Entertainment:
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Robert Downey Jr., Chris Hemsworth, Chris Evans, Scarlett
Johansson and Mark Ruffalo were among the stars walking the red carpet at the
Dolby Theatre on Monday for the “Age of Ultron” premiere
·
Apple has updated its Final Cut Pro X, Motion and Compressor
pro movie-making software tools, with improvements made to support for new
camera hardware, as well as additional 3D animation resources and effects
features
o
http://techcrunch.com/2015/04/13/apple-updates-final-cut-pro-x-motion-and-compressor-creative-apps/
·
VideoBlocks is a new video stock marketplace that essentially
follows the Costco model and plans to make most of its revenue from memberships
- the typical one-off video will cost about $50 for an HD download and $199 for
4K videos
·
Ninja Metrics is unveiling what it calls a powerful analytics
platform for entertainment such as streaming media and music
·
Sony just added some business and tech crunch to Crackle, its
streaming entertainment service - it’s about to introduce a linear TV-like
experience, the company told advertisers today in its first solo upfront
presentation
·
CineLife serves fans of art house and independent movies by harnessing
a device’s location-based technology, it can tell users showtimes and locations
for films that are playing nearby. It also enables them to buy tickets, tapping
into existing online providers including Fandango and MovieTickets.com
o
http://deadline.com/2015/04/spotlight-cinema-networks-cinelife-app-indie-movies-tickets-1201409320/
·
Disney has come aboard to co-produce and co-finance “The BFG”
the adaptation of the Roald Dahl classic that Steven Spielberg is directing in
Vancouver
·
Radio Disney has partnered with iBiquity Digital to broadcast
on as many as 60 HD2/HD3 stations nationwide, becoming the first national
station on the high-definition AM/FM digital bands
·
See below for a video on LA startups that are focused on VR
·
Eyeing Latin America, EMEA, the CIS and the Asia Pacific
regions, AMC Networks International has announced a significant expansion for
its international portfolio at MIPTV, following the brand's launch outside of
North America late last year
Tech:
·
Snapchat has stopped selling Brand Stories, the first type of
ad it released last fall, according to multiple people familiar with the move
·
Universal Record is a vibrating plastic disc that lets you
play music from any digital source, via Bluetooth, on any record player
·
After five years off the road, Activision is bringing “Guitar
Hero” back on tour this fall
·
Google today announced a new developer program called “Designed
For Families” which will allow app publishers to opt into an additional review
in order have their apps labeled as being “family-friendly”
·
Today, photo-sharing and organization app Lyve is rolling out
a new feature which will allow anyone to create photo albums with others in
their same location, whether that’s at a wedding, a concert, a festival, a
party, or anything else
·
Apple has a new patent, granted today by the USPTO (via
AppleInsider), that would use contextual information including your current
time zone, ringer silence status, battery life, location and cell network
strength to determine whether or not you’re available for a call automatically,
and display that information to friends
·
Twilio has long made it easy for developers to integrate voice
calling and text messaging into their applications, but starting today, the
service will also offer a video chat
·
Microsoft today announced the general availability of Skype
for Business
·
DuckDuckGo, the little search engine that could, is gearing up
to launch a redesigned Android app
·
Hawthorne-based SpaceX scrubbed its first launch attempt in
its latest mission to the International Space Station on Monday due to weather,
saying that the next launch opportunity for the Dragon is today at 1:10 pm
·
Apple launched iOS 8.3 to the masses, the company has released
a beta version of its iOS 8.4 to developers that slips in a very big change - inside
the update is an overhauled version of the flagship Music app that could offer
an early look at what Apple's soon-to-launch music streaming service could look
like
·
See below for an interesting article on how Marisa Mayer is
mobilizing Yahoo!
Deals:
·
Rakuten is looking to acquire
PopSugar for $580MM
·
Docker raised $95MM in its Series D
·
Movidius, the company that makes the
vision processor that powers Google’s Tango tablet, today announced that it has
raised a $40MM funding round led by Summit Bridge Capital — a collaboration
between Atlantic Bridge Capital and WestSummit Capital
·
Microsoft said today that it has
acquired Datazen Software, a company with mobile-friendly business-intelligence
(BI) tools
·
Nokia said on Tuesday that it was in
advanced talks to buy Alcatel-Lucent, its French rival, in a deal that could
further consolidate the global telecom industry
Business:
·
Cyberattacks and cybercrime against large companies – those
with over 2,500 employees - rose 40% globally in 2014, according to Symantec's
annual Internet Security Threat study published Tuesday
·
Amazon and HarperCollins have reached a new multi-year
publishing deal - expected to go into effect this week - that covers both print
and digital titles
·
United Launch Alliance, a joint venture of Lockheed Martin and
Boeing, has unveiled a reusable rocket named "Vulcan" that is slated
to take off in 2019 and end U.S. dependence on Russian-built rocket engines
·
Zillow Group Inc.’ Chief Executive Spencer Rascoff said in a
conference call to discuss operational progress that full-year 2015 revenue is
expected to be $690MM, according to FactSet, which is below the FactSet
consensus of $740.4MM
·
Apple’s stock buyback plan a bigger deal than Apple Watch,
iPhone sales
·
IBM, deepening its partnership with Apple to make use of
health information gathered by millions of Apple devices, is creating a unit
dedicated to providing data analytics to the health care sector
Exec Moves:
·
Sanford Panitch’s move from Fox to
Sony is a huge loss for Fox, with the potential to change both studios’
approaches to the international film production business
Startups:
·
Santa Barbara-based WorldViz, a
developer of virtual reality software, said this morning that it has raised a
Series A funding round from Intel
·
Dubb, a new, angel-backed startup,
has launched a new, mobile marketplace to help you find customers. According to
Dubb, its new, mobile marketplace is aimed at both professional and
semi-professionals, and helps creative professionals post listing of their
services
·
llumio, which created a platform
that provides visibility into application traffic anywhere and dynamically computes
fine-grained policies, raised $100MM in its Series C
Government:
·
Congressional Republicans are following through on their
promise to oppose the Federal Communication Commission’s net neutrality order
·
By one estimate U.S. online political advertising could
quadruple to nearly $1B in the 2016 election, creating huge opportunities for
digital strategy firms eager to capitalize on a shift from traditional mediums
like television
·
The U.S. ended the month of March with a budget deficit of
$53B, up 43% from the same period last year, bringing the current fiscal YTD
deficit to $439B at the end of last month
·
The FCC officially published its new net neutrality rules to
the Federal Register yesterday, opening the door to legal challenges
Other:
·
The McLaren Tarmac is a $20k bike that came from the long
partnership between Specialized and McLaren, the world renowned maker of F1
race cars and supercars for the wealthy
·
The Massachusetts State Police have declared the Boston
Marathon course a "no drone zone" when runners take off on Monday
·
Justin Bieber was put into a chokehold and kicked out of Coachella
on Sunday night
·
Gravity Payments founder Dan Price surprised his 120 employees
Monday: After reading that money fluctuations are a big problem for those
earning less than $70,000, he decided to make that the minimum wage for all the
employees at his credit-card payment-processing company (he cut his own salary
from $1MM to $70k)
·
See below for an article on Las Vegas and the coming
gamblification of American pro sports
