitter in April,

Atención, teleadictos! Roku has unwrapped Espacio Latino, a new destination for U.S. Spanish-speaking audiences, which aggregates hundreds of hours of free programming on the Roku Channel. For the launch of Espacio Latino, Roku has inked deals with several new partners: NBCUniversal’s Telemundo, Hemisphere Media Group, Cisneros Media, Eurochannel, Weather Channel en Español and Canela.TV. Roku

When Apple first added a podcast library to the iTunes catalog in 2005, the impending boom of the format was not yet clear. But Fausto Fernós and Marc Felion were ahead of the curve, and their variety podcast “Feast of Fun” (née “Feast of Fools”) was the first to be hosted by an openly gay

Variety has named its 10 Comics to Watch for 2022. This year’s honorees will be profiled in the July 20 issue of Variety and be honored at this year’s Just for Laughs Comedy Festival, held in Montreal July 13-31. There will be a panel and cocktail reception held on July 29, followed by a performance showcase July 30. Variety has been

Dave Clark, Amazon’s CEO of Worldwide Consumer, is resigning from the ecommerce powerhouse after 23 years. He will leave Amazon effective July 1, 2022. Clark is the highest-profile executive departure for the company since Andy Jassy took over as CEO in July 2021, when founder Jeff Bezos relinquished the reins. Clark, in announcing his departure

As “Top Gun: Maverick” shattered box-office records over Memorial Day weekend, the original “Top Gun” soared to the top of the U.S. streaming charts this week. Paramount Pictures’ 1986 “Top Gun,” starring a 23-year-old Tom Cruise as hotshot Navy pilot Maverick, was the most popular streaming title for the week of May 26-June 1, according

On Eighth Avenue in Midtown Manhattan, right next to a Chik-fil-A, is Spyscape — a two-floor, futuristic-looking museum/interactive experience space that gives spycraft lovers a close-up look at the world of espionage. Now DC’s famed Caped Crusader is about to swoop down on Spyscape. Batman x Spyscape is a hybrid experience that uses a live-updating

Disney hired Mark Bozon, a top gaming executive from Apple, as a senior creative leader for its cross-divisional Next Generation Storytelling initiative — which encompasses Disney’s “metaverse” ambitions. In a May 20 tweet, Bozon announced he was leaving Apple after 12 years, saying “I’m headed to an absolute dream job” (without revealing he was heading

WWE stands to pin down some extra cash — and hopes to whip up fan enthusiasm — in its first sale of NFTs featuring the wrestling entertainment company’s top stars. WWE, together with Fox Entertainment’s Blockchain Creative Labs, on Friday, June 3, plans to launch its its first NFT (nonfungible token) sale on Moonsault, WWE’s

Shares of Meta Platforms climbed more than 5% Thursday, coming after longtime COO Sheryl Sandberg — one of the most powerful women execs in the tech industry — announced she was stepping down from the role. The rise in Meta’s stock price came amid a broader uptick in tech stocks, as the Nasdaq Composite was

Sheryl Sandberg, who has been chief operating officer at Meta, the company formerly known as Facebook, has announced that she will be stepping down from the role after 14 years. “When I took this job in 2008, I hoped I would be in this role for five years,” Sandberg wrote in a Facebook post Wednesday.

Jonathan Bing has left his post as director of communications at Netflix to take the role of chief communications officer at Vice Media Group, Variety has confirmed. Based out of Los Angeles, Bing will lead Vice Media’s communications strategy across its portfolio of brands, including Vice News, Vice TV, Vice Studios and Refinery 29. He

Elon Musk is demanding that Tesla employees cease remote work or be fired, in two emails sent to staff of the electric car company on Tuesday. In the emails, which were leaked to electric car news website Electrek, Musk stated that all employees must be in the office for a minimum of 40 hours per

YouTube wants to make your mobile phone the ultimate couch companion for streaming videos on internet-connected TVs. Starting Wednesday, YouTube is rolling out a feature that lets viewers connect their viewing experience on TVs with their iOS or Android mobile device — enabling a bunch of new interactive capabilities. YouTube’s smartphone apps already let you

Audible will immerse listeners in “The Big Lie,” an original drama series based on the FBI’s real-life infiltration of Hollywood during the 1950’s Red Scare. “The Big Lie,” premiering June 16 on Audible, stars Jon Hamm as FBI special agent Jack Bergin, who sets out to shut down production of “Salt of the Earth” —