We have been hearing rumors about Verizon launching a video streaming service for a while and last Tuesday we got a big report from the New York Times revealing the name and key aspects about the service, which will be called “Go90”. During a presentation at CTIA’s Super Mobility Conference, Marni Walden, EVP and president of product innovation and new business of Verizon Wireless confirmed previously reported details on how the service is going to work, revealing that the company has already sent 5 million private invitation for targeted customers, which represent around 5% of the carrier’s postpaid subscribers.
The service will be free, ad-supported and aimed at millennials, users around 30 years or younger, smartly enough since they are the biggest cord-cutters. Its availability won’t depend on a Verizon subscription so anyone will be able to use it even if they are on Sprint, AT&T or T-Mobile. The name Go90 denotes the mobile-only initial approach of Verizon and it refers to the movement of turning the phone to landscape mode – turning 90 degrees, so, go 90. As for the content, instead of having entire rosters from TV channels, it will include a selection of popular shows from Comedy Central, Food Network, ESPN, Scripps, HuffPost Live, NFL Network and Discovery, as well as popular online series from DreamWorks Animation’s AwesomenessTV, Vice Media, Tastemade, Maker Studios and Machinima. Interestingly, the last content providers are all part of the AOL acquisition that took place a few months ago for $4.4 billion. Go90 will also feature National Football League games and live concerts.
Still according to the NYT report, the service will be integrated with Twitter and Facebook, as social media is a huge part of the mobile experience. Users will be encouraged to share video clips and engage on both channels and there are also plans to include more social media networks in the future. Walden noted that, even though the service is aimed for mobile users at first, they will consider creating streaming options that work on TV as well in the future. Although the invites have already been sent, there isn’t any information on when it will be available for everyone but it shouldn’t take long until we hear from it again.