ITV

Category: Over The Top Services

  • Online presence, a must for TV channels, says PepperMedia’s Radhakrishnan Ramachandran

    Online presence, a must for TV channels, says PepperMedia’s Radhakrishnan Ramachandran

    MUMBAI: Narendra Modi dreams of a ‘Digital India’ as do many others who are working towards achieving the same goal. One of them is PepperMedia founder and CEO Radhakrishnan Ramachandran.

     

    Ramachandran entered the digital space almost 15 years ago, when it was in its nascent stage. With the launch of India Syndicate, which was later followed by iStream.com, Ramachandran has seen the online video segment grow from scratch in India.

     

    “With iStream.com, we ventured into the world of online video segment with Youtube and established a good platform. Through this initiative we helped the likes of MTV and Colors launch their channels on Youtube. We also worked on MSN videos and Yahoo for Yahoo Cricket. We had raised $5 million from SAIF for launching istream.com as a VOD play. However, had to shut it down in 2013 since the second round of funding didn’t  happen. ,” recalls Ramachandran, adding he didn’t lose faith in the medium and went on to launch his third venture, an MCN, (PepperMedia) with personal financial backing.

     

    Talking about the plans ahead, Ramachandaran says, “The next 12-18 months, our focus will be on Youtube because nobody else has been able to crack the model. Of course, we have Netflix and Hulu aboard but in India, it is only Youtube, which has been able to successfully monetise and hence we will focus on that.”

     

    In the online video segment, where monetisation is the biggest challenge, consumption pattern has changed over the years. Making revenue with plans in place, a startup focused on creating original online video content and building video solutions for brands and media entities, aims to marry content and technology. To achieve the same, PepperMedia recently appointed Milind Naik as its director of technology.

     

    “If you are looking at building a sustainable business model in the MCN space, technology is one of the core accelerators. It will play a key role in simplifying the model for brand managers, by helping them analyse the impact of their video campaigns on platforms like Youtube,” says Ramachandran. He adds, “Our team is building tools, which will help brands monetise.”

     

    The startup is looking at enhancing the MCN model by bringing together TV networks, celebrities, content creators and brands.

     

    “We are powering TV networks on the digital world as we offer them end-to-end solutions and have revenue sharing deal with them. We hope to rope in celebs and create content with them for the virtual world. Content creators are someone, who have the talent to become stars online across languages and platforms,” Ramachandran says.

     

    He further draws concern over the critical issue of getting brands associated with the entire network. “There are two business models – one, the more views you get on Youtube, the more money you get out of it. Second, can we also have a premium model where you can get brands to marry with the content? So, that will be the primary area of focus,” he informs.

     

    For instance, in July 2014, the company had partnered with fashion retail major Megamart to launch an online reality show for designers. Titled ‘Megamart Fashion Designer of the Year,’ the show aimed at discovering the top talent in the fashion designing space in the country.

     

    Being part of the online video ecosystem for a long time now, Ramachandran believes that it is the company’s job to lure brands to open their minds and their purses. “It would mean building tools that would help brands build engaged audiences and monitor their influence metrics. It would also mean creating customised decks for brands that would help them analyse the impact of their video campaigns on platforms like YouTube,” he states.

     

    Nonetheless, he is happy that things have changed and continue to move towards a better phase. Recalling earlier days, Ramachandaran says, “In 2008-2009, it was very difficult to convince TV channels to put their content online. But today most of them have their own video-on-demand platforms. Its good to know that they have realised if they don’t take this route, there is bound to be trouble in the future.”

     

    Citing the example of the West, Ramachandaran believes that over the coming years, the number of people watching content on television will also decrease. “As more and more people consume content on mobile, especially regional content, VoD needs to be on everyone’s game plan and need to tweak their strategy to suit the consumer,” he advises.

     

    Though there is a huge gap between the West and India’s online monetisation system, there is hope as investors are showing interest in the transparent medium. To build sustainable and monetisable concepts, products and global audiences, the year 2015 will play an important role in PepperMedia’s future plans. “If we get brands on board and have the best technology to do so, then MCN will soon go through a purple patch in our country too,” he concludes.

     

     

  • MPA report values Asia Pacific online video revenue opportunity at $12 billion by 2020

    MPA report values Asia Pacific online video revenue opportunity at $12 billion by 2020

    MUMBAI: A research report published by Media Partners Asia (MPA) indicates that the total market for online video services across 13 countries in Asia Pacific will grow from $3.5 billion in net revenues in 2014 to reach $12.4 billion by 2020, representing an average annual growth of 23.5 per cent. Advertising will contribute more than 80 per cent to the online video pie by 2020 with the subscription revenue opportunity, largely driven by subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) platforms, growing from less than $700 million in 2014 to more than $2.3 billion by 2020.

    The report, entitled ‘Asia Pacific Online Video Distribution 2015’, evaluates  the commercial distribution of legal over-the-top (OTT) video services in 13 markets with historical data and forecasts plus profiles of key OTT platforms.

    Commenting on the report, MPA executive director Vivek Couto said, “The market for the legal consumption of OTT services in Asia Pacific is at an early stage with monetisation models nascent in most countries. As barriers to entry reduce and broadband penetration increases, more disruptors are emerging and host of new platforms are proliferating, though business models are not always scalable and issues such as piracy; content; and platform operation remain problematic. This is especially true in a number of Asian markets where piracy is significant and the limited scale of OTT video revenues are not commensurate with content costs.”

    “Meanwhile, large scale global digital brands (from YouTube to Netflix) are expanding rapidly in a number of Asian markets or readying to launch in key territories over 2015 and 2016. Major local and regional television companies are also in the early stages of launching a number of large scale advertising and subscription based OTT platforms, anchored to local, Asian and Hollywood content while telecom operators are either moving upstream into content and OTT services or providing a crucial link for the ecosystem,” he added.

    Key takeouts from the report include:

    •    Infrastructure. Fixed broadband subscribers reached 325.3 million in 2014 across Asia Pacific, equivalent to an average household penetration rate of 36 per cent. By 2020, MPA projections indicate that this penetration level will reach 40 per cent as fixed broadband subs grow to 403.5 million mobile broadband will grow rapidly, expanding at CAGR of 15 per cent over 2014 and 2020 to reach almost 2 billion subs by 2020 (58 per cent penetration of population) versus 866 million (26 per cent penetration) in 2014.

     

    •    OTT Video Consumption. Active Asia Pacific OTT video subscribers reached 594 million in 2014, according to MPA. China accounted for more 85 per cent of the market size in 2014 and will represent 80 per cent by 2020. Ex-China, the largest markets in 2014 were Korea; India; Japan; and Hong Kong. By 2020, MPA projections indicate that active OTT video customers will reach 977 million. By 2020, in Asia ex-China, India will emerge as the second largest market, followed by Korea, Japan and Hong Kong. In Southeast Asia, Malaysia will be joined by Indonesia and the Philippines as market leaders.  

    The market for subscription-based OTT video reached 75.3 million active subscribers in 2014 and is expected to reach 225 million by 2020. China will be the largest contributor, driven by internet-enabled TV and set-top box platforms and online video companies offering premium services. Japan, Korea, India and Australia will emerge as material opportunities, powered by SVOD but India will trend towards more a freemium-oriented model.

    •    Industry economics. MPA divides industry monetization models into distinct segments:

    o    SVOD.  In terms of SVOD revenue across OTT platforms, the largest markets in Asia Pacific by 2020 will be Japan; China; Korea; and Australia. New Zealand and India will lead the next best placed group of geographies. MPA projections indicate that total SVOD-based OTT revenues in Asia Pacific will grow at a CAGR of 16 per cent between 2014 and 2020, growing from $953 million in 2014 to more than $2.3 billion by 2020.

    o    Online video and OTT advertising. Asia Pacific online video advertising exceeded US$3.7 billion in net terms in 2014, up 35 per cent year-on-year. The largest markets for online video advertising in 2014 were, by far, China and Japan, followed by Australia, India and Korea. By 2020, the total Asia Pacific online vide advertising pie is expected to grow to $10 billion, a CAGR of 18 per cent from 2014, with China dominant, followed by Japan and Australia. India will gain increasing scale and overtake Korea while Indonesia will be the clear leader in Southeast Asia.

    OTT video advertising revenue, a subset of the online video advertising pie, reached $2.1 billion in 2014, up 43 per cent year-on-year from a low base, and almost entirely driven by China. This pie, is projected by MPA to expand to $5.5 billion by 2020 at a CAGR of ~18 per cent. China will be the largest contributor with India, Korea and Indonesia starting to become gradually significant over time.

  • Broadcom India eyes huge growth potential in cable broadband & OTT services

    Broadcom India eyes huge growth potential in cable broadband & OTT services

    KOLKATA: With digital television (DTV) and digitisation, household penetration is increasing in the country. “There exists tremendous opportunities for cable broadband and over-the-top (OTT) services”, opines Broadcom India managing director Rajiv Kapur.
     
     “The over-the-top television market may still be in its infancy in India, but it holds much promise for the future. The demand for OTT is going up. There are progressive operators who have been talking about value-added services. Internet entertainment on TV is on the rise,” says Kapur.
     
    Looking ahead, “one can see existing television sets transformed into smart TVs, enabling internet applications everywhere in the home,” adds Kapur. “We are expanding the options for entertainment in the home.  We are revolutionizing television by providing a full-range of platform solutions for content-sharing and video streaming throughout the home,” he further informs.
     
    Broadcom’s video and broadband solutions enables service providers offer a high-quality, TV-watching experience to its subscribers along with high-speed internet browsing.
     
    He went on to explain Broadcom’s role in OTT and broadband services through Set Top Boxes (STBs). Kapur says that the company constantly educates and trains various operators on the OTT services.
     
    India is currently witnessing the digitisation of analog cable TV signals as mandated by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (I&B). With digitisation, analog cable subscribers have been also migrating largely to digital cable, which has gained about 10 million subscribers in 2013, while net DTH subscribers increased by approximately three million.
     
    Post digitisation, while the viewing experience and expectations of the subscribers are soaring, it has also increased the demand for high-speed broadband.
     
    As per the Cisco Visual Networking Index 2014, in India, mobile data traffic will grow by a colossal 24-fold from 2013 to 2018, a Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of 88 per cent and Internet-Video-to-TV traffic will increase 8-fold between 2013 and 2018 (50.9 per cent CAGR).
     
    “Consumers are now more acutely aware about the content on their portable devices and the TV”, he further adds.
     
    As the users evolve with digital content streamed to them, the demand for OTT services increases.
     
    It should also be noted that in a report borne out by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) survey, it forecasts 176 million OTT viewers by 2015 generating revenues of $552 million.

     

    Moreover, Morgan Stanley, a multinational financial services company, projects in its report that mobile data subscribers in India are likely to grow on an average by 25 per cent every year to reach 519 million by fiscal 2018, driven by falling handset prices and rise in smart phone usage and penetration.

     

    ‘With Wi-Fi internet access, end-users are looking for enhanced ways to communicate with large format screens too,” S Rajagopalan, a media analyst opines.

     

    “With this, users can also use Smart TV, though the interface is not user-friendly. The manufacturer, therefore, has to innovate with the interface, such as Flex Smartphone or Bluetooth / Wi-Fi-enabled keyboard to be integrated, which will grab the attention of the end-user. Maybe over a period of time, Smart TV will be preferred by the end-user to laptops, which will lead to more speed and bandwidth in the broadband segment,” concludes Rajagopalan.

  • Dish Network launches Sling TV for on the go devices including tablets and smartphones

    Dish Network launches Sling TV for on the go devices including tablets and smartphones

    BENGALURU: Sling TV L.L.C., a subsidiary of Dish Network Corporation announced that it will launch Sling TV, a live, over-the-top television service, to customers in the US, in the first quarter of 2015. Sling TV will deliver live sports, lifestyle, family, news and information channels, Video-On-Demand entertainment and the best of online video to broadband-connected devices at home and on-the-go. Priced at US$20 per month, the service will require no commitment, contract, credit check or hardware installation, says a Dish Network release.

    At launch, subscribers can watch live TV by downloading the app to supported versions of iOS and Android, or by visiting the upcoming Sling website from Macs and PCs. Sling TV is designed to deliver a high-quality television experience inside and outside the home, anywhere a wired, Wi-Fi or mobile broadband connection is available. The service is delivered over an IP-based content delivery system that leverages adaptive bitrate streaming technology. This allows for the highest quality streaming experience possible regardless of network quality fluctuations or location says Dish Networks.

    “Sling TV provides a viable alternative for live television to the millennial audience,” said Dish Network President and CEO Joseph P Clayton. “This service gives millions of consumers a new consideration for pay-TV; Sling TV fills a void for an underserved audience.”

    “Consumers can now watch their favourite shows on their favourite devices that they already use to watch video. Live television, including ESPN, for $20 per month with no commitment or contract, is a game changer,” said Sling TV CEO Roger Lynch. “The arrival of Sling TV lets consumers, who’ve embraced services like Netflix and Hulu, take more control of their video entertainment experience.”

    Supported internet-connected devices for Sling TV are expected to include Amazon Fire TV, Amazon Fire TV Stick, Google’s Nexus Player, select LG Smart TVs, Roku players, Roku TV models, select Samsung Smart TVs, Xbox One, iOS, Android, Mac and PC. Sling TV expects to announce its availability on additional streaming devices and smart TVs in the coming months.

    At launch, Sling TV is offering a core programming package with live and Video-On-Demand shows, sports, movies and online video, as well as two optional add-on packs. Customers will be able to pause, rewind and fast-forward most live channels and Video-On-Demand content. For certain channels, the service includes a 3-day replay feature that gives customers the ability to watch some shows that have aired in the past three days; no DVR is needed. Sling TV’s features are available across all supported platforms.

    Priced at US$ 20 per month, ‘The Best of Live TV’ core package includes 12 Nielsen-rated sports, lifestyle, family and news networks: ESPN, ESPN2, TNT, TBS, Food Network, HGTV, Travel Channel, Adult Swim, Cartoon Network, Disney Channel, ABC Family and CNN. This package additionally features an array of Video-On-Demand entertainment and the best of online video with unique content from Maker Studios, the global leader in online short-form video.

    Consumers can tailor their experience with add-on packs for access to additional programming, at US$ 5 per month. Sling TV will offer a ‘Kids Extra’ add-on with Disney Junior, Disney XD, Boomerang, Baby TV and Duck TV, and a ‘News & Info Extra’ add-on with HLN, Cooking Channel, DIY and Bloomberg TV. A ‘Sports Extra’ package is coming soon says the company. Sling TV expects to expand its core package, Video-On-Demand content, online video and add-on packs throughout 2015.
     
    Sling TV is an emerging over-the-top service that is independent from Sling Media’s line of Slingbox products and services. Sling Media is the leading provider of multi-screen TV solutions giving consumers the ability to access their live and recorded traditional pay-TV service anywhere in the world, on any connected device.
     

     

  • Spuul adds ‘Mardaani’

    Spuul adds ‘Mardaani’

    MUMABI: Spuul, the popular online streaming service for Indian cinema and television, is proud to have added ‘Mardaani’ on pay-per-view to their movie catalogue offered via subscription services.

     

    ‘Mardaani’ is the story of a cop, Shivani Shivaji Roy (Rani Mukerji), who confronts the mastermind behind a child trafficking mafia. The mafia kingpin makes the mistake of kidnapping and smuggling a teenage girl, Pyari, out of the city. What follows is a cat-and-mouse game between the fearless cop and the ruthless mafia don in a very personal war. Rani Mukerji plays an edge of the seatrole of a lifetime, in this raw and gritty film, which is a distinct departure from Pradeep Sarkar’s style of filmmaking.

     

    At a time when there’s rampant violence against women, this movie is a must-watch for everyone.

     

    Spuul users worldwide can watch this crime drama on all second screen devices including mobile, tablets, web, smart TVs, as well as stream to their TVs via Chromecast.

     

    Speaking on this development, Spuul Chief Content Officer Prakash Ramchandani said, “We are delighted to make the latest movies easily accessible for our users. The release of Mardaani this festive season reiterates our commitment to providing the best content to our subscribers.”

     

    “A digital distribution platform like Spuul provides us a window to connect with all YRF movie lovers and enables access of our film catalogue by allowing a real movie watching experience anytime and anywhere, as per our viewer’s convenience,” said Yash Raj Films Vice President – Digital Anand Gurnani.

     

    Spuul, standing by its promise of delivering diverse content to its users, has been adding new-age movies and TV show such as Ankhon Dekhi, Main Tera Hero, Queen, Gunday, Bigg Boss 8 hosted by Salman Khan, and many more. Spuul users can also access hassle-free entertainment at home or while travelling with free offline download. We are working behind the scenes to bring you the best in Indian entertainment so stay tuned for more!

     

  • Zenga strikes gold again; brings home two honours

    Zenga strikes gold again; brings home two honours

    NEW DELHI: Zenga Media has received awards for Best Mobile & Web TV and Best Engagement App “Sunny Leone” along with the Integrated Marketing at the 2nd Asian Customer Engagement Forum & Awards.

     The customer engagement forum, founded in 2012-13, is one of Asia’s largest communities of customer engagement and advocacy professionals, including the most innovative practitioners around.

    Zenga Media which is the exclusive digital rights holder of Sunny Leone in India, creating and managing Sunny Leone’s official mobile app has showcased its excellence by winning Best Engagement App.

     

    The thought behind Celebrity Fan Engagement App was based on the fact that people are used to handheld devices like smart phones and tablets for close interaction and direct engagement. This is a space Zenga Media decided to look closely at helping celebrities reach out to their fan keeping in mind a direct interaction and gratification to the followership that these celebrities have.

     Sunny Leone said, “I am excited to receive an award for the Best Engagement App at the 2ndAsian Customer Engagement Forum & Awards. The app provides an entire new way for me to communicate with my fans and give them a new and unique content experience! I am really thankful to ZengaTV and OneDigital team to have closely worked with me in creating something which is loved by my fans and helping me stay in touch with my fans. ”

    The award winning Sunny Leone application is available for all iOS, windows and android mobile and Tab users. Fans can download this free of cost from iTunes App Store for iPhone/ iPad and Google Play for android users and windows store for windows users.

    “While the idea was big, the challenge was to create a first of its kind app, bridging the gap between the celebrity and fans. This app offers opportunity for her fans to stay in touch with her through live interactions apart from new videos, images and wallpaper on Sunny Leone. The integrated approach adopted by our team for the web and mobile TV led to the great success of the Zenga App, while the team also works on building direct engagement with fans through her Facebook, YouTube channel and ZengaTV channel. It’s a great feeling to win an award particularly because it recognizes our innovative approach that the brand stands for in each area, be it in product development or marketing.  Kudos to the team for bringing this honour and setting an example in taking customer engagement to the next level” said ZengaTV & OneDigital Entertainment MD & CTO Shabir Momin.

     

  • Ditto TV partners with Hull to power customer engagement

    Ditto TV partners with Hull to power customer engagement

     MUMBAI: Ditto TV, a distribution platform from Zee New Media, the digital arm of Zee Entertainment Enterprises Limited (ZEEL) has announced its partnership with the unified customer engagement platform, Hull to strengthen its customer engagement activities.

    The partnership with Hull will provide unified identity management, cross-domain single sign-on, social login and engagement mechanics across their next-generation iOS, Android and Web applications users. These features will be available to Ditto TV’s over one million registered customer base and a potential audience of 700 million plus.

    On this development, Ditto TV business head Manoj Padmanabhan said, “We chose Hull because they were ahead of the competition with their ability to offer a single interface to all customer interaction across every device, their quick turnaround, high availability, and rich feature set.”

    Hull was competing against many different solution providers including in-house development and bagged the partnership thanks to its affordable price, scalability, flexibility and rich feature set, making it the best choice to quickly build a large-scale unified user experience across all of Ditto TV’s platforms.

     

    “We are pleased to have Zee Entertainment utilizing our Hull connected consumer platform as a central hub that gathers all data into a unified user profile and enables multi-channel communication,” commented Hull president & CEO Stefan Koenig.

     

  • Qyuki and Fullscreen join forces to enhance opportunities for content creators

    Qyuki and Fullscreen join forces to enhance opportunities for content creators

    MUMBAI: Qyuki, a multichannel network founded by Shekhar Kapur, Samir Bangara and A. R. Rahman and global youth media company Fullscreen, has announced an exclusive alliance that becomes one of India’s multichannel networks.

    Indian creators in the Qyuki-Fullscreen network will receive opportunities to develop, monetise and distribute their content and leverage technology, production and optimisation of services from both networks.

    Speaking about the development Qyuki co-founder and managing director Sanir Bangara said, “The internet is about collaboration and as we build out our vision to create the largest online media company for Indian youth, we believe we have found a great partner in Fullscreen which will enable us to not only grow the Indian market rapidly but also present Indian talent at a global scale”.

    Indian creators will have access to Fullscreen’s tools and services that intersect every aspect of their careers. Its proprietary technology, the ‘Creator Platform’, offers production, audience development and measurement tools.

     Fullscreen president Ezra Cooperstein commented, “Qyuki has built a strong network and content studio featuring some of India’s most creative and acclaimed talent in music and storytelling. This partnership will strengthen our global creator network and further empower the next generation of Indian creators with Fullscreen’s global best practices in content creation and monetisation.”

    Marquee creators in the Qyuki network include AR Rahman, Ranjit Barot, Salim-Sulaiman, and YouTubers Shraddha Sharma, Gaurav Dagaonkar and Siddharth Slathia, amongst several others.

     

  • Ditto TV offers discounts during GOSF

    Ditto TV offers discounts during GOSF

    MUMBAI: This holiday season, Ditto TV will offer exclusive discounts through their alliance with Great Online Shopping Festival (GOSF).  

    Ditto TV, India’s first OTT (Over-The-Top) TV distribution platform from Zee New Media, the digital arm of Zee Entertainment Enterprises Limited (ZEEL), hosts 150 channels across leading genres and rich on-demand video content globally. Today, the platform has over 5 million users.

     

    Through the GOSF association, Ditto TV will give subscribers a flat 70 per cent off on the yearly subscription pack of Rs 1099 which will be available for Rs 299 starting from 10 to 12 December 2014.

    To ease the payment system, Ditto TV will offer cash on delivery. Subscribers can also pay online through net banking using the promo code: GOSF299.

    The users will have access to its content library of over 150 live television channels and more than 10,000 hours of videos, TV shows and Bollywood movies.

    Ditto TV business head Manoj Padmanabhan said, “GOSF is one of the most popular online shopping festivals which draws the interests of a large number of people across the country. Through this association we are confident of gaining access to a wide user base, and a hitherto untapped audience for Ditto TV. Introducing them to LIVE TV and Video on Demand (VOD) through varied Internet enabled devices.”

    Ditto TV, which was set up in February 2012, has partnered for content with IndiaCast, Multi Screen Media (Sony Entertainment Television), Bennett Coleman & Co. Ltd., TV Today Network, BBC, Turner India, Bikini TV, ZEE etc.

     

  • Netflix CEO Reed Hastings believes free-to-air TV will be extinct by 2030

    Netflix CEO Reed Hastings believes free-to-air TV will be extinct by 2030

    NEW DELHI: At a time when Prasar Bharati CEO has said Doordarshan’s future lies in Freedish, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings has said that “the age of broadcast TV will probably last until 2030.”

     

    Speaking at a Netflix event in Mexico City, Hastings compared broadcast television to the horse and cart and said it will simply be a ‘casualty of evolution’. “It’s kind of like the horse, you know, the horse was good until we had the car,” he commented. Hastings has expressed his thoughts on the death of linear TV before, predicting in April 2013 that it would be replaced by online TV.

     

    The current model of TV programming distribution will be broken and non-existent within the next decade and a half, he further said.

     

    Hastings told reporters that he thinks the current system where television channels are grouped into free-to-air network television and premium cable channels is becoming obsolete.

     

    Recent data suggests Netflix makes up more than a third of all internet traffic in North America during peak periods. That’s far more than any other source, and an indication of the type of heft that the once upstart company now has in the content game.

     

    Netflix no longer breaks out its Canadian subscriber numbers separately, but boasts more than 34 million households in the United States— comparable to the reach of many television networks.

     

    To keep up with that growth and pay for exclusive content like Orange Is the New Black, the company recently announced a price increase of between $1 and $2 a month for new customers.

     

    The company showed off its disruptive influence in the industry in the summer in a testy exchange between a Netflix executive and the CRTC, which was demanding that the company hand over reams of subscriber data — something the company says it has no legal obligation to do.

     

    That exchange came as the regulator was looking into changing the rules on “bundling” cable whereby customers are forced to pay for packages of channels — as opposed to picking and choosing the ones they want.

     

    Although Netflix is the giant of the streaming space, others exist. Earlier this year Rogers and Shaw launched Shomi, a streaming service that’s meant to rival Netflix.

     

    Ratings company, Nielsen, is going to start tracking Netflix viewing in its ratings numbers, something it hasn’t done before.

     

    Although Netflix likes to boast about the popularity of its shows, Hastings downplayed the significance of Nielsen’s move because, by the company’s own admission, it will not include mobile usage.

     

    “It’s not very relevant,” Hastings said and added, “There’s so much viewing that happens on a mobile phone or an iPad that (the new ratings]) won’t capture.”