Newsrooms and streaming services get cozy

“Grab a blanket, settle in on the couch, and get ready for a night of binge-watching fantastic journalism.”

Grab a blanket, settle in on the couch, and get ready for a night of binge-watching fantastic journalism.

With the growth of subscription video-on-demand services like Hulu, Apple TV+, Netflix, and HBO Max has come an accelerated competition between them for audience-grabbing content. The wealth of outstanding video journalism originating from traditional newsrooms has never been more poised to take over TVs everywhere.

The trend of content collaborations is already off to a promising start. In 2020, Hulu partnered with The New York Times for its well-received show The Weekly. HBO has generated headlines with its current news series with Axios and garnered awards and acclaim for its former program VICE News Tonight. Amazon Prime came out of the gate early in the streaming wars with The New Yorker Presents.

In the race to expand their market share, the platforms have poured copious money into content, from Hollywood productions to independent films to shows by online creators. Audiences in this advanced era of digital media have shown interest in a wide variety of formats, from 15-minute shorts to full-length documentaries.

As heads of newsrooms continue to search for new ways to generate revenue, the prospect of shows backed by streaming services is tantalizing. Both evergreen and up-to-the-minute news have the potential to amass large viewerships beyond proprietary platforms. Pursuing this avenue of distribution means bringing journalism to where the people are.

There will continue to be hesitancy about porting your outlet’s brand to another platform. But the benefits in outweigh the concerns and create a win-win scenario. More exclusive content brings subscribers to streaming services and puts more eyeballs on newsrooms’ work.

News consumers are the biggest winners of all. Whether they’re chillin’ at home or on the go, they’re getting great original content from the platforms that they love.

Mark S. Luckie is a digital strategist and former partnerships manager at Twitter and Facebook.

Grab a blanket, settle in on the couch, and get ready for a night of binge-watching fantastic journalism.

With the growth of subscription video-on-demand services like Hulu, Apple TV+, Netflix, and HBO Max has come an accelerated competition between them for audience-grabbing content. The wealth of outstanding video journalism originating from traditional newsrooms has never been more poised to take over TVs everywhere.

The trend of content collaborations is already off to a promising start. In 2020, Hulu partnered with The New York Times for its well-received show The Weekly. HBO has generated headlines with its current news series with Axios and garnered awards and acclaim for its former program VICE News Tonight. Amazon Prime came out of the gate early in the streaming wars with The New Yorker Presents.

In the race to expand their market share, the platforms have poured copious money into content, from Hollywood productions to independent films to shows by online creators. Audiences in this advanced era of digital media have shown interest in a wide variety of formats, from 15-minute shorts to full-length documentaries.

As heads of newsrooms continue to search for new ways to generate revenue, the prospect of shows backed by streaming services is tantalizing. Both evergreen and up-to-the-minute news have the potential to amass large viewerships beyond proprietary platforms. Pursuing this avenue of distribution means bringing journalism to where the people are.

There will continue to be hesitancy about porting your outlet’s brand to another platform. But the benefits in outweigh the concerns and create a win-win scenario. More exclusive content brings subscribers to streaming services and puts more eyeballs on newsrooms’ work.

News consumers are the biggest winners of all. Whether they’re chillin’ at home or on the go, they’re getting great original content from the platforms that they love.

Mark S. Luckie is a digital strategist and former partnerships manager at Twitter and Facebook.

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