Our monthly recap of the latest developments in vertical video, AI technology, the creator economy, and audience shifts, and what they mean for the content production and distribution business.
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What’s Inside:
- Pedro Pina’s U.K. Influence Campaign at Edinburgh: A recap of the YouTube EMEA VP’s James MacTaggart Memorial Lecture.
- Game ON: Netflix’s subscriber gains thanks to Grand Theft Auto VI.
- Vertical Video’s “Arrival”: A skewed Hollywood perspective and another big month for short-form.
- On the Pod: Catch up on our The SwitchScreen strand with interviews with Bedrock’s Jonas Engwall and wedotv’s Philipp Rotermund.
- Creator Savvy: The latest developments in intersections between “traditional” media and social media stars.
- The AI Conundrum: Rapid developments, existential fears, and real cost savings.
- Still FAST: The free streaming channels space is as busy as ever.
Pedro Pina’s U.K. Influence Campaign at Edinburgh
The James MacTaggart Memorial Lecture at the Edinburgh TV Festival is a storied institution in the U.K.’s media landscape; an annual opportunity for the business to hear from a changemaker about the state of affairs, pressure points, and necessary innovation. This year, in a move that wasn’t without its critics, YouTube EMEA VP Pedro Pina was invited to address the final Edinburgh TV Festival as the event gears up for its move to Manchester. Fatima Salaria, the festival’s chair, acknowledged the resistance in her opening address.
“Some people said we had let the fox into the hen house,” Salaria said. “You can see why. He represents a platform with enormous power over audiences, advertising, creators, and increasingly television itself. It’s a good line, but it’s also a bit convenient because YouTube didn’t do this to us while television sat innocently in the corner. Broadcasters put programs, clips, and talent on platforms. Producers built businesses there. Advertisers followed audiences there. Creators found communities and invented formats traditional television had often missed. Viewers moved between a drama, a podcast, a creator, and a YouTube channel without asking anyone in this room for permission. The boundaries we still argue about are the ones the audience mostly stopped caring about years ago.”
TV isn’t dying, Pina said—it’s on the cusp of a new golden age. Pina argued that the U.K.’s legacy broadcasters don’t need to fear YouTube—it’s not a villain, he said—but should instead be open to partnering with the platform. Television will get left behind if it doesn’t adapt, Pina stressed. “Let’s not sugarcoat it. Things will have to change because the playing field TV once dominated has shifted, and the steady revenue streams and booming budgets built on the central position TV once held can no longer be relied upon.”
Game ON
The extended, six-hour exclusive look at the Grand Theft Auto VI gameplay gave Netflix its third-highest acquisition peak this year, Ampere Analysis says, driving more than 100,000 new signups on launch day.
The extended look on August 27 outperformed almost every live sports event featured on the service this year. It was second only to the final installment of Stranger Things and the Rousey vs Carano MMA fight in driving subscriber acquisition. Per Netflix data, the preview reached the top ten English-language movie rankings in 93 countries and was number one in 87.
“Netflix may not be able to compete directly with the biggest AAA game franchises, but it can vie for the attention around them,” said Katie Holt, senior research analyst at Ampere Analysis. “Trailers, reveals, and adaptations give Netflix a way into gaming culture without owning the games themselves. GTA VI is a particularly powerful example, given the scale of the franchise and the anticipation around its launch.”
Vertical Video’s “Arrival”
With The Hollywood Reporter now ranking the most-viewed vertical video series, the genre has apparently “arrived”. Ignoring that somewhat baffling U.S.-centric thinking about a genre that has reshaped the Chinese and wider Asian ecosystem for years, it’s been a transformative summer for the genre, with plenty of landmark developments over the past month. We’ve seen new use cases, with COL Group joining forces with Lingopie to launch DramaRizz, which uses vertical short-form drama for language learning. New models are emerging, like LoveHit producing literary adaptations with two versions: short-form vertical and 16:9 TV movies. Brand involvement is becoming a key part of the ecosystem, and COL Group, VIRTUE Asia, and V47 Entertainment are tapping into it for the first-ever upfront event for microdramas and the vertical video economy, taking place in Singapore on October 27. Platform partnerships, especially in Asia, are becoming a key growth driver; this last month saw ReelShort align with Vidio in Indonesia and COL Group with Thailand’s CP Group, parent of True Corporation. In 16:9 reformatting news, Snips landed deals with Banijay Rights and BIG Media to adapt shows for vertical, short-form rollout. In international distribution developments, Primitives reached a deal with Belgium’s Play Media to represent an initial slate of 20 original microdrama series worldwide. Microdramas still drive the ecosystem, but other genres are emerging; Keller/Noll (Chopped, America Says) and Crazy Legs Productions are collaborating on a new short-form vertical quiz show format, Do You See What Eye See. And new entrants include WEBTOON Entertainment, which launched a limited slate of vertical short-form live-action romance dramas.
On the Pod
ScreenMDM Talks featured a dedicated The SwitchScreen strand ahead of IBC, hosting Bedrock’s Jonas Engwall, who discussed streaming economics and European tech sovereignty, and wedotv’s Philipp Rotermund, who covered the latest developments in free streaming channels and ad tech.
Creator Savvy
The two-way traffic between “legacy” platforms and the creator economy continues to get busier. Recent developments range from a 24-hour stunt with The Bov Boys to kick off the return of Big Brother at ITV, Netflix’s pacts with Drew Binsky and Kevin Langue, Ample Entertainment’s new YouTube channel with Nate Berkus, the YouTube comedy Sideswiped being picked up by VIZIO’s WatchFree+ streaming service, and ChaiFlicks picking up the SVOD rights to the YouTube series And They’re Jewish with Hen Mazzig. We covered plenty of developments in broadcasting and creator tie-ups in our ScreenMDM Extra premium post on the sports sector, which is also available to ScreenMDM Club members.
We also recently reported on a new ranking of leading creators: The Affinity 100, unveiled by Evan Shapiro and Shira Lazar at IBC, based not on vanity metrics but on key indicators of fandom and engagement.
The AI Conundrum
When Elon Musk says maybe we should slow down on AI development, you have to wonder how this game-changing technology is fundamentally rewiring the media business—not to mention society at large. Interesting stat from Forrester Research cited recently by Marion Ranchet: 55% of companies that laid off workers to replace them with AI regret it and are now rehiring. Not great news for folks at the other 45%, but perhaps a recognition that human-powered AI could be the way forward rather than AI run amok. We reported this month on a fascinating piece of intel from the team at Media Partners Asia on the power of AI in niche streaming. Using an AI-native production strategy that has cut costs by a whopping 90%, Stage, a D2C streaming platform built for India’s regional dialects, has scaled rapidly from one market to six, with plans to reach 14 by March 2027. It was a busy month for Utopai Studios—whose CEO and co-founder, Cecilia Shen, is speaking at MIPCOM—as it integrated its Asia-Pacific operations, including its Korean production infrastructure, Japanese development business, and regional alliances. It also clinched a pact with the Japanese tech company DeNA on an AI-assisted animation production workflow. Also in Asia, COL Group expanded its distribution ecosystem with a new vertical, COL AI Studios, intended as a development pathway for taking proven IP into animation, short-form and long-form series, advertising, branded entertainment, and live-action content. Meanwhile, on the copyright front, the Motion Picture Association and ByteDance agreed to a framework of guardrails for generative AI video models to protect IP rights, and in the U.K., former Pact chief John McVay was tapped as vice chair of AIMICI, which assists U.K. screen industry companies in navigating the responsible use of AI tools.
Still FAST
We reported on a staggering amount of FAST news over the last month—from TV OS platforms, content powerhouses, and BVOD services. European AVOD major Rakuten TV added a The Walking Dead Universe channel in the U.K. and a slate of music channels from Stingray for users in France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, and the U.K. Stingray also scored a deal bringing 20 of its FAST channels to LG Channels across 13 European markets. wedotv and V, operator of the VIDAA smart TV platform, renewed and broadened their alliance with additional channels and expansion into MENA and South Africa. Samsung TV Plus brought Red Bull TV to France, the KCON LA festival to viewers in 17 countries, the Samurai vs Ninja FAST channel from Lightning International and REMOW to Southeast Asia, and three single-IP FAST channels—Beverly Hills, 90210, Lucky Dog, and Gunsmoke—to Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. BBC Studios brought BBC Earth and BBC Lifestyle to Joyn in Germany and expanded its Iberian channels and streaming operations with a dedicated base in Madrid. CJ ENM launched two new FAST channels on Prime Video in the U.S. FreeCast is adding 28 FAST channels from Rede Brasileira de Televisão Internacional to its lineup. The Don Lemon Channel is launching in partnership with Swerve TV, featuring daily live news and opinion and partner programming from other independent voices. ZDF’s streaming platform in Germany added more than 15 thematic channels, delivering films, drama series, nature docs and more. As the TV OS wars intensify, TiVo OS revealed several platform enhancements, expanding its streaming channel lineup and adding new AI-powered discovery and recommendation features, along with more sports experiences and interactive commerce.
