Cable cord-cutting seems to be getting bigger and bigger and now HBO has recently announced the start of its standalone streaming service. Finally, after about five months of talking and planning, the new HBO Now video streaming service is becoming a reality.

This goes to show that within a world that is fragmented by “digital technology,” ultimately, the will of the consumer reigns supreme.

The new HBO Now streaming service is more than just a way for the huge movie company to bring its movies and TV series and to the over 10 million consumers who choose to pay for broadband internet service from cable TV providers, but do not get the TV channels. Its also provides a way to further its “competition” against Netflix for the most ground-breaking Television service in the world.

HBO’s new standalone service is also the latest step towards forcing the huge cable TV industry into something it claims it cannot afford to do, specifically, giving cable subscribers the choice of choosing smaller “chunks” of television channels for less money.

Richard Plepler, the CEO of HBO announced the particulars of the new HBO Now service at an Apple product launching event that took place in San Francisco, CA.

The new streaming service offers its subscribers access to new HBO programming with no need for a cable subscriptions for the first time ever. The service will be offered at a price of $14.99 per month.

Once a consumer subscribes to the service, they can access all HBO material. This includes new shows, archives of older movies, shows, sports, documentaries and more. The HBO Now service is due for its official launch early next month, right before its Game of Thrones series returns on April 12^th.

When the fourth Jurassic Park was finally given the green light, after more than 13 years of development, it seemed like it would never be released. But this isn’t uncommon in the film industry, many films just don’t make it. For the most part, these films are never cancelled outright, but instead are left to gather dust as production slows down.

There have been numerous films which were stuck in development until they are finally finished and released. The Hobbit trilogy was one such example, before filming could even begin, the studio was involved in a dispute over copyright and creative control issues before finally receiving the go ahead. Aliens vs Predator was a concept originally intended to follow the release of Predator 2 in 1993, but due to actor changes and various delays, it was never finished until its release in 2004. So what movies have been trapped in development hell and will they ever see the light of day?

22 years will have passed since the first Jurassic Park was released back in 1993 and terrified pretty much everyone who went to see it. Following the disappointment that was Jurassic Park 3 back in 2001, the fourth film in the series, Jurassic World has finally got a release date, and its first trailer. Amazingly after more than two decades, the film has stood the test of time, and still looks good today.

With very little computer generated scenes to show its age, something many films of the 90s suffer from now, the incredible animatronics of the dinosaurs still look realistic. Jurassic World has been in development for well over a decade and is finally being released in June 2015. Through countless script changes, delays, cancellations and casting changes, the journey has not been an easy one.

Steven Spielberg, director of the first two films, came up with an idea for a fourth film whilst on the set for Jurassic Park 3. An idea he later claimed he wish they had used for the third film. In December 2002, Spielberg officially confirmed the fourth Jurassic Park for a summer 2005 release, claiming it had the best story since the first one. At this point, it was even heavily rumoured that the old original cast members could be reprising roles in the new film. Jeff Goldblum, Sam Neill and Richard Attenborough all confirmed they were to play the roles of Ian Malcolm, Dr Alan Grant and John Hammond respectively. The film continued to be pushed back over the next several years, with countless changes made with writers, actors and directors all joining and leaving before anything concrete.

Various plots were considered throughout the pre-production phase, including a departure from the previous 3 films and no longer set on an island, where the dinosaurs reached mainland Costa Rica. Malcolm and Hammond would be bought in with a group of experts to investigate the dinosaurs breeding uncontrollably and no doubt causing a worldwide panic. Another idea was that the main character, Nick Harris, a mercenary, had been hired by a Swiss corporation to train several genetically modified dinosaurs to be used in rescue missions. An early draft of this script was leaked on the internet after hackers intercepted an email from Steven Spielberg. An even stranger plot was the next draft from John Sayles, which involved genetically modified dinosaur-human hybrids. But even with all the film scripts floating around, none of which satisfied Spielberg, so the project was put on indefinite hold until the right script came along.

Over the next several years, various writers were approached by Steven Spielberg and plots were discussed but were still no closer to a final idea. The breakthrough came in 2012 when Spielberg announced they had found a writer, David Protosevich, and the film would have a 2013 release date as confirmed by Universal. As Protosevich was working on two story ideas for the film, it was later announced that yet again, these ideas did not fit the film Spielberg had imagined so the project was shelved again. In the end it was Colin Trevorrow (Safety not Guaranteed) who would be bought on board to direct, joining him would be Derek Connolly to co-write. With a director and writer in place, the film started to take shape finally as Chris Pratt was announced as the lead.

On September 10th 2013, Universal Studios announces the name for the fourth Jurassic Park as Jurassic World. It was later announced that film would be shot on Panavision 35mm and 65mm film. The reasons being to match the aesthetic look of the original as well as a personal preference of Spielberg himself. For those wondering if the incredible animatronic dinosaurs are returning, its good news as Legacy Effects, the company behind the original three films’ special effects , have been bought back.

The film is set for release for June 2015, and the full trailer will be released during Super Bowl XLIX on February 1st.

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Hulu has said that adapting viewable ads has helped bring in more business. This is contrary to what other Web publishers have experienced. Publishers have found viewable ads rather hurt ther bottom line than help business.

Without knowing what to expect Hulu’s senior vice president of advertising sales, Peter Naylor, said that selling ad space using viewability data paid off well.

“We are absolutely benefiting from viewability. In one case, seven days after a campaign started, we got incremental money,” said Mr. Naylor.

Hulu is explicitly designed for people to watch long-form video content on a video player without any need to scroll. There are no hidden banners, nor a multitude of pages.

“In order to make yourself lucky you have to design for viewabilty,” he said. “We don’t do autoplay video. We promise [brands that] people will watch full 30-second ads. So delivering two seconds (the minimum standard for viewable ads the industry has embraced) is no problem.”

Mr Naylor is empathatic towards Web publishers caught in the race of oversized Web ads and higher rates. They also face a growing mobile audience and the challenges of Web fraud.

“It’s an incredibly challenging time to be a publisher,” Mr. Naylor said. “Over the last few years, we’ve seen agencies deal with this push from ad agency procurement departments. It’s become the golden age of accountability. Now you’ve got all this complexity, and viewabilty is just another thing on the list.”

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Facebook has launched a new program aimed to help missing children in the U.S. The program will push Amber Alerts directly on to the newsfeeds of users.

The program has been developed between Facebook and the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC). It launched on Tuesday the 13th of January in the United States.

“When a child goes missing, the most important thing is getting out the relevant information, the correct information, to the right people at the right time,” Emily Vacher, Facebook head of global safety told USA Today.

Since January 2011, Facebook has had special pages for Amber Alerts. It issues notifications when a child goes missing. The new system is designed to target people living in the area where the child has gone missing.

It will automatically send them a post and photo about the missing child. Both desktops and mobile phones will receive notifications.

Additional information can be seen by the user by clicking on “learn more” or if you share the post on your timeline.

“If you see an Amber Alert delivered, it means you are actually in a position to be able to help,” said Vacher.

Every Facebook user will automatically receive these alerts and there is no option to opt out of it, as confirmed by a Facebook spokesperson. Vaucher says that users won’t be swarmed by posts but will typically see one to two alerts per year.