Streaming
Page: 26
Members of the American Federation of Musicians voted to ratify the union’s agreement with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers. The agreement, which covers basic theatrical motion picture and basic television motion picture contracts, gives musicians streaming residuals for the first time, as well as protections against artificial intelligence, according to AFM. In addition to […]
All products and services featured are independently chosen by editors. However, Billboard may receive a commission on orders placed through its retail links, and the retailer may receive certain auditable data for accounting purposes. Most smart TVs have built-in speakers, but it may not be enough to provide crystal-clear sound quality to make you feel […]
All products and services featured are independently chosen by editors. However, Billboard may receive a commission on orders placed through its retail links, and the retailer may receive certain auditable data for accounting purposes.
The length a family would go to be reunited is examined in the new series We Were the Lucky Ones, which premiered its first episode via Hulu on Thursday (March 28). Joey King and Logan Lerman star in the limited TV series, which is adapted from the novel of the same title by Georgia Hunter, and you can stream We Were the Lucky Ones at home now.
Taking place in 1939, the series follows the Kurcs, a Polish-Jewish family separated at the start of World War II. Three generations of the family are put at different parts of the world, and viewers will watch as each character fights their way to safety during one of the darkest times in history. Driven by their need to survive, each family member must cope with the idea of never seeing each other again while leaning on hope and perseverance to keep them alive.
Trending on Billboard
Other cast members include Hadas Yaron, Sam Woolf, Robin Weigert, Lior Ashkenazi, Amit Rahav, Eva Feiler, Henry Lloyd-Hughes and Moran Rosenblatt.
Keep reading to learn more about the series and the streaming options available to watch We Were the Lucky Ones online.
Is We Were the Lucky Ones Based On a True Story?
The miniseries was adapted from the novel We Were the Lucky Ones, which Hunter wrote based on true events that happened to her ancestors. The author was born into a family of Holocaust survivors, which she learned more about at a family reunion she went to in 2000, according to her author website. In 2008, she set out to research more about her grandfather, his siblings and the journey they underwent to survive and eventually find their way back to one another.
“We Were the Lucky Ones: A Novel” by Georgia Hunter
$9.56
$18
47% off
$11.16
$16
30% off
Delve into the history of the Kurc family through the official novel written by Hunter. Within its pages you’ll be able to discover moments and scenes that didn’t make it into the Hulu series while gaining a further understanding of the struggles real people endured during World War II.
How to Watch We Were the Lucky Ones Online for Free
We Were the Lucky Ones is a Hulu original series that you can stream online exclusively through the streaming platform. Current Hulu subscribers can watch We Were the Lucky Ones for free when you log into your account.
Don’t have a Hulu subscription? New users will receive a 30-day free trial when you sign up for the streaming platform. After the free trial is over, you’ll be charged a subscription fee based on the plan you choose at checkout. Click here or the button below to start your free trial.
Hulu plans start as low as $7.99/month for the basic streaming package, or you can take advantage of a student membership for just $1.99/month.
For even more content you can bundle Hulu with Disney+ and ESPN+ and for live TV channel options, you can opt for Hulu + Live TV that includes over 90 live channels including ABC, CBS, NBC, ESPN, Bravo, TLC, OWN, FX and A&E.
Hulu programs and exclusive content you can look forward to streaming include Freaknik, Only Murders in the Building, Poor Things, All of Us Strangers, Death & Other Details, Shogun, The Bear, Survivor and The Great.
Check below for the trailer of We Were the Lucky Ones.
[embedded content]
Universal Music Group announced on Thursday (March 28) that its artists will soon have the ability to tease unreleased music on Spotify.
Sharing snippets of unreleased songs on social media has been one of the most popular promotional methods for artists during the TikTok era (sometimes to the chagrin of songwriters). In many instances, artists haven’t even finished writing the song that they tease. But fan enthusiasm can make these scraps of music go viral anyway, especially on TikTok, sending artists scrambling to write another verse, record a full song, and release it as soon as possible — hopefully to a rapturous reception.
The Universal Music Group announcement is notable because it comes as the company’s stand-off with TikTok nears the end of its second month. Official recordings of UMG acts are not currently available on the app. (Same goes for many, but not all, songs that feature contributions from UMPG songwriters.) While most UMG artists continue to use the app as a social tool to communicate with their followers, their ability to promote their music on TikTok is severely limited.
Teasing songs on Spotify represents a potential alternative for these acts. “We’re excited to broaden our relationship with Spotify through the introduction of new content offerings and collaborations that will bring deeper ‘social music’ experiences to the platform,” UMG chairman and CEO Lucian Grainge said in a statement.
Trending on Billboard
Spotify founder and CEO Daniel Ek added that “the forthcoming features will put more power in the hands of artists and their teams to help them authentically express themselves, efficiently promote their work, and better monetize their art.”
UMG did not say when its artists would be able to start sharing pre-release snippets on the platform. It’s also not clear the extent to which Spotify users will actively hunt for pre-release music on the streaming service — many prefer more passive forms of engagement.
TikTok, in contrast, excels at engaging those who see fandom as a participatory sport — they want to comment on unreleased demos and make their own remixes. And for younger listeners especially, the app is often a popular source of music discovery.
Midia Research found that TikTok is the second biggest driver of music discovery for Gen Z after YouTube. U.S. TikTokers “are nearly twice as likely to discover music on short-form video platforms than the average user of social or social-form video platforms,” according to a Luminate study released in November.
Spotify is then where many of these listeners go and listen to full songs they found on TikTok. To make this process even more friction-less, TikTok launched a new feature last year that allows users to quickly save music they find on the platform to Spotify and other streaming services.
But Spotify executives have been eager to tout the streamer’s ability to drive discovery on its own. “There’s a disconnect between where music is being teased and where music is actually being streamed,” Sulinna Ong, Spotify’s global head of editorial, said at the company’s Stream On event in 2023. “The most powerful time to reach fans is when they’ve chosen to engage with music, like when they open up Spotify.”
At the same event, Spotify co-president Gustav Soderstrom said that “Spotify recommendations drive close to half of all user streams.” “Each time your music gets played on a playlist like Release Radar, you receive, on average, three times more streams from that listener over the next six months,” he added. “And when a listener decides to follow you, they listen to, on average, five times more of your music.” This recommendation system sets Spotify apart from platforms that deliver “just a fleeting moment of viral fame.”
UMG also announced on Thursday that its publishing arm inked a deal with Spotify so the platform can share music videos in the U.S. Spotify music videos launched in beta for premium users in 11 countries — but not in the U.S. — earlier in March. At the time, Charlie Hellman, Spotify’s vp and head of music product, called videos “an important part of so many artists’ tool kits.
“It’s a natural fit for them to live in the same place that more than half a billion people choose to listen to music,” Hellman added in a statement.
All products and services featured are independently chosen by editors. However, Billboard may receive a commission on orders placed through its retail links, and the retailer may receive certain auditable data for accounting purposes.
Adam Sandler has garnered a collection of feel good comedies, but there’s one classic that’s rumored to be getting a sequel. Happy Gilmore developed a cult following after its premiere in 1996 and it continues to be labelled a classic. Now, according to Deadline, a script has been written for a follow-up movie.
Explore
Explore
See latest videos, charts and news
See latest videos, charts and news
To celebrate the news, there are a variety of streaming options that will let you watch Happy Gilmore online at home and relive every laugh-out-loud moment.
If you need a refresher, Happy Gilmore follows Happy (Sandler) who attempts to pursue a career as a professional hockey player. To his devastation, his dream is squashed but when his grandmother’s home is threatened, he decides to join a golf tournament to win the prize money and save her home. With a natural talent with a driver, he catches the eyes of well-mannered golf pros who are anything but happy to welcome him to the golf scene.
Trending on Billboard
Other cast members include Carl Weathers, Julie Bowen, Christopher McDonald, Richard Kiel, Bob Barker and Frances Bay.
How to Watch Happy Gilmore On Prime Video
Prime members can watch Happy Gilmore online when you add Starz to your subscription. Right now there is a promo going on where you can get the premium channel for $1.99/month for the first three months. After the three months are over, you’ll be charged the regular channel fee of $9.99/month on top of your Prime subscription. The promo is only going on until April 1 and will save you $24.
Don’t have a Prime membership? Amazon is offering a 30-day free trial for new users who sign up. After the free trial is over, you’ll be charged $14.99/month or $139/year. If you’re looking to save additional money, you can snag a 50% off student membership that also comes with a six month free trial or those a part of a qualifying government program can receive a 30-day free trial and half-off membership.
You don’t need a Prime membership to watch Happy Gilmore on Prime Video. The platform also lets you rent the movie for $4 or you can buy Happy Gilmore for 53% off, dropping the price from $15 to a wallet-friendly $7. Once you make your purchase, the movie will automatically be downloaded to your video library. Rentals are available for 30 days after buying and for 48 hours once you start streaming the movie.
How to Watch Happy Gilmore On Hulu
Hulu subscribers can watch Happy Gilmore online when you add Starz to your subscription for an extra $9.99/month. With it, you’ll get access to the entire Hulu library in addition to all the original and exclusive content on Starz.
Don’t have Hulu? New users will get a 30-day free trial when you sign up. You’ll have to add Starz to your membership through the premium channel options once you sign up in order to stream Happy Gilmore at home.
How to Watch Happy Gilmore At Home
Collectors won’t want to miss out on snagging a Blu-ray copy of Happy Gilmore that you can put on display next to the rest of your Sandler movies.
“Happy Gilmore” [Blu-ray]
In addition to the fill Happy Gilmore movie, the Blu-ray edition also comes with special features that will give you an even deeper look into the making of the movie. Deleted scenes are also included so you can see moments not shown in the film.
Check below to watch the trailer for Happy Gilmore.
[embedded content]
All products and services featured are independently chosen by editors. However, Billboard may receive a commission on orders placed through its retail links, and the retailer may receive certain auditable data for accounting purposes.
Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson is prepping to kick off the first-ever season as co-founder of the United Football League. The American minor football league was formerly separated into the XFL and USFL until the two merged at the end of 2023. The UFL will commence its 2024 spring season on Saturday (March 30) and there are a few streaming options that will let you livestream the game at home without cable.
While the NFL season may be over, the next 10 weeks will provide football fans with more content. Eight teams will face off against one another until the Conference Championship games on June 6-June 9 that will determine the two teams headed to the 2024 UFL Championship on June 16.
Trending on Billboard
If you’d prefer to watch the UFL games in person, tickets are still available through Ticketmaster and StubHub.
Keep reading to learn more about UFL 2024 and how to watch the games at home.
What Teams Are In the 2024 UFL?
Competing in the 2024 season will be eight teams: the Birmingham Stallions, Arlington Renegades, St. Louis Battlehawks, Michigan Panthers, D.C. Defenders, San Antonio Brahmas, Memphis Showboats and Houston Roughnecks.
Each game will be broadcast on either Fox, FS1, ABC, ESPN or ESPN2.
How to Watch UFL 2024 Games Without Cable
Cable viewers can watch the games live for no additional cost on any channel that has Fox, FS1, ABC, ESPN or ESPN2. If you don’t have cable you might be able to livestream the UFL 2024 games through an HD antenna like one here from Amazon.
Don’t have cable? Cord cutters can take advantage of free trials and promos through live TV streaming platforms such as DirecTV Stream, Sling TV, Fubo and Hulu + Live TV to stream UFL 2024 games online.
Right now you can take advantage of DirecTV Stream’s Sports Pack that can save you up to $30 for the first three months. To redeem, you’ll need to combine the Sports Pack with one of the channel packages the platform offers, which starts at $80/month. What’s notable about DirecTV Stream’s plans is the amount of local channels you receive including Fox, ESPN, ESPN2 and ABC. You’ll also receive a five day free trial when you first sign-up giving you free access to live UFL games.
Another affordable option on the market is Sling TV, which will give you access to channels like ESPN, ESPN2, FS1 and Fox. Plus, the platform is offering a $10 off deal for the first month knocking the price down from $40 to $30. You can choose between the Orange or Blue plan or combine the two for the most channel options.
Fubo is giving a seven day free trial to new subscribers as well as a $20 off promo for all the platform’s plans. You’ll receive over 100 channels, DVR storage and the ability to watch content on up to 10 devices.
New users who sign up for Hulu + Live TV will receive a 30-day free trial as well as hundreds of live TV channel options on top of access to the Hulu library. Once the free trial is over, you’ll be charged the regular subscription fee of $77/month. For even more content, you can also bundle your plan with Disney+ and ESPN+.
What Is the UFL 2024 Schedule?
Leading up to the 2024 UFL Conference Champions, there will be four games a week starting March 30 at 1 p.m. ET. Check below for the upcoming schedule or click here for the full season schedule.
Week 1, Saturday (March 30): Birmingham Stallions vs. Arlington Renegades at 1 p.m. ET on Fox, St. Lous Battlehawks vs. Michigan Panthers at 4 p.m. ET on Fox.
Week 1, Sunday (March 31): D.C. Defenders vs. San Antonio Brahmas at 12 p.m. ET on ESPN, Memphis Showboats vs. Houston Roughnecks at 3 p.m. ET on ESPN.
Week 2, Saturday (April 6): San Antonio Brahmas vs. Memphis Showboats at 12 p.m. ET on ESPN, Arlington Renegades vs. St. Louis Battlehawks at 8 p.m. ET on ABC.
Week 2, Sunday (April 7): Birmingham Stallions vs. Michigan Panthers at 12 p.m. ET on ESPN, Houston Roughnecks vs. D.C. Defenders at 4 p.m. ET on Fox.
Week 3, Saturday (April 13): D.C. Defenders vs. Arlington Renegades at 1 p.m. ET on ESPN, Memphis Showboats vs. Birmingham Stallions at 7 p.m. ET on Fox.
Week 3, Sunday (April 14): Houston Roughnecks vs. Michigan Panthers at 12 p.m. ET on ABC, St. Louis Battlehawks vs. San Antonio Brahmas at 3 p.m. ET on ABC.
Ariana Grande is the latest singer-songwriter to get her own “Written By” playlist on Spotify. The playlist includes Grande’s biggest hits, including “7 Rings,” “Thank U Next,” “Dangerous Woman” and “we can’t be friends (wait for your love,)” as well as songs she has written for other artists. The playlist shines a light on Grande’s talents in […]
The RIAA’s release of 2023 revenue figures show U.S. record labels are increasingly reliant — possibly too much so — on paid subscriptions for both revenue and revenue growth. While consumers continue to pay for premium streaming services, ad-supported on-demand streaming is languishing and newer platforms like TikTok provide more promotion than they do royalties.
The top-line takeaway of the RIAA’s 2023 report is that the U.S. market grew 7.7% to $17.12 billion, an improvement from the 6.6% uptick seen in 2022. Without adjusting for inflation, 2023 revenue was about 17% above the CD-era peak of $14.6 billion set in 1999, marking the ninth straight year of revenue growth after the U.S. market bottomed out at $6.95 billion in 2014. After nearly a decade of gains, the record business is healthy and stable.
But look over the RIAA’s report and you’ll see the U.S. market is missing the dynamism it could — and wants to — have. The revenue mix doesn’t have the diversity of past years. It’s not for lack of effort: Record labels are partnering with AI startups, licensing music to social media platforms and looking for new ways to engage with big spending superfans. But emerging categories remain just that — emerging — while other categories don’t yet provide much of a revenue boost. On-demand streaming turned around the industry, made music into an appealing asset class for investors and allowed handfuls of companies to go public. But where does it go from here?
Trending on Billboard
Here are five takeaways from the report.
The U.S. market is more reliant on paid subscriptions than ever.
Revenue from paid subscriptions from premium music streaming services such as Spotify and Apple Music totaled $10.15 billion and accounted for 59.3% of total recorded music revenues in 2023, an increase from 57.8% in 2022 (and far higher than percentages seen during the preceding years: 57.2% in 2021, 57.4% in 2020, 53.4% in 2019 and 47.3% in 2018). But U.S. labels were even more reliant on subscriptions for revenue growth, with paid subscriptions accounting for 79.4% of that growth in 2023. Ad-supported streaming — services such as TikTok and Facebook — grew 21.5%, or $56.2 million, but accounted for only 4.6% of annual growth.
New subscribers are harder to find.
For all the growth attributable to subscription services over the last decade, it might not be enough for some markets. As Billboard noted on March 15, SNEP, France’s recorded music trade group, warned that revenue growth from subscriptions “is slowing down here while our market is far from having reached maturity.” Fortunately for the United States, subscription penetration has surpassed 50% of U.S. internet users, according to MusicWatch. But the 2023 RIAA figures suggest streaming services have already picked the low-hanging fruit and will need new products to attract new customers. With far fewer new subscribers in 2023 than in previous years, labels were fortunate that Spotify raised the price for its standard individual plan in 2023. After adding 7.6 million subscribers in 2022 and 8.5 million in 2021, the U.S. market added just 5.2 million in 2023. That’s a sharp drop from the 15.1 million new subscribers gained in 2020 when pandemic restrictions caused an uptick in both music and video on-demand streaming services. Price increases by Spotify in July and Amazon Music in both January 2023 and August helped average monthly revenue per user improve to $8.74, up from $8.35 in 2022.
Advertising has stumbled.
A few years after advertising revenue surged, ad-supported streaming’s strength is probably its potential to convert some free users into paying customers. Ad-supported, on-demand streaming revenue rose just 2.3% in 2023, an even worse showing than the 3.5% improvement in 2022. Things looked much better a couple of years ago after ad-supported, on-demand streaming revenue jumped 46.7% in 2021 following a slowdown in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Ad-supported on-demand streaming actually did better in pandemic-stricken 2020, rising 32.2% even though the bottom fell out of the ad market when brands braced for a recession by curtailing their ad spending. It was a remarkable turn of fortune for the promise of ad-supported music; after Spotify’s ad-supported revenue jumped 81% in 2021, CEO Daniel Ek said the growing online ad market bode well for India, Indonesia and other developing markets where Spotify operates. Since then, however, subscriptions — especially in mature markets like the United States — have carried the load for Spotify and others.
Social media is growing fast but remains small.
The highest growth rate of any category in 2023 came from “other ad-supported streaming,” which includes relative newcomers to licensing agreements such as TikTok. Other ad-supporting streaming jumped 21.5%, to $317.7 million, making the category about 75% as valuable as the fast-declining download and ringtone category (which was down 12.2% last year). The downside is that the category remains a small part of labels’ business:. Last year, other ad-supported streaming accounted for less than 5% of total revenue growth — about 6% as much as subscription services.
Physical sales were dependable, not explosive.
Both LPs and CDs had double-digit growth in 2023 — 10.3% for LPs and 11.3% for CDs — as physical formats benefitted from enthusiasm for vinyl collectibles and K-pop fans’ penchant for buying multiple CD variants of new releases. Total physical revenue increased by $181 million, or 10.5%, to $1.91 billion, and it has grown 66% since 2018. That more than compensated for the $60 million decline in legacy digital formats such as track and album downloads and ringtones. Still, vinyl and CD sales accounted for 14.8% of 2023’s revenue gains compared to subscriptions’ 79.4%.
Recorded music revenue in the United States grew 7.7% in 2023 over the prior year, reaching a high-water mark of $17.1 billion at retail, according to the RIAA. Within that headline number, $14.4 billion — or 84% — was driven by streaming, a figure that was also up 8% over 2022.
It’s the eighth straight year of revenue growth for the U.S. business, and the rounded 8% growth over last year’s $15.9 billion represents an uptick from 2022, when the business grew 6.1% over the prior year. And while the headline figure marks the third straight year that the business has set a record for revenue — previously set in 1999, when revenue hit $14.6 billion prior to Napster taking hold — when adjusted for inflation, it still falls far below that 1999 figure, which would be $26.9 billion at current rates.
Still, the U.S. business has been growing steadily over the past several years, and streaming has settled into being a fairly consistent piece of the revenue pie: This marks the fourth straight year that overall streaming accounted for between 83% and 84% of revenue, showing that streaming and the overall revenue picture are growing in lockstep. Within the streaming category, paid subscription streaming accounted for $11.2 billion, or 78% of all streaming revenue, up 9% over the $10.2 billion it accounted for last year; and the average number of full-tier U.S. subscriptions grew 5.7% to 96.8 million, up from 91.6 million last year.
Trending on Billboard
However, limited-tier subscription revenue — the bucket into which Amazon Prime, Pandora Plus, fitness services and other paid subscriptions that don’t include access to full, on-demand catalogs falls — dropped 4% to $1.0 billion. Meanwhile, ad-supported streaming service revenue grew 2%, to $1.9 billion, up from $1.8 billion in 2022; and digital and customized radio revenue, which includes services like SiriusXM and SoundExchange distributions, picked up 8% year over year, to $1.3 billion. Synch revenue grew by a similar rate, up 7.4% to $411 million.
In terms of sales, digital downloads continued their slide, with revenue down 12.2% year-over-year to $434.1 million, now representing just 3% of the overall industry. On the flipside, physical sales once again surged, up 10.5% to $1.91 billion (from $1.73 billion last year). That was largely driven by vinyl sales growth, which was up 10.3% year over year to $1.35 billion in revenue — an increase from $1.22 billion in 2022, as units jumped to 43.2 million from 40.5 million. CD sales revenue also grew by double-digit percentages, increasing 11.3% to $537.1 million from a $482.6 million mark in 2022, even as the number of CDs sold fell. The format saw 37 million sales in 2023, down from 37.7 million the year prior, suggesting a rise in average price per unit year over year.
Overall, the percentage breakdown between digital revenue and physical revenue — 89% to 11% — remained essentially the same as it has since 2018, only fluctuating 1% one way or the other in the intervening years. At wholesale, overall revenue grew by 7%, up to $11 billion from last year’s $10.3 billion, marking the second straight year that metric crossed the $10 billion plateau.
Spotify has launched a new experiment, offering educational video courses to its U.K. users on subjects including music making, creativity, business and healthy living. The new courses show that Spotify is hoping to expand its reach beyond music, podcasts and audiobooks into a new fourth vertical, but the launch is still in the testing phase.
The videos are provided through partnerships with BBC Maestro, Skillshare, Thinkific and PlayVirtuoso and are available on Spotify’s desktop and mobile apps. They can be found by clicking a new ovular icon at the top of the screen. Two lessons in each course are freely available to both free and premium subscribers, but to access a full course, users must leave the app and purchase additional lessons on a dedicated web page to continue. Spotify will receive a commission on whatever is sold through its platform, according to The Verge.
“Testing video courses in the U.K. allows us to explore an exciting opportunity to better serve the needs of our users who have an active interest in learning,” said Babar Zafar, vp of product development at Spotify, in a blog post announcing the test. “Many of our users engage with podcasts and audiobooks on a daily basis for their learning needs, and we believe this highly engaged community will be interested in accessing and purchasing quality content from video course creators. At Spotify, we’re constantly striving to create new offerings for our creators and users, and having built best-in-class personalized music and podcast offerings, we look forward to exploring the potential of video-based learning on Spotify.”
Trending on Billboard
The post notes that roughly half of Spotify premium subscribers have engaged with education or self-help-themed podcasts.
Spotify did not immediately return Billboard’s request for more information on whether it’s planning to expand the test to other markets, including the United States.
Daniel Ek, CEO/founder of Spotify, hinted at the company’s interest in expanding into education nearly two years ago during his Spotify Investor Day presentation held on June 8, 2022. “We will firmly cement Spotify as the home for some of the greatest artists and creators and educators in the world,” he said at the time. “I’m not aware of any other company has been successful in taking a multi-business model and multi-vertical approach within one user experience.”
This U.K. test proves that Spotify is still searching for profitability and keen to expand its user base beyond what music streaming can provide. According to MIDiA Research, growth in music streaming subscriptions is expected to slow from double- to single-digits in the coming decade as the market reaches maturity. Plus, the margins made from music streaming continue to be tight.
Alex Noström, Spotify’s co-president/chief business officer, has also hinted at the company’s educational focus in the past, saying at the 2022 investor day presentation: “In the next 10 years, there are additional markets and verticals that we believe are natural fits for our platform and audience…There’s news, sports and education. Those are vast markets [that] we can imagine Spotify playing in… [All] are big consumer markets, sometimes much bigger than music… We have an opportunity to consolidate user’s habits and purchases to Spotify and also expand the pie allowing broader and more convenient access to these new content carrier categories.”