Here today, gone tomorrow
Show’s over
Five years and 80 million subscribers later, Singapore-based streaming service Hooq ended its run on April 30.
Variety described Hooq’s closure as a “shock” as it was believed that the Covid-19 pandemic would have made the service more popular with viewers staying home during the lockdown period.
Techcrunch reported that when Hooq was first launched in 2015, it aimed to be the “Netflix for South-east Asia” by providing both Hollywood and regional video content to viewers in Singapore, Indonesia, Thailand, Philippines and India.
However, it became increasingly difficult for Hooq to navigate the changing video streaming market, which heated up with the arrival of streaming giant Netflix in 2016.
This led to parent company Singtel filing for Hooq’s liquidation on March 27 this year.
“Global and local content providers are increasingly going direct, the cost of content remains high, and emerging market consumers’ willingness to pay has increased only gradually amidst an increasing array of choices,” Hooq said in a statement to Channel News Asia.
“Because of these changes, a viable business model for an independent, over-the-top distribution platform has become increasingly challenged,” he said.
In a post, Hooq said it was not able to process refunds for existing customers as it was in the process of “liquidation/insolvency”.
Reality sinks in
Facebook has unfriended Oculus Go as the company announced that it will no longer be selling the entry-level virtual reality (VR) headset this year.
Instead, it will be focusing on the sales and development of newer models Quest and Rift.
Users who already have an Oculus Go headset will still be able to use it after the sale of the product ends.
“We’ll also continue to maintain the system software with bug fixes and security patches through 2022,” Facebook said in a statement.
“That said, we won’t be shipping new features for Oculus Go moving forward, and we’ll no longer accept new Oculus Go apps or app updates into the Store after December 4, 2020.”
According to CNBC, Oculus Go was first released in 2018 with a price tag of US$199 (RM850).
It stood out because it’s an all-in-one headset that doesn’t need to be connected to a phone or computer to work.
Oculus Go allowed users to experience events like concerts and comedy shows in VR.
Endofanera
For many Malaysians into collecting physical Blu-ray and DVD boxsets, it was a sad day when Speedy Video Distributor, the company behind Speedy Video stores announced that all 14 of its remaining outlets in Malaysia will be closing down permanently.
The company made the announcement on its Facebook page on June 13, adding that all its outlets are having shut down sales with selected Blu-ray discs going for RM10 each and DVD boxsets starting from RM30.
However, it’s not the end for the company, as it’s embracing digital and making the transition to an online platform.
gone in a Flash
Three years after the first end-oflife (EOL) announcement for Flash Player, Adobe reminded users that it will stop distributing and updating the software at the end of the year.
It added that the announcement was made in collaboration with technology partners such as Google, Apple and Mozilla, as they have also issued their own statements on how the EOL will affect developers and consumers.
After the EOL date, Adobe will remove the download page for Flash Player and said it will block content from running on it.
“Customers should not use Flash Player after the EOL date since it will not be supported by Adobe,” it said, adding that it will no longer get security patches and updates.
Users can turn to alternatives such as HTML5 and WEBGL which are widely supported.
Flash Player was first released in
1996 and became a
hit because it allowed users to enjoy interactive content such as games, as well as watch videos and animations.
Most users back then would need to install a Flash plug-in to watch videos or play games on websites.
In 2010, late Apple CEO Steve Jobs wrote an open letter criticising
Flash Player for the lack of support for touch-based models and security issues, as well as for draining battery and poor performance on mobile devices.
He then declared that it would never show up on Apple products such as iphones and ipads – Forbes noted that ever since Jobs wrote that letter, the software has been on “death row”.