Thompson on Hollywood

Navigating the Streaming Studio System, from Amazon and Netflix to Warner Archive Instant

News

Viewers have more than their fair share of choices when it comes to online video content, as both Amazon and Warner Bros. have recently unveiled new streaming services to compete with on-the-rise Netflix.

By Ryan Lattanzio
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May 8, 2013 2:35 PM
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A New Age of Original Content Needs Script Services: A Guide

Features

Hollywood is allergic to taking risks on the unknown. But not every young adult franchise or fairy tale retelling can be as uber-successful around the world as "Twilight" ($392 million), "The Hunger Games" ($691 million) or "Oz: The Great and Powerful" ($426 million to date). This year's "Beautiful Creatures" grossed $57-million worldwide, and $200-million "Jack the Giant Slayer" mustered a miserable global $158 million.

By Sophia Savage
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April 9, 2013 2:27 PM
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Amazon and IMDb Launch X-Ray for TV Feature for Kindle Fire Users

News

Amazon and IMDb are launching a new TV iteration of "X-Ray for Movies." The original feature was released six months ago, and allows users to access corresponding IMDb info with one tap while watching films on their Kindle Fires. The new feature does the same thing, but for television series.

By Beth Hanna
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March 27, 2013 2:24 PM
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The Best In Digital Entertainment Content: What We Would Buy with $100

News

The digital world offers free content galore, and then there's all that mystery content hidden behind pay-walls. We've sifted through the best of the priced materials to determined what's worth paying for. Inspired by PaidContent, our TOH team picked what we'd buy if we had $100 to spend on digital entertainment content. There's some overlap: clearly a Netflix subscription is something none of us can do without.

By TOH!
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December 27, 2012 3:10 PM
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Amazon Releases 2012 Bestsellers; Self-Publishing, Romance and Erotica Ruled

News

Amazon's 2012 list of bestsellers highlights the increasing impact of self-published authors and their relationship with traditional publishers. Four of the five romance titles on the list were originally independently published, and then scooped up by a traditional publisher that pushed the hot titles into the bestselling stratosphere.

By Beth Hanna
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December 17, 2012 2:54 PM
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Amazon Studios Options First Novel, Self-Published Southern Gothic 'SEED'

News

Amazon's original content branch Amazon Studios has optioned the rights for author Ania Ahlborn's "SEED," a self-published Southern Gothic horror novel centering on a man whose malignant supernatural past catches up with him following a car accident. This is the first novel option for the studio, which has heretofore optioned only movie scripts and episodic series.

By Beth Hanna
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October 3, 2012 2:26 PM
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IMDb and Kindle Partner on X-Ray for Movies

News

IMDb and Amazon's Kindle Fire proudly introduce a useful interruption during your feature presentation: "X-Ray for Movies." By tapping on the screen of a movie, the user will be able to see the names and filmographies of each of the actors. The X-Ray program, exclusive to Kindle Fire at the moment, is backed with over 100 million data items from IMDb's resources. What does IMDb's founder and CEO, Col Needham have to say about this? That it's a revolution, twenty years in the making. “X-Ray for Movies revolutionizes the way we watch movies," Needham stated in a press release, "This is the culmination of everything we’ve been working on for over twenty years and is the result of a combination of sophisticated technology and old-fashioned hard work. "

By Maggie Lange
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September 10, 2012 2:44 PM
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Amazon Prime Partners with EPIX to Bring 'Hunger Games,' 'Avengers,' 'Iron Man,' 'Thor' & More to Instant Video Library

News

Amazon and EPIX announce a new multi-year licensing agreement that will add thousands of new releases, classics titles and original programming to Amazon's Prime Instant Video in the US, doubling the VOD library since the launch of the Kindle Fire a year ago. Included are titles from EPIX studio partners: Paramount Pictures, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios and Lionsgate...

By Sophia Savage
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September 4, 2012 12:10 PM
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Katniss Takes Down Harry on Amazon

News

Harry Potter's holly and phoenix feather wand is no match for Katniss Everdeen's bow and arrow -- at least, not on Amazon. The company reports that sales for the "Hunger Games" series have overtaken the "Harry Potter" books in both print and e-book sales, making the Suzanne Collins trilogy Amazon's best-seller.

By Beth Hanna
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August 17, 2012 12:53 PM
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Amazon Prime Instant Adds 'Fringe' & 'West Wing' to Library for a Supernatural-FBI-Clinton-Administration Summer

News

Fans of showrunner-creators Aaron Sorkin and J.J. Abrams will find this exciting: Amazon announces today a licensing agreement with Warner Bros. to add both "Fringe" and "The West Wing" to its Prime Instant Video library this summer. Both titles were previously unavailable.