Nintendo, Ad Firm Plan Wii Video Service

By Geoff Duncan Published December 26, 2008

Nintendo, Ad Firm Plan Wii Video Service

Dentsu, Inc., Japan’s largest advertising agency, has said it is partnering with Nintendo to create a video distribution service for the popular Wii gaming console. However, unlike video offerings already on the market for the computing PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 consoles, the Wii video service will (at least initially) offer original programming created specifically for the service, rather than carrying existing television, movie, and video programming from third parties.

The companies plan to begin offering the video service in Japan in 2009; no plans have been announced for bringing the service to other markets.

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The companies also have not decided what sort of programming the service will offer, but a Dentsu spokesperson indicated the company plans to offer some programming for free on an ad-supported basis when the service launches, with other programming becoming available later for a fee. The daily newspaper Nikkei has speculated (subscription required) cartoons and other family-oriented programming would be among the first offerings on the service. Nikkei also speculated that the service would launch outside the Japanese market in late 2009.

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Geoff Duncan writes, programs, edits, plays music, and delights in making software misbehave. He's probably the only member…

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AT&T is renaming its streaming video service yet again

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AT&T is going to rename its streaming video services, which include AT&T TV, AT&T TV Now, and AT&T Watch TV, to "DirecTV Stream" on August 26, according to The Verge. Why the name change? It appears to be part of an effort to establish a new brand for the company's video properties, which were formally spun off into a new company earlier in August.

And while that might be a perfectly legitimate reason to change the service's name, it's enough to make our heads spin. Since 2019, AT&T has engaged in a confusing set of product launches and rebranding efforts that have used both AT&T and DirecTV names. The company's original effort at a cable TV alternative streaming service was called DirecTV Now. You could use it with your existing broadband internet connection and it didn't require a set-top box. This service was rebranded as AT&T TV Now, but ended up eventually being absorbed by AT&T TV, a service that still delivered live TV content over the internet, but required a dedicated Android TV set-top box, making it the logical successor to AT&T's U-verse TV service. All the while, the company kept alive its AT&T Watch TV service, which is a very lightweight package of more than 35 live TV channels.

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Streaming services are the ‘Wild West’ for political ads, report finds

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Many political ads that appear on your streaming services aren't being fact-checked and could help spread misinformation without being taken down, a new report from the Mozilla Foundation has found.

Researchers at Mozilla found that six major streaming services — YouTube TV, Hulu, Tubi, Sling, Roku, and CBS All Access — are, by and large, incredibly unclear about what political ads they allow and how they may or may not vet them.

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Everything coming to Peacock, NBCUniversal’s streaming video service

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The streaming landscape will get a little more crowded this year with the arrival of Peacock, the streaming video service that launched in April from media conglomerate Comcast's NBCUniversal. The service is currently available to some Comcast TV subscribers, but when it goes public July 15 it will offer multiple tiers of free and subscription-based plans offering access to a library of new and classic movies and TV series, from original projects to fan-favorite sitcoms and films.

With so many streaming services currently available and upcoming, it can be difficult to decide which ones to invest in -- and what you get for your money can be as important a factor in that decision as how much you spend. In order to make that choice a little easier, we've put together a list of everything expected to be available on Peacock through 2021.