Tubi hit the 97 million mark for monthly active users in 2024, up 24% from 2023, and counted 10 billion streaming hours, 18% more than the year prior. “Tubi’s momentum is growing as audiences increasingly value a premium entertainment experience that is also 100% free, fun and reflective of culture,” said Tubi CEO Anjali Sud. “Our strategy is simple yet powerful: put viewers first by offering unique stories from unique storytellers, a vast selection of content to choose from and a delightful experience across devices. We let our viewers guide us and obsess over their engagement, and we are seeing the results.” Fox Corp. acquired Tubi in 2020 for $440 million.

Xumo, the streaming platform joint venture between Comcast and Charter Communications, has expanded its enterprise partnership with Google TV Freeplay. In addition to distributing all 160+ FAST that are currently offered on Google TV Freeplay, Xumo will now monetize all those channels, which will be branded as “provided by Xumo” within the experience. “Advertisers know that streaming is the future of TV but reaching audiences holistically and at scale remains a challenge that can hinder more media investment,” said Ying Wang, General Manager, Xumo Advertising. “By adding Google TV Freeplay to Xumo’s growing list of inventory partners, we are making it easier than ever for advertisers to seamlessly reach incremental audiences across a variety of streaming platforms, far beyond FAST channels to smart TVs and other connected devices.”

Paramount+ announced the title of its upcoming anthology series that delves into unsolved crimes. The first installment, “Unspeakable: The Murder of Jonbenet Ramsey” (w/t), stars Melissa McCarthy and Clive Owen as Patsy and John Bennett Ramsey. Production for the series, produced by Showtime/MTV Entertainment Studios and 101 Studios, is currently underway in Calgary, Canada and will debut on Paramount+.

Season two of “Gypsy Rose: Life After Lockup” is set to kick off Monday, March 10 at 9p on Lifetime. The reality show follows the post-prison life of a woman convicted of second-degree murder for the death of her abusive mother.

Also at CES, NBCUniversal unveiled new engagement capabilities within its One Platform technology stack as well as success metrics that demonstrate the effectiveness of TV advertising. This comes ahead of a two-year run of English and Spanish-language programming that kicks off this year, and the company’s 100th anniversary in 2026. “Our One Platform ecosystem has maximized our marketers’ reach and scale over the past five years to prove TV is a performance vehicle in a way no other product in the marketplace has,” said Mark Marshall, Chairman, Global Advertising & Partnerships, NBCUniversal. “As we head into our next century, we are kicking off a slate of unrivaled content combined with cutting-edge technology and exceptional end-to-end advertising solutions that will drive demand in new ways and provide long-term viability for our clients.” Among the offerings are new viewer and advertiser experiences on Peacock; more predictive ad models; and the alignment of the emotional metadata of advertiser creative with the emotional metadata of content, using AI and machine-learning.

With 81% of Gen Z video viewers watching videos in vertical or portrait format weekly, and 79% saying adding a shorts feature to a streaming service would increase their weekly streamer app usage (that’s according to GenZ Insights in collaboration with Quickplay and Toluna), OTT solutions provider Quickplay has launched Quickplay Shorts. The new product creates and syndicates vertical short-form content from live and VOD long form video, and a social infinite vertical scroll front-end experience. “Quickplay Shorts redefines the game for streaming providers by seamlessly connecting with existing AV pipelines, enabling real-time delivery of both on-demand and live short-form content, and driving a rich, engaging user interface that enhances viewer engagement and retention,” said Juan Martin, CTO of Quickplay.

For more on CES, keep an eye out for a report slated to land in your inbox this afternoon.

Comcast announced Universal Ads, a platform aimed at simplifying the buying process for advertisers of all sizes. “Universal Ads has been purpose-built in response to what advertisers have been asking from Comcast. That is, make TV simpler to buy, scale and measure in a way that is compatible with the needs of performance marketers, and really, all marketers,” said James Rooke, President, Comcast Advertising. “Comcast has tremendous assets across tech, media and data. Universal Ads brings those assets together in a way that has never been done before.” Launching this quarter, Universal Ads is built on top of FreeWheel’s ad technology. Committed launch partners include A+E, AMC Networks, DirecTV, Fox Corporation, NBCUniversal, Paramount, Roku, TelevisaUnivision, Warner Bros. Discovery, and Xumo.

Cineverse announced that Multicom Entertainment Group has enlisted OTT solution Matchpoint. Cineverse will digitize and distribute Multicom’s catalog of more than 5,000 assets, including the app/channel TheArchive. “Multicom is an ideal partner for our Matchpoint services as a mature media company that is ready to scale and needs our unique technology to expand globally,” said Brandon Topping, Cineverse SVP of SaaS Sales.

Roku introduced Roku Data Cloud, which enables partners to access, analyze, and leverage Roku’s proprietary TV data seamlessly. Roku Data Cloud offers a connection for advertisers, agencies, and partners to receive accurate and reliable information from Roku’s TV operating system, which provides a view of viewership habits, preferences, and identity. It also unearths ad campaign data that informs future strategy across phases of the marketing cycle.

Sinclair’s annual Diversity Scholarship program is now accepting applications for the 2025 academic year. The program has provided nearly $400,000 in tuition assistance since 2013.

Amazon’s Monday move doesn’t sit well with some. “The Upfronts are a longstanding tradition with a set schedule every year that is built on cross-industry collaboration in service of our collective agency and client partners,” said NBCU’s Mark Marshall in a statement to Variety. “The counterprogramming of Upfront events is unfortunate to our agencies and clients.”

Joey King (“A Family Affair”) and Cooper Koch (“Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story”) have been enlisted to reveal the nominees for the 31st Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards® on Wednesday, January 8. The nominations will be streamed on Netflix’s YouTube channel beginning at 10:30a. The ceremony streams on Netflix Sunday, February 23 at 8p.

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The New Jersey Devils and Citizens are now accepting applications for the Jersey Shops presented by Citizens program, an initiative aimed at helping small businesses in the state. New this year, Citizens will provide four selected businesses with $5,000 to support their small business growth, as well as one year of professional support and networking, through Luminary valued at $2,500.

Peter Daboll has joined AI platform DAIVID as Head of US. Daboll was previously CEO of Ace Metrix.

Sherry Pitkofsky has been promoted to SVP of Marketing at Scripps Networks. Pitkofsky had been a VP of Brand Strategy.

Linda Hamilton Daly is leaving Hallmark Media, with the elimination of her job as EVP, Programming. “Hallmark is aligning its consumer-facing touch points, including content, under a single leader, Chief Brand Officer Darren Abbott, with a focus and expertise in the expression of the Hallmark brand to consumers — from product to experiences and now content, across multiple platforms,” said the company in a statement.

Today’s Trivia Question
Which series did Vulture describe as “the prime example of hackneyed, brainless situation comedy”? (Email [email protected] with your answer and be sure to include your name, company, city and time zone. Unofficial rules: a limit of four answers per time zone.)