Tag Archives: discovery

A New Streaming Service Just for Classic TV and Film Launches Today — And It’s Free | Vox

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I tried accessing ShoutFactory! content this morning (Thursday, February 5) but content is not yet playable/accessable on my desktop or iPad. I’m interesting in checking out Twilight Zone, Bushido Man and Dreamscape.  An error comes up “Sorry, the requested video is not yet available on this device.” Content may be accessible later this afternoon or there may be an issue with accessing content from Canada. The About Us page states “SHOUT! FACTORY TV is a free-to-the viewer, ad-supported video offering containing full-length television shows, movies, specials, and original content viewable through desktop computers, mobile, tablet, and “over-the’top” devices such as Roku…In addition, Shout! Factory maintains a vast digital distribution network which delivers video and audio content to all the leading digital service providers in North America.”

The big four broadcast networks — ABC, CBS, Fox, and NBC — don’t really have specific brands. They’re nebulous, offering drama, comedy, reality, and whatever else they put on the air. They’re the giant department stores of TV. Cable channels are more like specialty stores. ESPN is for sports fans. Nickelodeon is for kids. TNT knows drama.

The same is now happening with streaming services. We have a “big three” — Netflix, Hulu, and Amazon Prime. We have offshoots of TV networks, like HBO Go and Showtime Anytime.

And now we’re starting to see the rise of specialty streaming services, like one launching from Shout! Factory. Previously known for releasing DVDs of films and TV shows other studios didn’t want to, Shout’s new streaming service carries the same philosophy to the world of online TV. It’s filled with classic shows and movies that are hard to find elsewhere. It’s got more of an eye toward curation than building a platform. It’s built off of others’ software.

And it’s completely free.

READ MORE: A new streaming service just for classic TV and film launches today – and it’s free | Vox

25 Essential Graphic Novels | Flavorwire

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Best Graphic Novels – Flavorwire

Long dismissed as a less serious art form, graphic novels have finally started to gain more mainstream credibility over the last 20 years. There are many, many excellent examples out there, but if you’re looking for a place to start, start here! The world of the graphic novel is one that spans a wide range of authors, artists, styles, and subject matter, and this primer covers all the bases. While the distinction between graphic novels and comic books gets dicey the term “graphic novel” was only introduced in the late 1970s, for the purposes of this list, they are lengthier, meatier book-like works — and they’re all brilliant for both their literary and visual merit.

via 25 Essential Graphic Novels | Flavorwire.

An African Reading List | BOOK RIOT

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If you’re like me and are trying to diversify your reading, then you know that discoverability is an issue. I want to start reading more books by non-U.S. and UK authors, but where do I start? Well, if you’re interested in African authors, here’s what I’ve got.

Through extensive Googling and suggestions from fellow Rioters, I’ve compiled the following list. These are fiction books by African authors, sorted by country. Not every African country is represented here, though I did my best. All of these books are available for purchase in the U.S. If an author has written multiple books such as Achebe or Adichie, I listed just one so you’d have the author’s name. I also did not have any sort of genre/format restriction, so though most of these are adult literary fiction, not all of them are.

I can’t necessarily recommend these books one way or another because many of them I haven’t read though I have read a good number, but hopefully this list will get you started. I absolutely know I missed books on this list, so please feel free to leave your suggestions in the comments, as well as provide recommendations if you have read some of these books.

SEE THE LIST: An African Reading List | BOOK RIOT

Coldplay Announces Lyrics Scavenger Hunt in Libraries Worldwide| Radio.com

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The good news? Coldplay fans can read the lyrics to the band’s new album before it hits stores. The bad news? They’ll have to find them, first.

The band announced today (April 28) they will hide handwritten lyric sheets of Ghost Stories from frontman Chris Martin in nine libraries across the world, creating a scavenger hunt for fans to discover.

Clues to each sheet’s location will be dispensed on Coldplay’s Twitter account. Once a page is found, a photo of it will be uploaded for others to see.

Additionally, one of the envelopes containing the lyrics also includes a ticket for a free trip to London to see the band’s July 1 performance at the Royal Albert Hall.

via Coldplay Announces Lyrics Scavenger Hunt in Libraries Worldwide | Radio.com

The Beginner’s Guide to Spotify | Mashable

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Digital music might not have the same allure as sitting down to listen to a record on your turntable, but what it lacks in atmosphere, it makes up for in convenience — especially when you aren’t home with your collection.

It’s been five years since Spotify publicly launched and shifted the music industry’s focus toward streaming as a way to combat illegal downloading. While the streaming business model is far from perfect, even the most casual music fan should test out streaming while it’s still growing.

If you’re just dipping your toe into the stream, follow our beginner’s guide and soon you’ll be listening to Spotify’s massive library without the worry of losing precious hard drive space.

Macro topics:

  • Signing Up
  • Organizing Your Music
  • Sharing and Discovering Tunes

Read: The Beginner’s Guide to Spotify | Mashable

The Beginner’s Guide to SoundCloud | Mashable

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Read: The Beginner’s Guide to SoundCloud | Mashable

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The Best Music Download Stores You’re Not Using (but Should) | LifeHacker

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Streaming music is great, but you’ve probably heard songs you just have to own, or you an artist or band you’d like to support by purchasing their music. Doing so on the big stores is cheap and easy, but there’s a world of smaller music stores with interesting music you should check out too. Let’s take a look.

Overviews of Bandcamp, Beatport, CDBaby, eMusic, Jamendo and SoundCloud. Read: The Best Music Download Stores You’re Not Using (but Should) | LifeHacker.

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A Mountain Range of Shelves Turns This Kids’ Library Into a Playground | Gizmodo

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Learning to read is a massive adventure in itself, but discovering the library—a magical place where the stories are plentiful and the books are free—is downright mind-blowing. In an effort to match the fun between the pages, the Mexican branding studio Anagrama transformed the interior of a local heritage site into Niños Conarte, a geometric mountain range of literature.

See all the pics: A Mountain Range of Shelves Turns This Kids’ Library Into a Playground | Gizmodo.

Twitter #Music: What Went Wrong? | Information Space

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Read: Twitter #Music: What Went Wrong? | Information Space

25 Independent Presses That Prove This Is the Golden Age of Indie Publishing | Flavorwire

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Independent publishing — that is, publishing whatever an individual or small group think is worthy of dumping their time and money into — is nothing new. From Virginia and Leonard Woolf starting up Hogarth Press to the early days of Farrar, Straus and Giroux championing now-iconic authors that other publishers wouldn’t touch, DIY publishing has long been responsible for some of our best literature.

That’s why, no matter what the latest doomsday prognostication about the future of big publishing happens to be, this is an exciting time to be a fan of literature. Among the long list of indie presses that are putting out great stuff, we’re singling out 25 that we love — but we encourage you to do some more digging of your own to discover even more great indies that are publishing great works of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, translated literature, and more.

Read: 25 Independent Presses That Prove This Is the Golden Age of Indie Publishing | Flavorwire.