Streaming

To close out spooky season, I shared some of my favorite creepy clips from YouTube. I tried to avoid series that spanned multiple videos or had the backing of bigger corporate sponsors, like Adult Swim’s infomercials. But let’s toss all qualifiers out the window: What YouTube clip or clips have unsettled you the most?

Meta settled the latest set of claims about how its design affected a teen’s mental health, the parties confirm. YouTube and TikTok previously settled, leaving Snap the last defendant standing. Meta spokesperson Liza Crenshaw says settlements like this are common in this process. There’s plenty more left to be tried.

That’s the logline for Death Stranding anime Isolations, which just dropped its first short teaser. Produced by Hideo Kojima, the series releases on Disney Plus and Hulu some time in 2027. It’s separate from the live-action Death Stranding film from A24, which is set to start filming next year.

As reported by Business Insider, Instagram offered some YouTube creators $50,000 to post videos to its new “Features” video format, while others received offers up to $500,000. “We’ve been public about the fact that we are funding Features content directly with some creators right now to support them,” a Meta spokesperson tells Business Insider.

That’s the subject line of a real press release I just got in my email. Glover will “direct, write, executive produce, and star in the series,” according to the announcement. Stephen Glover, his brother, will also be a writer and executive producer. No word on when the series might actually be out.

Alongside laying off 1,000 employees, Netflix has fired the heads of its film and content divisions this month. We’ve already explained the company can’t fire its way out of a slump that’s now hitting its engagement metrics, but Bloomberg recounts just why co-CEO Ted Sarandos thinks otherwise, and how he got here in the first place.

Xbox CEO Asha Sharma and team countered by asking for $800 million, and Netflix has pulled its offer, Puck reports in an article discussing the new leadership at Netflix.

Amazon announced that its Fallout-themed reality show — which throws contestants into a Vault-Tec bunker — will start streaming on January 13th. It’s something of a spiritual sequel to the Squid Game competition on Netflix.

The app has a new, “simplified” top bar, where you’ll find tabs for things like subscriptions, Live, Music, and custom feeds, YouTube says. The custom feeds will stay in that top bar, according to YouTube Creator Liaison Rene Ritchie.

It was pretty obvious from the show’s finale, but now it’s official: Mike Flanagan is making a second season of his Carrie remake on Prime Video. “From the beginning, we imagined a story that goes far beyond the prom, and I’m incredibly grateful for Stephen [King]’s trust and support in exploring what comes next,” Flanagan said in a statement.

The show’s encore comes over a decade after its sixth season ended in 2015. Variety reports Disney has greenlit the reboot, but hasn’t shared a release date yet or announced whether any of the original cast is returning.

When unusual activity is detected on an account, the platform will now temporarily pause features for 24 hours, including uploading or updating videos, livestreaming, creating or adjusting playlists, uploading thumbnails, and making private videos public. Full feature access will be restored once the account’s security is verified.

Star Wars Funday Football will be a real-time, animated telecast of Super Bowl LXI that will animate the players as Star Wars characters, just before the original cut returns to theaters on February 19th.

The co-CEO has “complained internally for months that Americans were spending less time watching Netflix and that the service was short on new hit shows,” according to a big story from The Wall Street Journal.

Following last week’s departure of chief content officer Bela Bajaria and broader company layoffs, Dan Lin is leaving the company as well, TheWrap reports. Lin was hired in 2024.

Wired reports that Character filing for bankruptcy and agreeing to sell assets to Disney last week was the second of “two interrelated and integrated” transactions. The first, which took place in September, involved Disney hiring a “majority” of the chatbot startup’s employees, a familiar move from the “acquihire” playbook.

The Independent reports an upcoming government white paper will include plans to extend the UK’s £180 (about $240) annual TV Licence — which is required to watch broadcast TV, BBC iPlayer, and live TV on streaming services — to cover all online streaming content, including Prime Video, Netflix, Disney Plus, and YouTube. Yikes.

Bajaria joined in 2016 and became chief content officer in 2023. Peter Rice, a former Disney and Fox exec, will take over the role, Variety reports.

Bowen Yang and Matt Rogers’s extremely popular ‘Las Culturistas’ podcast will stream on Hulu and Disney+ beginning on November 18th. As Disney competes with other major streamers for podcasts, this is their biggest acquisition yet.

The “Ask YouTube” feature, which pulls uses AI to generate a search results page populated with text and suggested videos to watch, popped up on mobile as an experiment in August. I tested the web version earlier this year, and in a few minutes using the mobile version, it’s pretty similar.

The broadcaster announced that viewers in the UK and US can now watch a 24-hour news feed via the BBC News YouTube channel, with plans to expand access to Poland, Kenya, Australia and Nigeria soon. This is part of the BBC’s plan to access broader and younger adiences via YouTube’s platform as its traditional license-paying TV broadcast market continues to decline.

Johnny Boufarhat, the founder of the virtual events startup Hopin, is back with a stealth startup developing a voice-centric operating system for TV streaming devices.

The video platform has reportedly been in discussions with publishers in recent months. The feature could launch as soon as next year, and YouTube has considered bundling it with its $16-per-month Premium subscription. Still, after launching a music streaming service this feels like an obvious next step for YouTube to compete against Spotify.

Apple has confirmed that its extremely stressful thriller Maximum Pleasure Guaranteed is getting a second season, though there aren’t any details on when it might be streaming. Along with Margo’s Got Money Troubles, the series is part of a new trend of shows exploring platforms like OnlyFans from different perspectives.