Source: https://bejone03.expressions.syr.edu/trf235/2016/02/
Timestamp: 2019-04-18 15:00:15+00:00

Document:
AT&T is a leading global telecommunications company with many subsidiaries and business ventures, including DirecTV and Cricket Wireless. Its services and products include wireless communications, data/broadband and Internet services, video services, local exchange services, long-distance services, telecommunications equipment, managed networking and wholesale services . Recently, the company has been working to improve employee relations, improve the brand name, and invest in new streaming technology to appeal to the ever-profitable millennial target audience.
In 1876, Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone. That was the foundation of the company that would become AT&T – a brand that is now intimately tied with innovation in communications.
In 1984, the former AT&T agreed to divest its local telephone operations but retain its long distance, R&D and manufacturing arms. From this, SBC Communications Inc. (first known as Southwestern Bell Corp.) was born.
Twelve years later, the Telecommunications Act of 1996 drove major changes in the competitive landscape. SBC expanded its U.S. presence through a series of acquisitions, including Pacific Telesis Group (1997) and Ameritech Corp. (1999). In 2005, SBC acquired AT&T Corp., creating the new AT&T, a leader in global communications for businesses. The acquisition of BellSouth in 2006 consolidated the ownership of Cingular Wireless.
AT&T led one of the most significant transformations in communications since the invention of the telephone: the birth of the mobile Internet. In 2013, AT&T bought Cricket to give customers in the growing prepaid market more access to mobile Internet services. In 2015, they completed their purchase of 2 Mexican wireless companies, Iusacell and Nextel Mexico. Today, they are encoiraging smartphone adoption and on their way to becoming a leading wireless provider in that country, too. Their 2015 acquisition of DIRECTV makes them the world’s largest pay TV provider.
With the goal of staying relevant in the increasingly social world, AT&T is launching a new streaming service, debuted through their DirecTV platform on April 26th, 2016. This streaming service, Fullscreen, targets a younger generation of 18-35 year olds who attain much of their TV watching through online portals and OTT services. ATT&T will co-produce premium content that will air both on fullscreen subscription video on demand service and on a Fullscreen programming block on AT&T’s AUDIENCE, available to DIRECTV and U-verse TV subscribers .
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YouTube is a worldwide video sharing company, which was launched in April 14, 2005 by three former PayPal employees . Soon after their launch, Google purchased the company for $1.65 billion, making it the most expensive acquisition for Google at that time . YouTube now operates as a subsidiary of Google. Since it’s launch, YouTube popularity has skyrocketed, serving as the premier destination to post videos, and creating a network of channels with a significantly easier barrier of entry compared to more established mediums. Youtube has positioned itself as a significant competitor to traditional media, with the coveted 18-49 year-old market accessing YouTube’s mobile site than any cable television network . Many established networks and personalities now use YouTube as an extension to reach a much wider audience, such as The Ellen Show and The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. With YouTube’s massive popularity, especially with the younger demographic, much of the company’s recent actions focus on profiting on their large user base.
While Google is a publicly traded company, it is unclear what effect YouTube has on their stocks. Google has never released the earnings of YouTube and many have speculated that the web service has focused on building a strong user base rather than creating a profit . Despite YouTube announcing it’s paid subscription plan, YouTube Red, a vast majority of YouTube’s revenue comes from advertisements, taking 45% of profits from every video allowing ads . However, within the past few months, Google’s stock (now known as Alphabet, but still retaining the GOOG stock market tag) has fluctuated wildly especially with the April release of their First Quarter 2016 results, reporting a disappointing net income of $5.25 billion . These earnings were more than $310 million less than average expectations, causing nearly a 5% drop in stock within 24 hours of the earnings release. Much of this can be attributed to spending that increased nearly 27%, focusing on improving YouTube’s servers and content acquisition for YouTube Red that was released in February 2016 . While these numbers might be disappointing, the company seems to be doubling-down on its approach to attract viewers now, and worry about profits later, and it does seem unlikely that this will have a lasting effect on Google’s entire stock.
YouTube Red, announced in late 2015, was the company’s attempt to launch into the paid subscription market. For $9.99/month users are able to view videos without advertisements, download videos, receive a free subscription to Google Music, and gain exclusive content . While there was some controversy, YouTube released the first round of their exclusive content, to very mixed results, in February 10, 2016.
YouTube Red’s first documentary, A Trip to Unicorn Island focuses on YouTube star Lily Singh and is produced by Astronauts Wanted. The piece focuses on Singh, holder of the YouTube account ||SuperWoman|| with more than 8 million subscribers, during her first worldwide tour . The documentary is clearly targeted at her tween fanbase as she delves into her struggle with depression and preaches self-acceptance. However, mainstream media has given the piece little to no attention and currently holds a 4.2 rating on IMDb .
Taking from the success of made-for-tv Disney films such as High School Musical, Dance Camp is a teen musical featuring songs created by YouTubers themselves . Similarly to A Trip to Unicorn Island, YouTube’s first foray into the musical world has received essentially no professional press, as has user reviews hovering around 3.5 .
This web series centers the most subscribed YouTuber, Felix Kjellberg, otherwise known as PewDiePie, as he navigates different sets inspired off popular horror video games. The show format mimics what made his channel so popular; commentating and screaming the more terrified he becomes. His name popularity seems to have garnered some of the most press as well, with episode seven offered to the public for free amassing nearly 24 million views .
The most “traditional” offering of YouTube Red is Rooster Teeth‘s Lazer Team, which prior to appearing on Red’s lineup received an actual theatrical release in late January . The film created notoriety in the Summer of 2014 when it received nearly $2.5 million in a crowdfunding campaign on Indiegogo . The internet company Rooster Teeth has had a very close relationship with YouTube over the company’s life cycle, so it isn’t surprising that the sci-fi movie was brought to YouTube instead of a more traditional physical DVD release. The movie also brings some credibility to the subscription service, since it is the only content to receive enough professional reviews to warrant a Metacritic score, receiving “mixed or average reviews” with a 42% .
While YouTube Red’s offerings have received very mixed critical reception, the company has plans to release much more content within 2016. This new content seems to branch out into new demographics, while still maintaining headlining YouTube stars such as Bad Internet written by College Humor and reality show Prank Academy starring PrankVsPrank, which was just began releasing episodes in April . Much of this content targets YouTube’s very young demographic, and while it might attract viewers, it still remains to be seen if they have the capital to spend $10 every month for YouTube Red, especially when Netflix and Hulu‘s offerings seem to be much more well-received.
Despite the fact that YouTube has had a chokehold in streaming archived video, the company has fallen behind in the live-streaming market. Streaming services such as Twitch, Periscope, and even Facebook Live might not necessarily have the numbers that YouTube does, but it has left YouTube with a significantly smaller portion of that market. To combat this, YouTube released YouTube Gaming in August 2015 to combat Twitch, and continues to expand into the live video world . According to a report by VentureBeat, Google might soon be entering the mobile market as well with an app called YouTube Connect, which would directly combat the popularity of Periscope . YouTube was also the host of the first live-streamed event in the 2016 election cycle, with stars interviewing candidates live onto the website .
On April 18, YouTube also announced that it would combine live streaming with some of its newest technology: 360 degree video . The company also announced that it would immediately begin to introduce spatial sound recognition into it’s 360 video, creating a more immersive sound experience. The effect of this announcement was released to the public during Coachella 2016, where artists such as Matt & Kim and Open the Gates was live-streamed to the public with 360 degree video .
As the cost of producing 360 degree-quality videos has reduced in price, YouTube has put capable cameras in all of their creative studios, allowing use for all YouTube content creators . While the effects of this announcement are already being felt, this could also have massive implications for the virtual reality world, where live-streaming has never been compatible with the new technology, but now could be when paired with Google’s own Google Cardboard VR device.
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In 1997, Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph founded Netflix after previously working together as high ranking software engineers at a company called Pure Software. At the beginning, Netflix was an online movie rental service. Over time Netflix adopted a subscription based model that offered endless movie options for a monthly fee.
International expansion is “vital” for Netflix to grow due to a subscription plateau in the United States. The company plans to be in 200 countries by the end of 2016 and in January announced it was live in more than 190 countries already.
In the next quarter, Netflix will release seven new seasons of original content that will include shows like Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, Bloodline, Grace and Frankie, and Orange is the New Black. Also,the company will release the original films The Do-Over, Special Correspondents, and The fundamentals of Caring, which are set to have stars like Adam Sandler, Ricky Gervais, and Paul Rudd behind the projects. Most importantly, the second quarter marks the beginning of the first talk show on Netflix called Chelsea, starting Chelsea Handler.
Ultimately, Netflix shows that they are a media powerhouse that looks to make a major impact not only in the United States, but around the world. It will be interesting to see if their experiment in timed streaming will work, and if they can keep Amazon from gaining ground in the marketplace.
On April 4, 2016 Warner brothers, Albert, Sam, Harry and Jack founded Warner Bros. Entertainment. Almost a century later, they have released over 7500 films, including multiple billion-dollar productions in the same year. They are currently a division of the media conglomerate, Time Warner. In the last 15 years, Warner Bros. has surpassed the billion-dollar marker for both domestic and international box office. This includes the past 9 years of reaching over $3 billion globally.
Kevin Tsujihara – Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Warner Bros.
Warner Bros. is a division of Time Warner Cable. Time Warner is represented by TWX, and as of April 25, they are up over 15 points from their numbers taken in February 2016. Time Warner’s first quarterly report of 2016 will be released on May 4.
As of April 25, 2016, Warner Bros. Pictures has garnered 12.5% of the available market share. This percentage equates to over $400 million of gross profit, tracking sixteen total movies, including four released this year. Three of the four movies Warner Bros. have released this year (Batman V. Superman: Dawn of Justice, How to Be Single and Barbershop: The Next Cut) collected the majority of the year’s total gross up to this point. However, Batman V. Superman: Dawn of Justice has clearly been the company’s best investment as it compiled over $300 million in just one month of operation. This has lead the company to become the third highest earning distributor of market share and total gross.
Batman V. Superman is the follow up film to Zack Snyder’s 2013 superhero flick, Man of Steel. After seeing the success of Marvel’s Cinematic Universe, DC Comics knew that it wanted to expand and compete with its dynamic array of superhero figures. DC’s model to create their own cinematic universe compares to the already executed universe that Marvel has created. Just as Marvel had started with Iron Man, DC began their approach with Man of Steel. Batman V. Superman was the long awaited follow up that would launch DC into their next phase, a phase that looks all to familiar when you consider that Marvel’s third Avengers film will already be released as of next year. That’s why the reception that it received was so incredibly important because it potentially make or break DC’s long term plans for years to come. Batman V. Superman opened to an Easter weekend record of over $170 million across North America. That is the sixth best opening for a film in cinematic history.
In just its first week of release (Mar. 25 – 31), Batman V. Superman obtained over $200 million domestically and over $500 million internationally. Even with the movie receiving negative reviews and consistent criticism (28% on Rotten Tomatoes), it still only took Warner Bros. a week to surpass their budget of over $200 million. Much of this financial success can be attributed to the strategic and substantial marketing campaign that Warner Brothers executed. Warner Bros. has always made it a point to efficiently market its biggest movies as exhibited in the past with the Harry Potter series as well as the Dark Knight and Hangover trilogies. For this movie, Warner Bros. outlined a campaign that would consist of interactive and viral content, along with mass-produced advertising. In totally, roughly $150-160 million was spent on marketing Batman V. Superman, including about $30 million on TV spending alone.
The campaign started around the central villain of the movie, Lex Luthor (played by Jesse Eisenberg). Marketers wanted to make the campaign as interactive as possible, which is why they took the fictional character and put him in the real world. Luthor’s fictional company, LexCorp Industries, was given a fictional website and a twitter account was created for Luthor in order to allow the fans to legitimately interact with the character. Furthermore, Fortune did an interview with Eisenberg (as exhibited below) as Luthor to discuss his inheritance of the company along with his future plans.
The campaign continued its interactive nature through Snapchat filters, specially made behind the scenes exclusives broadcasted internationally and even provided live streaming content for this year’s NCAA March Madness.
Warner Bros. went on to partner with a total of 130 companies in order to market the movie, including Turkish Airlines, Facebook and Amazon. Turkish Airlines even paid for an elusive Super Bowl spot, as well as advertisements in over 40 international markets.
Along with making the campaign as interactive as possible, Warner Bros. certainly didn’t shy away from using its A-list actors as huge selling points in advertising the movie. Ben Affleck’s character Bruce Wayne was seen driving a Jeep Wrangler through Metropolis. Eisenberg and Affleck can be seen jetting around the world with Turkish Airlines. And of course, the stars all took to Late Night to promote the film, including The Tonight Show, Jimmy Kimmel Live and even Graham Norton (UK). Much of this was through a huge publicity tour that Affleck and Henry Cavill that started all the way in China.
Keanu and War Dogs, along with blockbuster The Legend of Tarzan and action flick, Central Intelligence. And that’s just in the next few months. Warner Brothers will close out their year with the release of the Harry Potter spinoff, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. 2017 will see the release of the prequel Kong: Skull Island, Christopher Nolan’s WWII epic Dunkirk and of course, the all important Justice League Part One.
Warner Brothers Pictures has continued its tradition of producing some of the year’s biggest blockbusters in the year. Batman v. Superman is this year’s example of how far Warner Brothers is willing to go in order to see its coveted investments succeed, and succeed historically. Through an extensive marketing campaign, Batman V. Superman was able to obtain over $800 million after just one month of its release. The rest of 2016 will see the release of many more big budgeted films and with over $400 million in the books, the future looks promising for Warner Brothers Pictures.
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