Millennials
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Quibi is remaking ‘Legends of the Hidden Temple’ for adults
Clearly, nostalgia can be profitable. Disney used it to create hype around its Disney+ streaming service, and within a day of launch, Disney+ had more than 10 million subscribers. Now, Quibi is using nostalgia to its benefit. According to a tweet, Quibi is rebooting the once-popular Nickelodeon show Legends of the Hidden Temple.
Samsung's foldable smartphone teased for November reveal
Samsung's foldable smartphone has been in the works for years, but now it looks like we're finally going to get a sneak peek of the technology within the next couple of months. Speaking to CNBC at the IFA electronics show in Berlin last week, Samsung Mobile's CEO DJ Koh said it's "time to deliver" on the long-promised device, and that it could be unveiled at the Samsung Developer Conference in November. Strong emphasis on the could, though -- Samsung does have a history of bigging up its plans.
Walmart's Jet.com has its own grocery brand just for millennials
Walmart has been battling it out with Amazon for some time now and last year it purchased Jet.com to give it an online edge. At the time, Walmart said that the acquisition would bring "fresh ideas and expertise, as well as an attractive brand with proven appeal, especially for millennials." Now it's using Jet.com to actively target "metro millennials," whatever those are, with a new grocery brand called Uniquely J.
Tumblr's mobile apps finally have photo filters and stickers
In a move possibly inspired by Snapchat, or even Instagram, Tumblr is bringing photo filters and stickers to its iOS and Android apps. But that's not it: The feature will also work with GIF posts, which is going to let you spice up your feed even more than you already are. Tumblr says you can choose from over 100 "extremely relevant" stickers, so you shouldn't have a problem finding one that fits the message you're trying to get across. And fret not if you don't see these in your Tumblr app yet, as the update just started rolling out today to the App Store and Google Play.
Comcast's Watchable streaming app adds new exclusive series
Even cable giant Comcast has to pay attention to internet viewers, and last year it launched an interesting YouTube-like site called Watchable. Packed with content from creators including Buzzfeed and Vice it took aim directly at the very millennials that might not have cable at all, and now Comcast is trying harder to attract those viewers by offering several free new shows that are exclusive to Watchable. Oddly, probably because the site is not called "embeddable," we'll have to show you the trailers for its original programming on YouTube.
Verizon's video service sidesteps Verizon's bandwidth caps
Engadget's parent company Verizon is taking a page from T-Mobile's playbook and proving that it really doesn't care about net neutrality. The latest update to its Go90 video streaming app makes it so watching the company's content won't count toward a Verizon customer's 4G LTE data cap. This is bad for a few reasons. Some of the content on Big Red's app is shared among other services (Lifehacker's example is The Daily Show), but watching it anywhere but Go90 will eat into your monthly data allotment. Which isn't fair. At all.
Millennials are watching video on tablets and computers more than TVs
Apparently kids these days prefer to watch shows and movies on things other than a TV. According to a new study by Deloitte, 56 percent of "training millennials" (people ages 14-24) are tuning in to their favorite shows on computers, smartphones, tablets and gaming devices rather than a television. The majority, 32 percent, are watching on their computers, while just 7 percent are keeping up with the Kardashians on their tablets. That's a huge contrast from grandma's "mature" 67+ age group where a whopping 92 percent of viewers are still watching the tube the traditional way, and even a noticeable difference from millennials ages 25-30 where 53 percent of viewers are still cuddling up in their Snuggies in front of a traditional set. If the trend continues, all those 4K TV makers might need to look at focusing their efforts on something a little smaller instead.
The Daily Grind: Are MMO gamers aging out of the genre?
In a recent report, Resident Evil developer Capcom claimed that its playerbase's average age is inching upward and its core users are in their late 30s and 40s, making for the "increasing possibility that some percentage of the existing users will outgrow games altogether." The Resident Evil games aren't MMOs, of course, but journalists and commenters have been suggesting the same pattern for the MMORPG genre for years as a way to explain everything from the rise of "accessible" MMOs to the reduction of grindy time-consuming gameplay to themes seemingly catering to those darn kids on our lawn. Perhaps armchair demographers are wrong and the future holds the promise of retirement homes filled with gaming rigs and World of Warcraft IV. What do you think -- are classic MMO gamers slowly aging out of the genre? Is MMO gaming something we "outgrow," or is it something we're ultimately pushed away from? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
Motorola rings millennials overseas for media survey
Motorola already sent out its dutiful survey team to pick the brains of millennials (ages 16 to 27) in the US, but now those same folks have infiltrated nations across the pond. Somewhat surprisingly, the results were mighty similar, even though Europe is notorious for buying HDTVs and not the HDTV programming to go along with it. Still, some 78% of the 1,200 surveyed confirmed that they would prefer a TV program to restart the moment they switched over, leading us to believe that only 22% enjoy showing up to a movie that has already started. Also curious was the fact that 53% of respondents in the UAE said they "loved HD content," yet the region is just now starting to see high-def material from broadcasters. Anywho, the read link has lots and lots of numbers if you care to humor yourself, but the real comedy is in the Millennial Generation video after the jump.
RCN bringing HDTV to student residence in New York City
We told you that kids these days had it made, didn't we? The latest episode of college students getting more than just ample amounts of study time comes courtesy of RCN, which is delivering triple-play services to student residence rooms at 1760 Third Avenue in Manhattan, New York. The agreement with Educational Housing Services will enable the carrier to offer high-speed internet, digital phone and HD programming to over 1,100 students representing "a variety of institutions of higher learning, including LIM (Laboratory Institute of Merchandising)." U-verse in a University of Houston dorm, RCN here -- what's next, FiOS TV in Corvallis?
Second Life's generation gap
By now, if you've been keeping track of the metrics, it should come as no surprise to you that Linden Lab's virtual environment Second Life is dominated by Generation X and Baby Boomers. Generation Y (also popularly called Millennials) don't make much of a mark on the landscape of Second Life at all. While the boxing and labeling of generations in this fashion seems a little arbitrary, it is commonly done as demographers identify various key socio-cultural differences between the groups, though the edge-cases between them, of course, tend to be a bit blurry -- and everyone, of course, is an individual. The Metaverse Journal's Feldspar Epstein looks at assorted issues with the use of Second Life and education as it pertains to Millenials. In a broader social context, however, the generation gap between the Boomers/GenXers and the Millennials is starkly apparent. Millennials consistently number among the least active users of Second Life. The Baby Boomers dominate the virtual environment's usage landscape, followed closely by the Generation Xers. Are you a part of the most widely-known collaborative virtual environment or keeping a close eye on it? Massively's Second Life coverage keeps you in the loop.
Colleges throwing in high-def amenities to lure in millennials
College ain't what it used to be, but in far too many instances, the dorm rooms provide an unwanted look at how it was many, many decades ago. In order to lure more students to campus (and prevent too many from parking their keisters in off-site apartments), a number of universities are revamping their housing facilities to cater to millennials. We've already seen the University of Houston hook one of its residence halls up with U-verse, and a recent writeup on the matter reports on the plans of a number of institutions to include HDTVs and other tech-related gear in order to warm the hearts of gadget-loving freshmen. We have to say, our minuscule dorm in the heart of Raleigh barely had room for a 19-inch CRT back in the day, but we may have chose to stick there longer than a single semester had a 42-inch flat-panel greeted us on move-in day.[Image courtesy of Flickr]
Motorola study finds millennials hungry for VOD
Kids these days -- understanding way more than their parents do about all this newfangled technology. Shortly after hearing that millennials were entirely more savvy about emerging TV technologies than the older crowd, a new study commissioned by Motorola has found that this same demographic (ages 16 to 27) is starved for video-on-demand. Beyond that, the 1,000 person study discovered that 62% had "influence over which HDTV set and programming package to buy," while 70% felt that "their expectations and demands are far greater than their parents' for rich media experiences." The report also found some pretty interesting figures dealing with transferring media from DVRs to portable devices (among other things), so be sure and dig into the read link below if you're a sucker for stats.
Report shows millennials more savvy about emerging TV technologies
Let's be honest -- we all understand that the younger set is entirely more likely to dig (i.e. understand) emerging technologies compared to those who've been around for a few more decades, but a new survey commissioned by Hallmark Channel confirms everything you've been assuming. Reportedly, just 31-percent of millennials (primarily in the 18 - 34 media target) found "new television technologies" to be complicated versus 55-percent of baby boomers. Furthermore, nearly half of those in the former category use their DVR regularly while just a quarter of boomers do so. Humorously enough, a staggering 87-percent of the millennials surveyed said that they "regularly fast-forward through commercials," and we can certainly raise our glasses to that. Laugh while you still can, young ones -- one day you'll be calling your kids to get the remote working with your 19-year old BD-UP5000.[Image courtesy of Chris's Picasa Gallery]
