Go90 Becoming Part of Oath, Focusing on Multi-Platform Delivery
This is a time for experimentation in online video services, and not all of those experiments will pan out. Speaking at the Recode Code Media conference yesterday, Tim Armstrong, CEO of Oath, announced that Go90 will get folded into Oath, meaning the standalone video service will no longer stand alone. It will distribute programming to multiple platforms within the organization. While Go90 itself will stick around, it sounds like it doesn't have that long to live.
“The brand will remain, I don’t know how long for,” Armstrong said, quoted in Variety. Go90's new role will be as a content engine and video library, but not an isolated service.
Go90 has been through several changes in its young life. It debuted in September 2015, created by Verizon as a free mobile video destination for millennials. It didn't find much of an audience, and so Verizon laid off 155 employees and brought in a new creative team in January 2017.
Oath, a subsidiary of Verizon, was created in June 2017 when Verizon joined its digital divisions, including AOL and Yahoo. Oath and Go90 were guided by two different strategies, Armstrong told conference attendees, but now everyone involved will follow the same plan. Assets signed by Go90 will be used by it and other Oath platforms including HuffPost, Yahoo Sports, and Yahoo Finance.
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