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Tech News
NBCUniversal is testing what it calls its largest mobile update ever for the Peacock iPhone app, adding a vertical Clips Feed, conversational AI-powered search, and adaptive live mobile video. The features build on existing tools like Your Bravoverse and Peacock Performance View, and will roll out fully starting early next year.
NBCUniversal is overhauling the Peacock mobile app to add more vertical, short-form video alongside new franchise-specific hubs for properties like Bravo, The Office, Law & Order and the NBA. The company is also teasing a membership program offering perks such as temporary Instacart memberships and New York Times Cooking subscriptions, tied to how long someone has subscribed to Peacock.
Alza, founded by former Tribeca Festival COO Pete Torres, ran October 16-18 in New York as the city's first festival dedicated to vertical-format microdramas, featuring film premieres and industry panels. Attendance at screenings was modest, drawing largely middle-aged women, even as platforms like Instagram, Vurt, and major streamers experiment with vertical video features for TV.
Vurt, a startup focused on short vertical microdramas, has released dedicated apps for Apple TV and Android TV, giving viewers access to roughly 3,500 episodes across more than 100 series on big screens. The company says its userbase has grown from 10,000 to 675,000 since launching in March, and it monetizes content through ads rather than microtransactions, distinguishing itself from rivals like DramaBox and ReelShort that rely on AI-generated content and paid unlocks.
RoseBerry Media is re-editing two early-2000s storylines from the Australian soap Neighbours, including footage featuring Margot Robbie, into short vertical-video clips for the Epis streaming app. The company says it used an AI-assisted production workflow to adapt the classic footage for mobile viewing, despite the original show running for 41 seasons from 1985 to 2025.
YouTube announced at its Made On YouTube event that creators can now organize short, vertical video clips into serialized microdrama-style series. The feature mirrors the format popularized by standalone microdrama apps, which use brief, cliffhanger-driven episodes shot for phone screens.