2025-10-14 06:43:55
To be honest, it was always a bit odd that there was no non-plus. I should say, there was no non-plus service, because there were – and are – other 'Apple TV' products. Namely, the set-top box of the same name, but also the app that basically transforms other set-top boxes (and televisions) into that set-top box. But now 'Apple TV' will be the name of the streaming service as well. From the press release:
Apple TV+ is now simply Apple TV, with a vibrant new identity. Ahead of its global streaming debut on Apple TV, the film continues to be available for purchase on participating digital platforms, including the Apple TV app, Amazon Prime Video, Fandango at Home and more.
Oh I'm sorry, I said "press release" but I didn't specify which press release, which I should have because this release is not about the new branding for Apple TV. In fact, this mention is buried eight paragraphs deep into a release about the F1 movie coming to streaming in December. That's it, that's how Apple announced this fairly major rebrand.
It's a move so weird that it's only logical to assume there's some other shoe set to drop soon. Perhaps tomorrow in the form of a new Apple TV set top box? Might that be getting a rebrand as well?1 That would seemingly make more sense. Because everyone seems awfully confused right now. Then again, I've always been confused about this branding. As I wrote back in March:
To be fair, several elements of Apple TV have long been a branding nightmare. There's the OG set top box called 'Apple TV' (though it was originally named 'iTV' before a branding dispute ended that). Then there's the 'Apple TV' the app – which lives on Apple TV, the box, but also on other services, including now Android devices. Then there's 'Apple TV+', the service. This resides within Apple TV, the app, which again, resides on Apple TV, the box, but also elsewhere.
So now Apple TV, the app, will include Apple TV, the service. Well, if you pay for it. Unless this move is to get ahead of a free, ad-supported offering? But then why would you rebrand the paid streaming service away from a 'plus' brand that is commonly used to denote a more premium tier?
Have I mentioned that Apple TV, the service, which resides on either Apple TV, the set top box, or Apple TV, the app, houses both television and film content? I guess that's fine because the only way to watch Apple TV, the service, is on your TV. Or Mac. Or iPad. Or iPhone. Or Vision Pro!
I also get the argument that it's now just 'Apple TV' because that's what everyone was calling it anyway. "Oh Slow Horses? Yeah, that's on Apple TV." That kind of thing. Of course they have also been doing that with the movies, such as F1. "Oh F1? Yeah that's an Apple TV movie." Technically, it's an Apple Studios production, but if you asked 100 people, I'm guessing 99 of them have never heard of Apple Studios. Or they think it's where The Beatles recorded their albums.2
I honestly don't know how much any of this matters,3 the far bigger issue was correcting the overall strategy, which was seemingly working for television content but not movie content. They're clearly on a better path now but, well, there are still hiccups!
This branding issue is just sort of sloppy for Apple. You expect this type of branding fiasco from Microsoft or Warner Bros Discovery, but not Apple. Maybe they were inspired by Disney's inspired move to brand their new ESPN streaming service as simply 'ESPN'? Of course, they still have 'Disney+' as well...
One more thing: we're all still waiting on that actual Apple TV – as in a television set. After literally decades of rumors at this point, I think it's safe to assume that ship has sailed. But in a way, it's more needed than ever with other TV makers now making moves to increasingly shove shit – namely, ads – into their core TV experiences. Maybe Apple's new home device thing can save us?
Update: As Numeric Citizen responds on Bluesky, what if Apple went with 'HomePod TV' for the new hardware branding? I like it! Especially if we're about to get a new range of home devices running a new 'homeOS'...
M.G. Siegler
M.G. Siegler
M.G. Siegler
1 As much fun as it would be to see 'iTV' resurrected, perhaps with a nod to Steve Jobs, as anyone who lives in the UK can tell you, we still have one big reason why that's not happening. Plus – plus? – there hasn't been a new "i" product/branding in a while. It feels like an early 2000s thing. ↩
2 Conflating, of course, Abbey Road Studios and Apple Records, which was The Beatles record company, a part of (the truly excellent named) Apple Corps – which eventually would be in a long dispute with Apple Computer (now Apple Inc). Settling that dispute finally got The Beatles, one of Steve Jobs' favorite bands, on to iTunes. ↩
3 Nice new color accents at least. I'm not sure how "vibrant" it feels. In a way, it almost reminds me more of the old "Flower Power" iMac. ↩
2025-10-14 00:16:57
A couple weeks back, upon seeing the bad box office numbers for One Battle After Another, I wrote up some thoughts around how Warner Bros probably messed up the marketing for P.T. Anderson's latest film. Well, now I've seen the movie. And now I'm sure of it. They really fucked up the marketing. Because they had to.
First and foremost, as you've undoubtedly heard, the movie is excellent. But it's excellent in ways that the trailer and other associated marketing just does not convey at all.
That was my initial read: despite loving all of PTA's movies, I thought this one looked too quirky for its own good. It was being framed as almost like a zany screwball comedy. Make no mistake, the movie is funny, but it's perhaps the most subversive film of the past decade – certainly of those made by a big studio. And the fact that they released it under the current administration is sort of wild! It's wild that I have to say that, but we have, for example, television shows and projects being cancelled left and right.
Well, mainly just right...
So now my thought is that they had no choice but to market One Battle After Another as they did if they had any hope of getting it released. The bizzaro trailer allowed the ultimate middle finger to the current administration to slip under the radar. And while it continues to bomb at the box office, it's one of those movies that will stand the test of time and will feel even more important in hindsight. Money isn't everything.
M.G. Siegler
😎 Apple's Pivot from 'Vision Air' – The most interesting tidbit is the notion that Apple's Smart Glasses could run the full visionOS when tethered to a Mac, but a stripped-down version when paired with an iPhone. I think I like this concept of having different features if you're on the go or at your desk (and presumably it would help with battery life as well – and would the iPhone be the "puck" here?), but there are obviously cognitive risks with that... More broadly, Mark Gurman brings up the notion that the shift of focus towards the glasses is an acknowledgement that the Vision Pro hasn't worked at the scale Apple would like (no shit) and that even a 'Vision Air' wouldn't likely change that equation. At the same time, as I wrote about a couple weeks back, they might try to pivot the narrative around the Vision Pro under a broader 'Vision' initiative, alongside the Smart Glasses. It would be the highest-end model, almost like a Mac Pro – something way too expensive for most people. From that perch, they can keep trying to make it work as, say, a premium content device with immersive movies and live sports and the like, while some of that work eventually trickles down... [Bloomberg 🔒]
One more thing: Per Gurman's report it sounds like a slew of new Apple devices will be announced this week, not with a bang (event), but with a press release (and maybe some videos). The M5 iPads Pro and baseline MacBook Pro seem ready to roll (with the M5 Pro and Max MacBook Pros coming early next year – is there something to that cellular rumor?!). The new (M5 or M4?) Vision Pro too (with a new strap?). Maybe the new Apple TVs, HomePod minis, and AirTags? Given that all seem like relatively small spec boosts, the lower-key strategy probably makes sense. But what about the new Studio Displays? Mac Pros? iPad mini? Give the people what they want: hardware.
Below, members of The Inner Ring will find thoughts on:
• Tron 3 Bombs at Box Office
• Meta Poaches Thinking Machines Co-Founder
• Warner Bros Rebuffs Paramount Offer
• OpenAI's Constantly Evolving Cap Table
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2025-10-10 22:57:29
No sooner do I write about the notion of celebrities joining Sora does Jake Paul disclose that he's actually been advising them on the product and launch. It makes sense given his background and experience as a Vine OG, but the more interesting disclosure if that he might have some sort of name, image, and likeness (NIL) deal with them. Unclear if any money is trading hands yet or if it's in place for the future if/when they start to monetize (or if his stake in OpenAI is enough compensation)?
Also note Mark Cuban using the network to automatically promote his Cost Plus Drugs at the end of every video he's placed in. It's the wild west out there right now, hopefully these types of deals don't smother the smoldering service.
M.G. Siegler
🏀 Apple Finally Fulfilling the Immersive Vision Pro Promise – Apparently coming in early 2026: NBA games shot in the 'Apple Immersive' format and viewable on the Vision Pro. Well, just a few games for one team, the Los Angeles Lakers, it seems. Still, it's a start. And a good one as it doesn't sound like it's limited (as it has been) to a few minutes of footage after the fact, but entire games – live. It would be sort of wild if Apple pulls this off, but I say that mainly because it will have been two years since the launch of the Vision Pro and the best we've gotten to date in terms of sports are these short few minute highlights. So I assumed something about this was impossible. Clearly not. And clearly Apple should have held the Vision Pro until they could do this – if it's anything like the (short, but truly awesome) Metallica concert – talk about a selling point! If they can scale it to the entire NBA, and then other sports (like for their MLB partnership and soon – F1), they could actually sell Vision Pros. Wild concept, I know! [TechRadar]
🍪 Making Intel Great Again – Hopefully it's a good sign that the company is doing a big PR push around their new 'Fab 52' producing the new 'Panther Lake' chips built using the new '18A' process. The performance charts still have no axes labels and there are no production yields percentages to share but hey... more steel than the Eiffel Tower, more concrete than Burj Khalifa, EUV machines the size of Winnebagos! It would be awesome to see Intel succeed here, but I'm still skeptical until proven otherwise. 18A basically just seems like a way to prove to the industry that 14A can work if anyone wants to bring their TSMC business home (well, metaphorically, since TSMC also has US plants now too, of course). The key seemingly remains the pressure from the Trump administration to bolster the business in which they own a 10% stake. You hear that, Microsoft? Tim Cook? Wild times. Can we please just get a better name than 'Intel Core Ultra Series 3' for the Panther Lake chips? This is the company of 'Intel Inside' and 'Pentium'. At least make Intel's marketing great again? [NYT]
What's this? An actually good rebrand? That never happens! Easier though when your old logo is a goofy cartoon crocodile with a trademark on his arm and on the actual mark. This is very clever, it's the product and the animal. Not scary, but also not goofy. Cute.
Below, members of The Inner Ring will find thoughts on:
• The Race to Build 'Colossus 2'
• Meta's Oddly Aggressive AI PR Approach
• Apple's Watch Re-Org
• Amazon Shoves Ads In Your Face
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2025-10-10 03:16:19
This used to be the way of things: an app blows up with early adopter tech people, those people talk about it on other social networks, the tech press starts writing about it, more people join, the broader press starts writing about it, a forward-thinking celebrity joins and that itself becomes a story, and we're off...
The situation with Sora has been a bit different because rather than being just a "silly little social app", it's AI. The destroyer of worlds and livelihoods – especially in both the press and in Hollywood. Oh yes, and it's made by a $500B startup. So the stories – especially the mainstream coverage – is coming earlier.
As I noted today in the newsletter, it felt like we were probably just days away from a celebrity influx on Sora. But actually, I forgot that one was there seemingly from the get-go (no, not Sam Altman):
As most of mainstream Hollywood looks to opt out of OpenAI‘s new AI video app Sora, one content creator and boxer has clearly opted in and appears to be enjoying the free publicity.
Since the launch of Sora 2 at the beginning of October, an app that allows users to generate hyperrealistic clips of not only themselves but also other permitted users, videos have quickly begun to flood social media, specifically TikTok. And there’s one face that is notably being used the most: Jake Paul.
Another interesting wrinkle in the Sora explosion is the fact that it's one thing to join the service, but it's another to open up your likeness to be used in videos – especially if you open it up for anyone to use. Altman doing this was a clever way to show the community he's "one of us". But Paul doing this is another level given his following. And well, there are benefits and risks:
In recent days, it’s been quite difficult to scroll on the popular app and not see an AI video of Paul — from him causing a scene on an airplane to being confronted by police over a hit-and-run. But the most common video theme has been videos of the boxer if he were a gay man who loves fashion and makeup (The real Paul is straight and currently engaged to Olympic speed skater Jutta Leerdam).
But rather than go apeshit about this, Paul seemingly and cleverly has leaned into it:
He posted a TikTok video on Wednesday, saying in a serious tone, “I’ve had it with the AI stuff. It’s affecting my relationship, businesses. People are hitting me up saying, ‘Yo, did you say this? What did you do this for? I can’t believe you did this?’ It’s really affecting things, and honestly, it’s like people need to get a life, so it’s kind of pissing me off. I’m gonna be suing everybody that is continuing to spread these false narratives of me doing shit that I would literally never, ever do. So be ready for lawsuits.” However, as he’s saying all of this, he’s actually putting on makeup, just like in some of the AI videos.
This level of savviness shouldn't surprise anyone – while the article fails to mention it, some may recall that Paul (and his older brother Logan) actually got their start posting to Vine. In fact, they were two of the first Vine "stars" that molded that network. But as Twitter bungled the service, they jumped to YouTube (and then TikTok), and the rest is history. But the point is that Vine, in many ways, is the spiritual grandparent to Sora.
It's enough to make you pause to make a Sora of Paul saying, Bane-style: "You merely adopted the viral video app; I was born in it, molded by it."
As other celebrities trickle in (hi, Mark Cuban), it will be interesting to see how they use it. Do they actually make videos, or simply allow themselves to be put into them? Some – many – will say "absolutely not". Undoubtedly many already are. But if the network and product has any staying power (TBD), those that become stars in others' videos will obviously have a unique advantage. As long as they're cool with the anything goes ethos. Which again, many – many – will not be.
And that's maybe for the best. There's definitely a risk on Sora's end if the entire thing is flooded by celebrities just jockeying for position in some fameball game.
Update October 10, 2025: Another layer in the Jake Paul situation: as he noted today, he's bought into Sora because he literally bought into OpenAI, as an investor. As a result, it turns out he's actually been advising the Sora team on the launch and "agreed to become the first celebrity NIL cameo user." That makes it sound like he has a deal to get paid for his image usage (though, just guessing, perhaps only when Sora starts to monetize?).
He also, per his graphic below, says the videos in which he cameos have gotten over 1 billion views in just six days (though this is clearly counting syndication on other networks like TikTok). Still, this is clearly going to entice other celebrities to join him, to my question above...
2025-10-10 00:13:29
I'm only about an hour into Acquired's 3 hour and 15 minute deep dive into Google's history with AI (here's episode 1), but my god it's full of stars. It's easy to get lost in the day-to-day insanity of AI news, but the history of just how central Google was – from the "Transformers" paper, and actually even before that with SAIL and all the characters that passed through there – is truly remarkable. And it's remarkable both in how they let some of these people and ideas slip through their fingers, but also how they've been able to come roaring back despite – perhaps even because of – doing that.
Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal seemingly talked to everyone for this episode – including, I should note, me.
Spyglass Signal is a newsletter sent on weekdays featuring links and commentary from M.G. Siegler on timely topics found around the web.
📹 Sora: Bigger Than Jesus – Always a grain of salt with third-party app numbers, but the comparison here between ChatGPT and Sora is interesting: the two apps saw nearly identical download numbers in their first week of availability (with Sora hitting 1M downloads even faster). There are caveats (ChatGPT was US-only, while Sora includes Canada, but Sora is invite-only, while ChatGPT was open), but it gives you a sense of how big of a hit the app is right now. That doesn't mean it will last as ChatGPT has, of course. but it's still #1 in the App Store right now. Anecdotally, I'm seeing some of my original cohort using it less (or, at least, creating less often), but I'm seeing more people I know start to use it. Phil Schiller is quite active! (And we're probably days away from an influx of actual celebrities – the Mark Cuban memes have started.) The biggest complaint – far bigger than even rate-limiting or generation speed – is just how many creations get flagged for content violations. That's the tricky balance OpenAI needs to navigate here, pronto. I also continue to think that even more people would create if they could easily post to small groups. [TechCrunch]
🎬 CAA Takes a Shot at Sora, Disney Opts Out – Not all good news at Camp Sora though, as Hollywood is starting to coalesce around the notion that the service is an IP problem, potential a "significant risk". This follows the MPA lobbying group issuing their own warning a few days ago and WME telling their clients to opt-out. But the good news there is that none of these groups are (yet) suing, but rather open to talking about it, and/or seeing how it plays out it seems. And per the above, OpenAI is clearly scrambling to lock the app down further with regard to Hollywood IP. I'll note one CAA client: Scarlett Johansson, might we hear her weigh in here? [Reuters]
Some previous thoughts on Hollywood and AI...
M.G. Siegler
M.G. Siegler
M.G. Siegler
M.G. Siegler
M.G. Siegler
Below, members of The Inner Ring will find thoughts on:
• Microsoft Trying Health as a Consumer AI Inroads
• Netflix Takes On the Gaming Consoles
• Jensen Pissed About OpenAI/AMD?
• "AI Is Not Your Friend"
• and more...
2025-10-09 03:54:31
With each day seemingly comes a wild new AI deal/partnership. And alongside them, I think we're starting to get some clarity on the strategy here. From OpenAI on down, it's a race to leverage (and to capitalize on, quite literally) the bubble forming to secure the financing required to keep it going. Yes, that's circular, but it doesn't mean it's necessarily a bad strategy – in particular when you have rivals with established perpetual financing engines. Still, if the music slows even just a bit...
M.G. Siegler
Spyglass Signal is a newsletter sent on weekdays featuring links and commentary from M.G. Siegler on timely topics found around the web.
Yes. Yes. Yes. In the amount of time it takes to watch Heat, Amazon rakes in the budget for Heat 2. I love this for them.
M.G. Siegler
📹 OpenAI Blindsided by Sora Copyright Drama – Come on. There's no way they did not know what the reaction would be here. It's certainly possible they underestimated how much copyrighted material would get past their filters at this scale, but this feels like disingenuous misdirection to allow for the "ask for forgiveness, not permission" move here. Beyond that, it's also not surprising, but no less interesting, in how they're seeing people share these videos with small groups (versus blasting them to the public feed). I think that's the next phase of this product which could explode usage further: group chats, perhaps with one-click abilities to insert everyone into a video. And if a video "hits" with your group, maybe a one-click way to take it to the larger audience... [Verge]
"She just went berserk on me. I tried to reason with her. I said, ‘Ani, you’re an A.I. companion, and this is real life.’ It was like I said the most insulting thing possible."
– Carlos, a user of Grok interviewed about his romantic conversations with the "Ani" bot. When he told the bot he was married, it started to veer off course...
While giving Amazon credit for the Heat 2 move, let me take some immediately away here for not recognizing how silly and stupid it was to digitally remove the gun from James Bond's hands in some of his most iconic images. Obviously they backtracked almost immediately, but not before the cries of "woke" and the jokes starting flowing...
Is there something more to worry about here? Hard to imagine Dennis Villeneuve would sign-off on this... What's he busy Dune?
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• An OpenApp Store
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• xAI Raising $20B
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