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Three charts that explain the streaming wars.

Paramount+, the latest entrant in the streaming wars, launches today, promising a mix of classic TV shows and movies, sort-of-early access to some Hollywood blockbusters, and some reboots of stuff you didn’t know you wanted rebooted: Welcome back, Frasier Crane.

But in some ways, the stuff that ViacomCBS’s new service offers may be less important than the timing of its launch. It comes after every other big media company has rolled out its own streaming service. Which means Paramount+ is entering a very crowded marketplace.

And that means, most likely, that ViacomCBS isn’t just trying to get someone to pay $10 a month for Paramount+ — it … Read the rest

Google’s video site has room for everything, from everyone. Is that a feature or a bug?

YouTube has more than 2 billion users. It generates $20 billion a year. But those numbers don’t begin to explain the size and impact of the world’s biggest video site.

So let’s try this: YouTube is so big that you almost don’t notice it. It’s just always there, always on. It seems fundamental to digital life, like texting or email. Maybe, like my kids, you actively go to YouTube for entertainment or education. Maybe you’re like a lot of other people and end up watching YouTube without even knowing you’re doing it: You’re just watching a … Read the rest

The company is introducing a new strike system that could lead to some users getting permanently banned.

Like other social media companies, Twitter has banned harmful misinformation about the Covid-19 vaccines out of concern that it could make people more hesitant to get inoculated. Now, the social media platform is adding more layers to its approach.

On Monday, Twitter said that posts deemed to be harmful misinformation will be subject to labels directing people to content curated by Twitter, public health resources, or the company’s rules. At the same time, users who continue to post such tweets will be subject to a strike policy. If a user posts too much vaccine misinformation and gets five strikes, their account could be permanently deleted from the app.

“Our goal with … Read the rest

A law that would require some tech companies to pay news publishers is making waves around the world.

If you’re an Australian Facebook user who loves to share the news on your timeline, you may have noticed something different recently: You can’t.

In the next few days, though, things should go back to normal. Less than a week after suddenly banning news links for Australian users and shutting down Australian news pages to protest an upcoming law, Facebook says it’s gotten reassurances from the Australian government that it won’t be forced to pay publishers but will instead be given the chance to negotiate agreements with them — which it’s already starting to do. According to the Sydney Morning Herald, Facebook has agreed to … Read the rest

Interviews with diversity managers and internal data obtained by Recode indicate that Black Amazon employees are promoted less frequently and are rated more harshly than non-Black peers.

When Chanin Kelly-Rae started working at Amazon in 2019 as a global manager of diversity in the company’s cloud computing division, she had big ambitions for her new job. She had nearly two decades of experience leading diversity and inclusion efforts inside important institutions, like Washington state’s governor’s office, but she’d never worked at an influential global business leader like Amazon.

But less than a year later, Kelly-Rae quit. Her tenure inside the company convinced her that Amazon’s corporate workplace has deep, systemic issues that disadvantage Black employees and workers from other underrepresented backgrounds. And she was dismayed by her perception that Amazon leadership was unwilling to listen to internal experts about how to … Read the rest