Twitter gets rid of 'government-funded' label from news publishers

Twitter has removed the "government-funded" media labels the service attached to news publishers like CBC, BBC, and NPR. They were removed as of Friday morning, coinciding with Twitter's erasure of legacy blue checks. These checks were intended to identify notable people, government bodies, and journalists. But now, Twitter uses it as a "perk" for its Twitter Blue subscription service.

CBC and the other outlets decried the "unfair" use of the label, with the CBC pausing its use of the service. It argued that the designation was undermining its work. According to a spokesperson from CBC, they are reviewing this new development but will leave their Twitter accounts on pause for now. The last tweet it posted on April 18 on Twitter referred users to its other social media accounts.

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Sony buys Firewalk Studios

Image: Sony Interactive Entertainment

Sony Interactive Entertainment struck a deal with Firewalk Studios to publish a PlayStation 5 exclusive multiplayer game. Now, it's buying the studio outright. Sony announced that it reached an agreement with ProbablyMonsters Inc to acquire the studio.

The deal will roll Firewalk Studios and its team into the PlayStation brand. But its operations will continue to be run by the studio's existing management team. However, Sony didn't mention anything about the PS5-exclusive title it's working on, but it wanted to highlight the team's experience with working on Destiny at Bungie and Activision.

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Netflix's ad-supported tier to get 1080p video quality, two simultaneous streams in Canada

Netflix is making its ad-supported plan a more viable option for users who don't mind ads for a more affordable price. Subscribers of this tier in Canada and Spain will get a video quality boost from 720p to 1080p and support two simultaneous streams. Other markets with the ad plan will get it sometime this month.

The streaming service has supposedly been "pleased" with the progress of its Basics with Ads tier. Add to that the recent licensing deals mean the ads tier now offers "on average ~95 percent content parity globally (by viewing)" with the no-ads plans.

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Comixology's Marvel Comics app to shut down in June

Image: Marvel Comics

Comixology's Marvel Comics app will shut down on June 2, following layoffs at Amazon (Comixology's parent company since 2014) that hit the comic storefront hard. If you bought comics on the app, you can access them through the Marvel Unlimited app. May 2 will be the cutoff date for new purchases in the app. Any purchases made up to that date will transfer to Marvel Unlimited. 

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