Boy, has the entertainment world changed!
If we were to tell you 10 years ago that J.J. Abrams was producing an adaptation of a Stephen King novel, and that the project starred James Franco as an English teacher who goes back in time to prevent the assassination of John F. Kennedy, you would almost certainly assume that a major movie studio (Fox, Sony, Universal, etc.) or a major network (CBS, NBC, ABC, etc.) was on board.
Fast-forward to today and it’s Hulu that holds the rights to this story and the streaming giant just released the first trailer for the upcoming “eight-part event series” titled 11-22-63.
While it’s sort of ironic that the powers that be decided to release this on 11-19-15 instead of 11-22-15, the short spot packs quite the dramatic punch and certainly boasts an interesting premise. You can thank famed horror maven Stephen King for that, as the series is based on his novel of the same name.
Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush made news recently by suggesting that — if given the opportunity — he would travel back in time and kill baby Hitler. “Would you go back in time to save JFK?” is sort of the more positive, less creepy version of what has become an popular hypothetical.
Academy Award-winning Director Kevin Macdonald (Last King of Scotland, State of Play) directed the first two hours of the series and — given the level of talent involved with this project — anything but a home run for Hulu here would just feel a touch disappointing.
We’ll see soon enough as 11-22-63 is — appropriately enough — scheduled for a Presidents Day (February 15, 2016) release.
The miniseries also stars Chris Cooper (The Bourne Identity), Josh Duhamel (Transformers), Sarah Gadon (The Amazing Spider-Man 2), and T.R. Knight (42).
Some of the best shots in Grok Imagine’s AI-made Odyssey don’t contain actors. Ancient landscapes stretch into the distance. Close-ups of grimy hands suggest people who have touched something rougher than a keyboard. For a few seconds, the illusion holds.
https://twitter.com/imagine/status/2113712964419063911
YouTube videos could soon look better without eating quite so much data, right? Thankfully, the platform plans to introduce a new video format called AV2 on its web player in early 2027, promising more efficient streaming and potentially fewer playback hiccups on slower internet connections. The big headline is a roughly 30% improvement in compression efficiency over AV1, YouTube's existing video format. That doesn't guarantee every video will use 30% less data, but it could make streaming a little easier on both internet connections and data allowances.
What is AV2, and why should viewers care?
YouTube is changing how its Home page works, giving viewers more control over what shows up there and making some of the app’s most-used sections easier to reach. Custom Feeds are now replacing the existing topic chips for eligible users, while YouTube is also testing a redesigned top bar on mobile that moves Subscriptions closer to the Home feed.
YouTube first started experimenting with Custom Feeds earlier this year, letting you type out what you wanted to watch and turning that request into its own stream of recommendations. Now, the feature is starting to look less like a side experiment and more like something YouTube actually wants people to use as part of their everyday Home page.