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The Murdoch family’s ad-funded movie streaming service Tubi launches in the UK this week, offering 20,000 on-demand movies and TV episodes. In the US, the platform attracts around one million mainly younger viewers, beating most other ad-funded rivals. Success has been driven by “fandoms” – collections of Bollywood, Nollywood and art house movies as well as kitschy horror films like Slay, a drag queen vampire horror feature. Originally launched by ad tech company AdRise in 2014, Lachlan Murdoch acquired Tubi in 2020, two years before Rupert launched his lockdown-inspired linear channel TalkTV. Talk came to an inglorious end in April when the service rebranded and moved online. Lachlan’s triumph kills any comparisons between Tubi and the Logan kids’ feeble project The Hundred, from Succession – working tagline: “Know everything. No limits” and described by Kendall as “Substack-meets-Masterclass-meets-The Economist-meets-The-New Yorker”. Tubi’s tagline? “From deep cuts to hit movies, shows, series, live TV and awarded originals. No subscription. Free forever.”
