Verizon Launching Ad-Supported Mobile TV Service For Customers And Non-Customers Alike

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The landing page for the as-yet unvailable Go90 app.

Another day, another company trying its best to get its hooks into that elusive, sought-after demographic — the millennial: Verizon is throwing its hat into the streaming content ring with a new free mobile TV service available to both customers and non-customers called Go90, aimed at that chunk of the population that doesn’t mind watching video on devices other than a TV. Though no matter your age, you’ll have to sit through ads to get that free content.

Leaving the Verizon name out of the service was an intentional move to broaden its appeal, though the company is likely hoping that Go90 could attract new customers to its wireless service, reports the New York Times.

The ad-supported mobile streaming service gets its name from the act of rotating a phone to landscape view (90 degrees) to watch videos, and is aimed directly at the people most likely to watch content that way — 18- to 34-year-olds.

“Seventy percent of this group view on mobile first; that’s an enormous opportunity,” Marni M. Walden, president of product innovation and new business at Verizon told the NYT.

Go90 will feature live events, prime-time TV, NFL games, live concerts and a smattering of original content. Instead of making all of a certain network’s shows available, a slew of different programs will be available from a bunch of different networks: Comedy Central, Food Network, ESPN, NFL Network and Discovery will all have programming on the platform, as well as certain online series from AwesomenessTV, Vice, Tastemade and Machinima.

Go90 will start as a mobile-first product but could expand to streaming options for TV eventually. Right now, however, it’s all about the younger set — perhaps that explains the neon-soaked’90s nostalgia design going on with both the new @Go90 Twitter account and the site for the app. Because everyone knows millennials loooove throwbacks.

“If you look at this generation, the first place they go to look for anything is not a network lineup or a channel lineup, it’s the web,” Brian Angiolet, Verizon’s senior vice president for consumer products told the NYT.

Verizon is expected to formally announce the service this week.

Verizon to Offer Free Mobile TV, With an Eye on Millennials [New York Times]

by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist