Posted on 07/09/2024 12:40:22 PM PDT by Red Badger
If you use Redbox’s streaming service, you may have noticed you can’t stream the movies you bought or even the free collection of movies they offer. Earlier today, Redbox’s website stopped working. Now it just displaying an error message where you would typically find the free movies and movies or TV shows for sale.
For now, the issue is limited to Redbox, as Crackle, also owned by the same company, is still working. The exact cause of the issue is unknown and Cord Cutters News has reached out to Redbox for comment. If we hear back we will update our story.
For now, though, if you have movies on the Redbox streaming services that you bought, you will need to wait and see what happens. Likely, this is a technical glitch as the company just secured $8 million in new funding.
Last month, Chicken Soup for The Soul Entertainment, the parent company behind Redbox, Crackel, and the streaming service of the same name, announced that the entire board of directors and board of managers of each subsidiary of the company other than William J. Rouhana, Jr., had been fired. This was quickly followed by news that Redbox was filing for bankruptcy.
Now, according to a report from Bloomberg, HPS has agreed to give the company an $8 million load, but as part of the deal, Redbox’s parent company must reinstate the independent members of its board that were fired last month. Now the judge over seeing this bankruptcy has agreed to the plan.
Before this, employees had not been paid and benefits like health insurance had been canceled. With this loan, employees will be paid and health insurance will also be funded.
Recently the company missed a $4 million payment to NBCUniversal as a part of its settlement over unpaid royalties. Now, it faces a possible order to pay all the $16.7 million it owes NBCUniversal as questions about the future of the company grow. NBCUniversal sued, saying Redbox had not been paying royalties. It agreed to a payment plan but had missed the first payment.
Chicken Soup for The Soul Entertainment is in a tough situation after acquiring Redbox in 2022 for $50 million in stock and assumption of $325 million in debt. Add in a shaky media environment with cratering ad revenue and quarterly losses, and the company’s future is very much in the air. In August, CEO Rouhana said that the company was holding a strategic review to evaluate its opportunities, which is business speak for putting itself up for sale.
Last year, Chicken Soup for The Soul Entertainment announced that it was in active discussions for a potential sale but so far nothing has come from these talks.
Like many media companies, the company has been hit by a soft ad market that has negatively impacted revenues. For a company that heavily relies on ad-supported streaming, this market must negatively impact the service. Right now, the company seems confident that they will be able to work through these issues and pay their partners. We will have to wait and see what happens.
Ain’t that the truth. Ran across some vintage 78 classical Mozart, Bach, and Tchaikovsky some time back. Hit the mother lode.
Not all of us play multiplayer, the jerks. Left the PC guys laying in the dirt after we were the ones that put gaming on the map... so to speak. Gotta admit.... friggin games nowadays are 60+ gig but TB drives are much more affordable than then.
Now imagine that were your digital savings account.
When I worked at Earthlink, an ISP, they started a music service that as long as you had an account with them you had access to the music you BOUGHT but if you cancelled your internet account then POOF! it disappeared. The part of all your stuff disappearing was in fine print so many angry people.
“The choice for mankind lies between freedom and happiness and for the great bulk of mankind, happiness is better.”
― George Orwell, 1984
You will own nothing and be happy!......................
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