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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.
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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?
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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.
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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.”
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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.”
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The NCAA women’s tournament will finish its second round on Monday (March 25) before entering the Sweet 16 portion, as teams compete to make it to the championship on April 7. The 68 teams are dwindling down, and if you want to watch the 2024 women’s March Madness games live, there are a few streaming options to livestream the basketball games without cable.
If you prefer to watch the women’s 2024 March Madness games live, you can still get tickets to the NCAA tournament through Ticketmaster, StubHub, Vivid Seats, Seat Geek and Gametime — especially if you want to watch Iowa’s standout player Caitlin Clark live and in-person.
For those who couldn’t score travel deals or just want to stream the games live from your couch, there are a few live TV streamers airing both women and men’s March Madness games.
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Keep reading to how to watch the women’s March Madness 2024 games.
Where to Watch Women’s March Madness 2024 Games Online
The NCAA tournament will be livestreamed on CBS, ESPN and ABC. If you don’t have cable, you might be able to watch the games live through an HD antenna like one of these from Amazon. Cord cutters can also take advantage of free trials and promos from live TV streamers like DirecTV Stream, Sling TV, Fubo and Hulu + Live TV to stream the women’s March Madness games without cable.
DirecTV Stream is offering a special sports and entertainment package that’ll save you an upwards of $30 for the first three months. New users will also receive a five day free trial when you sign up. The best part about DirecTV Stream is the amount of local and cable channel options, which includes ABC, CBS, Fox, ESPN, ESPN2, NBC, truTV and ESPNU.
Sling TV is offering $10 off the first month giving you access to like ESPN, ESPN2, ESPN3, TBS, TNT, FS1, truTV and Fox. You can choose between the Orange or Blue plan or combine the two for the most channel options. You can also take advantage of Sling’s Ultimate Basketball Offers, which will save you up to $40 for four months.
Fubo offers a seven day free trial for new users who sign up and on top of that you can take advantage of the live TV streamer’s $20 off promo. For the first month, you can get $20 off all of the platform’s plans that’ll get you over 100 channels, DVR storage and the ability to watch content on up to 10 devices.
For the most content offerings, Hulu + Live TV gives you access to the entire Hulu library as well as hundreds of live channels to watch March Madness at home for free. As an added bonus, new users receive a 30-day free trial. Once the free trial is over, you’ll be charged the regular subscription fee of $76.99/month. You can save more money by bundling ESPN+ and Disney+ for more programs.
Only some games will be streamed on ESPN+ including the Final Four games. While ESPN+ doesn’t come with a free trial for new users, you can enjoy live sports and original content all in one place and for only $10.99/month. Check here to see which women’s March Madness games are on ESPN+.
Women’s March Madness 2024 Schedule
The Second Round concludes Monday (March 25), which will determine the final teams going into the Sweet 16. The remaining games include Belmont vs. Penn State at 6 p.m. ET, Syracuse vs. UConn at 6 p.m. ET, Oklahoma vs. Indiana at 6:30 p.m. ET, West Virginia vs. Iowa at 8 p.m. ET, Creighton vs. UCLA at 8:30 p.m. ET, Kansas vs. USC at 10 p.m. ET and Utah vs. Gonzaga at 10:30 p.m. ET.
Sweet 16 teams confirmed so far include Texas, Stanford, Oregon State, South Carolina, Colorado, LSU, Duke and Baylor.
Click here for the full and updated women’s March Madness 2024 schedule.
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Post Malone isn’t just pivoting into country and folk music, the “Circles” singer is also expanding his acting credits through his latest role in Road House. The new Prime Video original movie premiered on streaming Thursday (March 21), and you can watch Road House online now.
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The action-thriller movie follows Dalton (Jake Gyllenhaal), an ex-UFC fighter looking to escape his dark past and appetite for violence. While struggling to scrape by, he’s approached by the owner of a roadhouse in Florida Keys who hires him as a bouncer with the hope of stopping a violent gang and their crime boss, Brandt (Billy Magnussen), from destroying her bar. Things only take a turn for the worse when Knox (Conor McGregor), a ruthless gun-for-hire, enters the mix. As the bloodshed and violence escalates, Dalton realizes he’s facing worse than the UFC ever threw at him.
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You can see Malone star as the character Carter, an underground fighter who faces Dalton. Road House joins the growing list of movies the Billboard Hot 100 chart-topper has been involved with, including Jennifer Lopez’s short film This Is Me…Now and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem.
Other cast members include Jessica Williams, Daniela Melchior, Joaquim De Almeida and Lukas Gage.
Keep reading to learn more about Road House and the streaming options available.
Is Road House (2024) a Remake?
Road House starring Malone and Gyllenhaal is a remake from the cult-classic ’80s film of the same name. The original Road House starred Patrick Swayze as Dalton, who is hired as a bouncer to clean up the baddest honkeytonk bar in Missouri. With a black belt in karate and a Ph.D. in philosophy, Dalton sets out to create a safer space for the bar and its owner.
Swayze stars alongside Sam Elliott, Kelly Lynch, Ben Gazzara, Jeff Healey and Julie Michaels.
How to Watch Road House (2024) Online for Free
Road House is a Prime Original making it exclusive to Prime Video. Prime members can watch Road House for free online when they log into their account.
Don’t have a Prime membership? New users can take advantage of a 30-day free trial when you sign up, allowing you to stream Road House for free. Once your free trial is over, you’ll be charged the regular subscription fee of $14.99/month or $139/year. Click here or the button below to start your free trial.
Looking for additional savings? Students can get 6-months of Prime for free when you sign up for the student membership, which is also half off. EBT/Medicaid recipients can get 30-days free under the qualifying government program membership, which is also 50% off.
With your Prime membership, you’ll have access to the entire Prime Video library including original and exclusive TV shows and movies such as The Summer I Turned Pretty, Daisy Jones & The Six, Upgraded, Gen V, The Boys, Wilderness, X-Men ’97, Expats, Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan and The Underdoggs.
Want to expand your library of offerings? Amazon has premium channels such as Max, Starz and Paramount+ to increase the amount of content available to you.
Your membership will also include additional perks such as Prime Premiere, free one-day shipping, grocery delivery, access to Prime member-only deals and Prime Day, Prime Try Before You Buy and more.
How to Stream Road House (1989) at Home
Road House (1989) is also available to stream online for free on Prime Video with a Prime membership. You can also buy Road House on sale for $8 (reg. $15) or rent the movie for $4. You don’t have to have Prime membership to buy or rent the movie, just buy Road House and it’ll automatically download to your video library to stream whenever you want. Rentals are available for 30 days after purchase and for 48 hours once you start streaming the film.
Hulu and Max members can watch Road House online for free when you log into your account. Hulu also offers a 30-day free trial for new users when you sign up.
Collectors can also pick up a special-edition Blu-ray DVD that includes exclusive photo cards you can put on display.
“Road House” (Special Edition)
The Blu-ray edition of Road House is available in a limited-edition version with a 3D lenticular hardcase, photo cards and special features that’ll give you an deeper look into the movie.
Check below to watch the trailer for Road House (2024).
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If you’ve scrolled through TikTok recently, you might have noticed that it sounds different than it did a few months ago.
Users have gotten creative with their sound choices. They’ve posted edits to a song from the children’s cartoon Little Einsteins, the Spongebob theme song, music from the quiz platform Kahoot, Kevin MacLeod’s royalty-free track “Sneaky Snitch” and the 20th Century Fox theme. There have been dances set to classical music, and the iPhone ringtone. Users have even posted screen recordings of what it’s like scrolling through their feeds, one with the text, “This is the funniest era of TikTok to ever exist.”
It’s all because Universal Music Group (UMG) and TikTok failed to reach a new licensing agreement after the previous one expired on Jan. 31. UMG issued an open letter on Jan. 30 citing concerns over AI, compensation, harassment and copyright infringement on the social media app. TikTok responded in a statement, saying, “It is sad and disappointing that Universal Music Group has put their own greed above the interests of their artists and songwriters.” Music credited to songwriters signed to Universal Music Publishing Group disappeared at the end of last month following a grace period.
TikTok has proved vital to artists, breaking new artists’ careers and causing songs to go viral, but the removal of UMG’s catalog has hit social media creators hard, too. Kenna Dean, 22, a dance creator with 1.7 million followers on the app, is one of many TikTokers who found out her videos with music by Universal artists – including one with 1.5 million likes – had been muted.
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“It was actually really disappointing, because it’s time you put into those videos,” Dean says. “You have comments on them, and you have other people who have done your dances out there. And then all of that is just gone, which was alarming.”
Dean had plans to film a dance collaboration with two other creators, @karaleighcannella and @jaedengomezz, on the same day the catalog was pulled. “All of the dance creators, we kind of woke up and were like, ‘What do we dance to?’” Dean says. They stumbled across Niana Guerrero’s viral dance (which now has over 14 million likes) to Kevin MacLeod’s “Fluffing a Duck” – a royalty-free track – as well as a dance to the Samsung alarm tone. “I just thought it was so funny,” says Dean, who jumped on both trends.
UMG is just one portion of the music industry. There are, of course, many artists who are not affiliated with Universal, or any label at all, and that music is still available for creators to use on TikTok – and a lot of users have opted to simply use the music at their disposal. Dean pointed out that she’s trying to use more songs by independent artists.
“I think it is a chance that we can prove that we are also worth listening to,” says independent artist and creator Charisse Chua. “Us not being signed doesn’t stop us from still creating good music and releasing it out there.” Earlier this month, Chua, 19, posted a clip of her song “would you take it all back?” with the caption, “umg songs might be gone [from] tiktok but mine aren’t!!”
But it’s still a challenge to get music to reach more viewers. “I expected there to be a lot more interaction than there was,” Chua says, adding that there are a lot of artists trying to use the app to boost their music.
Many TikTokers have also turned to covers as a way to replace the missing songs. In one video, creators danced to a cover of Lady Gaga’s “Bad Romance” from the Alvin and the Chipmunks movies. Another user made a video featuring medieval-style instrumental versions of songs that got 1.9 million likes, with the audio being used in over 700 videos.
Glee covers are also popular, with a clip of the Glee Cast version of “Rose’s Turn,” uploaded by @girlyteengirl123, currently trending on the app, having been used in over 300,000 videos and reaching No. 3 in Billboard’s TikTok Top 50 chart. A remix of Ice Spice’s “Think U The Shit (Fart)” in the style of the Nintendo character Toad was uploaded to TikTok on Jan. 26 – just days before the licensing agreement expired – and has since gotten 2 million likes, having been used in close to 9,000 videos, often as a joking substitute for the original song. And some users took matters into their own hands, recording covers themselves.
“I just thought, ‘Well, I’m a singer. I might as well just do my own acapella version,’” Vicky Ntamag, 25, a musician and dancer, says. She began uploading her covers to TikTok after the dispute, starting with a cover of Nicki Minaj’s “FTCU” and responding to a few requests in her comments. Her cover of ATEEZ’s “Crazy Form” was used over 200 times and her acapella version of RIIZE’s “Talk Saxy” was used in upwards of 2,770 videos. RIIZE even posted a video dancing to Ntamag’s cover that now has a million likes.
At the time Ntamag posted the cover, the original song was still available on TikTok (RIIZE is signed to RCA which is under Sony Music Entertainment) but it has since been taken down as the song falls under Universal Publishing. RIIZE posted a video using Ntamag’s cover with the text “don’t worry everyone… we still have this sound!”
Some of these covers are gaining real traction – and attention from bigger artists. Mikael Arellano’s cover of Taylor Swift’s “Bejeweled” got 1.5 million likes, with OneRepublic commenting, “Can you help us too..” Arellano then posted a video singing the band’s “Counting Stars,” and OneRepublic used the audio in two videos uploaded to its account. Conan Gray, who recently told Rolling Stone, “I think there’s going to be a lot of interesting acapella covers happening from UMG artists until this is settled,” sang over a clip of his own music video.
“The TikTok community is really strong,” Ntamag says. “And we help each other with the songs. That’s why I’m taking the requests, because some of them want to use them for their edits, or there’s certain songs that were taken off that I’m going to make an acapella [version] for, just to help my fellow TikTokers.”
The communal aspect drives TikTok. Building upon a previous joke is how memes function and audio sharing is integral to that. Participating in and even viewing trends forms the shared experience of being on TikTok, and certain sounds define eras of the app – even if those sounds happen to be TV show themes and ringtones to capture the beginning of February. Soon after the dispute, TikTok seemed to shift away from some of the more creative options towards just using the music that was still available on the app, although covers and royalty-free tracks remain popular.
“We were all a little bummed when we saw that the music was taken off,” says Ntamag. “But I feel like it’s also an opportunity that we can use to share who we are and how funny we are and what kind of music we make and how creative we can be.”
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It’s time to enter high society through Palm Royale, the latest TV series to join Apple TV+‘s streaming library. Besides featuring a stacked cast of stars, the miniseries spotlights jaw-dropping ’60s-inspired style even earning Palm Royale a collaboration with Anthropologie.
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The Apple TV+ original series premiered Tuesday (March 20) and follows Maxine Simmons (Kristen Wiig) as she tries anything she can to climb her way into Palm Springs’ hottest social club: the Palm Royale in 1969. What she discovers is that entering the elite social group of the club is a lot harder than she expects. To make her dreams come true, she decides to scheme her way to the top.
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Other cast members include Ricky Martin, Laura Dern, Carol Burnett, Allison Janney, Josh Lucas and Leslie Bibb.
Keep reading to learn more about the original series and the streaming options available.
What Is Palm Royale Based On?
Palm Royale is adapted from the book Mr. and Mrs. American Pie by Juliet McDaniel, which follows Maxine Simmons after she gets a divorce and is exiled to Scottsdale, Arizona. She sets her sights on the Mrs. American Pie pageant where she hopes to win not only a crown but the title of best wife and mother.
How to Watch Palm Royale Online for Free
Palm Royale is an original Apple TV+ series, which means its available to watch exclusively through the streaming platform. If you’re a current Apple TV+ member, you can stream Palm Royale at home for free when you log into your account.
Don’t have an Apple TV+ membership? The streamer offers a seven day free trial that’ll let you watch Palm Royale at home for free. Once the free trial is over, you’ll be charged the regular subscription fee of $9.99/month.
Palm Springs won’t be the only series you can stream on Apple TV+, a subscription gives you access to the entire library of content. Shows and original movies you can look forward to streaming include The Afterparty, The Crowded Room, Ted Lasso, Platonic, The Last Thing He Told Me, Silo, Severance, High Desert, Shrinking, The Big Door Prize, Bad Sisters, Schmigadoon!, The Problem with John Stewart, The Morning Show, Ghosted, Still, Tetris, Palmer, Snoopy Presents: One-of-a-Kind Marcie and more.
Apple TV+ is available to stream on the Apple TV app, your iPhone, iPad, Apple TV, Mac and popular smart TVs including Samsung, LG, Sony, VIZIO, TCL, Toshiba and others, along with Amazon Fire TV devices, Chromecast with Google TV. Apple TV+ is available on PlayStation and Xbox gaming consoles as well.
Looking for additional ways to save money? You can get three months free with the purchase of an eligible Apple device or a free month trial when you sign up for Apple One, which bundles Apple TV+ with up to five other services.
Check below to watch the trailer for Palm Royale.
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Shares of Abu Dhabi-based music streaming company Anghami soared 59% on Wednesday (March 20) after an SEC filing showed media company MBC Group has taken a 13.7% stake in the company. Anghami rose as high as $1.79 before closing at $1.59. Trading volume spiked to 11.3 million shares, over 300 times its daily average.
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Saudi Arabia-based MBC Group bills itself as “the largest and leading media company in the Middle East and North Africa.” Founded in London in 1991 as a satellite TV channel, MBC Group’s properties now include 13 free-to-air TV channels, three radio stations and Shahid, a leading Arabic streaming platform. MBC Group also owns MBC Studios, a content production house, and MBC Academy, an educational and training platform.
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The two companies already had a marketing partnership that renewed in 2022. The partnership gives Anghami exposure across MBC Group’s programming. MBC Group “create[s] new opportunities for rising music talent,” Fadel Zahreddine, Group Director of Emerging Media at MBC GROUP, said at the time, “and we continue to inspire upcoming musicians by encouraging platforms like Anghami to give them the creative space to publish their premium music content.”
Investors appeared to take MBC Group’s ownership stake as a positive sign that Anghami would have the financial and promotional resources to build a profitable business. Anghami shares have fallen 86% since its Feb. 4, 2022 debut on the Nasdaq. The company was warned by the Nasdaq exchange in Nov. 2023 for trading under the $1 threshold for the previous 30 days. The Nasdaq gives companies 180 days to regain compliance or face delisting from the exchange. Anghami said it would “consider available options to cure the deficiency,” including a reverse share split.
Wednesday’s closing price is well below the valuation of two recent investments in Anghami, however. Anghami received a $5 million strategic investment from SRMG in Aug. 2023 that valued Anghami at $2.50 per share. A Nov. 2023 deal with OSN Group that valued Anghami at $3.65 per share — and caused Anghami’s share price to jump 97% to a 52-week high of $3.11 — will provide Anghami with the OSN+ video streaming platform and result in an investment up to $50 million.
Anghami shares traded as high as $16.80 in April 2022 but have fallen 86% below the $11.00 closing price on its first day of trading on Feb. 4, 2022, after merging with Vistas Media Acquisition Company, a special purpose acquisition company. In the 55 trading days in 2024, Anghami has closed below $1.00 29 times.
In the first nine months of 2023, Anghami had 1.73 million subscribers and adjusted revenue of $30 million, up 8% year over year. The company has not yet announced full-year 2023 results.
