Instagram launches IGTV in ‘challenge’ to YouTube

ATT unveils new TV service

SAN FRANCISCO, June 21, (AP): Facebook’s Instagram app is loosening its restraints on video in an attempt to lure younger viewers away from YouTube.

The expansion announced Wednesday, dubbed IGTV, will increase Instagram’s video time limit from one minute to 10 minutes for most users. Accounts with large audiences will be able to distribute programs lasting up to an hour.

Video will be available through Instagram or a new app called IGTV. It will give Facebook more opportunities to sell advertising.

It’s the latest instance in which Instagram has ripped a page from a rival’s playbook in an effort to preserve its status as a cool place for young people to share and view content. In this case, Instagram is mimicking Google’s YouTube. Before, Facebook and Instagram have copied Snapchat — another magnet for teens and young adults.

Instagram is moving further from its roots as a photo-sharing service as it dives headlong into longer-form video.

The initiative comes as parent company Facebook struggles to attract teens, while also dealing with a scandal that exposed its leaky controls for protecting users’ personal information.

Instagram CEO Kevin Systrom told The Associated Press that he hopes IGTV will emerge as a hub of creativity for relative unknowns who turn into internet sensations with fervent followings among teens and young adults.

That is what’s already happening on YouTube, which has become the world’s most popular video outlet since Google bought it for $1.76 billion nearly 12 years ago. It now boasts 1.8 billion users.

Instagram, which Facebook bought for $1 billion six years ago, recently crossed 1 billion users, up from 800 million users nine months ago.

Survey

Perhaps even more importantly, 72 percent of US kids ranging from 13- to 17-years old use Instagram, second in the demographic to YouTube at 85 percent, according to a recent survey by the Pew Research Center. Only 51 percent of people in that age people now use Facebook, down from 71 percent from a similar Pew survey in 2014-15.

That trend appears to be one of the reasons that Facebook is “hedging its bets” by opening Instagram to the longer-form videos typically found on YouTube, said analyst Paul Verna of the research firm eMarketer.

Besides giving Instagram another potential drawing card, longer clips are more conducive for video ads lasting from 30 seconds to one minute. Instagram doesn’t currently allow video ads, but Systrom said it eventually will. When the ads come, Instagram intends to share revenue with the videos’ creators — just as YouTube already does.

“We want to make sure they make a living because that is the only way it works in the long run,” Systrom said.

The ads also will help Facebook sustain its revenue growth. Total spending on online video ads in the US is expected to rise from nearly $18 billion this year to $27 billion in 2021.

Lele Pons, a YouTube sensation who also has amassed 25 million followers on Instagram, plans to launch a new cooking show on IGTV in hopes of increasing her audience and eventually generating more revenue. “I am looking forward to making videos for both YouTube and Instagram,” she said. “It’s like Coca-Cola and Pepsi. You will never know what you like better unless you try both.”

IGTV’s programming format will consist exclusively of vertical video designed to fill the entire screen of smartphones. By contrast, most YouTube videos fill only a portion of the screen unless the phone is tilted horizontally.

Snapchat began featuring vertical video before Instagram, another example of its penchant for copying rivals.

But Systrom sees it differently. “This is acknowledging vertical video is the future and we want the future to come more quickly, so we built IGTV.”

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NEW YORK: ATT is launching a new streaming service incorporating television networks from the Time Warner company it just bought.

The WatchTV service, a cablelike package of more than 30 TV channels delivered over the internet, is an example of the “skinny bundles” coming from telecom and broadband providers as more people watch TV online. Competitors include Sling TV, PlayStation Vue and ATT’s own DirecTV Now.

WatchTV will be free for subscribers of two unlimited wireless plans ATT is launching. Others can get WatchTV for $15 — $20 less than DirecTV Now, but with just half the channels.

Thursday’s announcement comes just days after ATT closed its $81 billion Time Warner deal. ATT said it needs to combine its distribution channels with entertainment properties to compete with internet-based rivals like Amazon, Netflix and Google, although the wireless carrier has a direct connection to its 92 million subscribers that its internet rivals do not. The Department of Justice sued to block the Time Warner deal on anti-competition concerns, but a federal judge sided with ATT.

WatchTV is the first example of how ATT plans to marry distribution and programming from Time Warner. If it gets enough subscribers, it will be able to collect valuable data and offer more personalized content — and ads.

But with people paying for a growing number of services like HBO, Hulu, Netflix and DirectTV Now, streaming can end up being just as expensive as cable, if not more so.

The new service will offer 31 channels at launch, including CNN, TBS and TNT — all part of Time Warner’s Turner networks. It won’t feature any sports networks — no ESPN for subscribers — but is heavy on news and entertainment offerings such as AMC, the History Channel, BBC America, Lifetime and Oprah Winfrey’s OWN.

Six more channels, including Comedy Central, will be available “soon after launch,” according to a lineup provided by ATT.

DirecTV Now starts at $35 a month for more than 60 channels, including sports channels, with additional channels available at higher prices.

The new wireless plans will be ATT’s only unlimited offerings for new customers, though existing customers can keep their current plans. They would need to upgrade to a new plan, though, to get WatchTV for free. The new plans start at $70 a month for a single line, $5 more than the current cheapest plan, though the new plans offer more benefits, too.

Subscribers of current and new plans can also get $15 a month off DirecTV Now. However, ATT will no longer include HBO for free on all unlimited plans, although the more expensive of the two plans, which starts at $80, will offer one free premium video or music service, such as HBO, Showtime or Amazon Music Unlimited. HBO is also part of Time Warner.