As viewers grow frustrated with the TV advertising experience and vote with their remotes, networks are responding with shorter ad breaks and digital tricks aimed at making brand messages palatable in an ad-averse world. But their latest experiment gets straight to the pitch: 6-second commercials. (See videos…

UPDATED WITH MORE DETAILS, 11:10 AM: Sony Pictures has just released its plans for a VOD release of The Interview — and it begins today. After reviving the pic’s Christmas Day release yesterday and signing on more than 300 indie theaters who pledged to show the comedy starting Thursday, Sony has confirmed that the…

Some in Hollywood may have been surprised by Microsoft’s announcement that Xbox Entertainment Studios, its much-touted experiment in new kinds of interactive TV programming and headed by former CBS President Nancy Tellem, would be shut down. But really, didn’t we see this coming? Here are five reasons why the…

Microsoft is beefing up the online video entertainment offerings of its Xbox Live online service by 25 percent, adding apps from HBO, Showtime, various Disney channels, Comedy Central and dozens of others it said will become available sometime this year. The company also is integrating Twitter and Twitter’s…

EXCLUSIVE: Xbox Entertainment Studios and TV producer Stephen David (The Men Who Built America) have teamed to develop a groundbreaking new hybrid series. Utilizing still-in-development Xbox tech, the project combines interactive gaming and docudrama storytelling similar to the content David’s Stephen David Entertainme…

Lightbox and XBox Studios earned a ton of press this weekend when an excavation crew unearthed hundreds of buried cartridges of Atari‘s 1982 E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial video game in a dumpsite in Alamogordo, N.M. The archaeological discovery confirmed a long-held legend in the gaming world that Atari had buried…

In what marks the first official scripted series green light for Xbox Entertainment Studios, the entertainment arm of Microsoft’s XBox has teamed with UK broadcaster Channel 4  to co-produce Humans. The drama, which has received an eight-episode order, hails from UK production company, Kudos (Broadchurch), which has…

Former WB Network and Generate CEO Jordan Levin will try to combine his network development and digital skills in a new role as EVP of Xbox Entertainment Studios, reporting to Xbox Entertainment Studios president Nancy Tellem. He will be responsible for development and production of scripted and unscripted content for…

EXCLUSIVE: As Nas marks the 20th anniversary of his groundbreaking debut album Illmatic, a half-hour series project loosely based on his life as a hip hop artist in the 1990s is getting off the ground with a deal at XBox Entertainment Studios. Titled Street Dreams, the project, from Jamie Patricof and Lynette Howell’s…

The mid-season premiere of AMC’s The Walking Dead is set to air Sunday night, but some Xbox users got a unscheduled sneak peek when Season 4’s ninth episode appeared for free on Xbox Video this morning. It has since been made unavailable to Xbox users. AMC confirmed the slip-up happened but declined to comment on how…

Xbox, which has greenlighted its first scripted series, Halo, and its first reality series with the street soccer competition Every Street United, is now entering the documentary arena with a multi-film series about the start of the digital revolution. It hails from Oscar-winning documentary producer Simon Chinn (Man O…

Microsoft‘s new Xbox One console moved as many as 1 million units in 24 hours this week as it smashed records in 14 countries including the US and U.K., the company boasted over the weekend. The Xbox One, the first new Xbox design in 7 years, is priced at $500 a pop and billed as not just a video gaming system but an…