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Cineverse and DIRECTV bring home the horror this october with SCREAMBOX Now Available as VOD streaming service. Romance Driven Dove Channel Also Now Available to DIRECTV Customers LOS ANGELES, Oct. 8, 2026 /PRNewswire/ - Cineverse (Nasdaq: CNVS), an entertainment technology company and studio, announced today the addition of both SVOD (subscription video-on-demand) access to SCREAMBOX and Dove Channel on DIRECTV. SCREAMBOX features a broad mix of content for casual and die-hard horror fans alike. The service is refreshed monthly with content from the Company's extensive genre library with films and episodes delivering every type of terror imaginable. SCREAMBOX currently features classic horror films like Black Christmas, slasher hits Terrifier 2 and 3 as well as the BBC series Bedlam and Being Human. Dove Channel features a lineup of films and series sending viewers on an escape to romance and excitement, where heartwarming tales, light-hearted love stories, and holiday escapes await. Dove is your streaming home away from home. Dove Channel currently features films Loving Every Minute, Romantic Friction and Love at the Lodge as well as series like Life with Derek and H2O: Just Add Water. "As we have seen for quite some time, fandom-driven channels like SCREAMBOX and Dove drive real engagement, subscriptions, and revenue for our distribution partners, while discouraging churn," said Cineverse SVP Partnerships and Business Development Alexandra Viglione. "The value of premium, curated, entertainment programming that targets the most passionate fans continues to grow, and through this expanding partnership with DIRECTV, we are able to reach these audiences however they prefer to watch." About DIRECTV DIRECTV is a premier provider of digital television entertainment in the United States. With a diverse range of programming options and cutting-edge technology, DIRECTV delivers a world-class viewing experience to millions of subscribers. Its commitment to innovation and customer satisfaction keeps it at the forefront of the entertainment industry while providing customers with greater choice, flexibility, and control. For more information, visit www.directv.com. About Cineverse Streaming Cineverse owns and/or operates a wide range of premium streaming brands, from free, ad-supported streaming television (FAST) channels to subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) apps. These span fandoms - from single IP channels around pop cultural icons such as Bob Ross and The Dog Whisperer with Cesar Milan, to channels curated for fans of Horror (Screambox, Midnight Pulp), Anime and Pan-Asian shows and films (RetroCrush, AsianCrush), Comedy (Gorilla Comedy+), Independent Film (Fandor), Romance (Dove Channel) and True Crime (Crime Hunters), to name a few. About Cineverse Cineverse (Nasdaq: CNVS) is an entertainment technology company and studio. Fiercely innovative and independent, Cineverse develops and invests in technology and content that drives the future of the industry. Core to its business is Matchpoint(R)- a growing tech ecosystem designed to prepare, distribute, monetize, and continuously improve content across any platform. Matchpoint helps studios large and small operate at scale and improve performance and efficiency in an increasingly fragmented distribution environment. Additionally, Cineverse distributes a vast library of premium films, series, and podcasts, across theatrical, home entertainment, and streaming; operates dozens of digital properties that super serve passionate fandoms around the world; and works with leading brands to connect them with audiences they value. From award-winning technology to the highest-grossing unrated film in U.S. history, Cineverse has created a playbook that marries tech and content to redefine the next era of entertainment. For more information, visit cineverse.com. For DIRECTV Communications For Cineverse SOURCE Cineverse Corp.

Supreme Court rejects Nexstar bid to end DIRECTV retrans lawsuit. [email protected] October 5, 2026 Key points. * The Supreme Court declined to hear Nexstar's appeal seeking to block DIRECTV's antitrust lawsuit. * The decision leaves intact a 2025 appeals court ruling that revived DIRECTV's case. * DIRECTV accuses Nexstar, Mission Broadcasting and White Knight of coordinating retransmission rates; Nexstar has denied any wrongdoing. The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear an appeal from Nexstar Media Group seeking to block an antitrust lawsuit brought by DIRECTV over retransmission consent negotiations involving stations owned by Nexstar, Mission Broadcasting and White Knight Broadcasting. The decision leaves intact a December 2025 ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit that revived DIRECTV's lawsuit and allows the satellite television provider to continue pursuing its claims in federal court in New York. DIRECTV filed the lawsuit in 2023, accusing Nexstar, Mission and White Knight of coordinating negotiations in markets where Nexstar and one of the other broadcasters own stations affiliated with major television networks. Mission and White Knight own fewer than three dozen television stations between them, with their stations operated by Nexstar through local management agreements. DIRECTV alleges the companies used a common negotiator who effectively acted as an agent of Nexstar and improperly shared confidential retransmission rates, financial information and negotiating positions. The company also alleges the broadcasters coordinated blackout dates and public messaging during carriage disputes. DIRECTV refused to pay the rates sought by the broadcasters, resulting in stations going dark for approximately one million subscribers. The company says thousands of customers subsequently canceled their subscriptions, causing DIRECTV to lose revenue. Stock price. A federal district court dismissed the lawsuit in 2024, but the Second Circuit reversed that decision in December 2025. The appeals court determined DIRECTV could pursue its antitrust claims based on alleged lost profits even though it did not pay the allegedly inflated retransmission rates. Nexstar appealed that decision to the Supreme Court, arguing a company should only be able to pursue a price-fixing claim if it actually paid the allegedly inflated price. Nexstar also argued the Second Circuit ruling conflicted with decisions from other federal appeals courts and could substantially broaden antitrust liability for sellers. DIRECTV disputed those arguments and maintained there was no conflict among the federal appeals courts. The Supreme Court's decision not to hear the case does not resolve DIRECTV's underlying allegations or determine whether Nexstar violated antitrust law. Instead, it allows the lawsuit to continue under the Second Circuit ruling. Discovery in the case has already produced additional evidence that DIRECTV says supports its allegations. In August, DIRECTV told the court that communications produced by Nexstar showed coordination between the companies through media consultant Eric Sahl. DIRECTV alleges those records show Nexstar, Mission and White Knight coordinating retransmission rates and negotiating positions while using similar strategies for blackouts and public messaging. Nexstar has denied any wrongdoing. The retransmission consent lawsuit is separate from ongoingn litigation involving DIRECTV and several state attorneys general over Nexstar's acquisition of TEGNA.

DIRECTV quietly improves picture quality for streaming customers. October 4, 2026 DIRECTV has rolled out a major improvement to picture quality across its streaming service, quietly raising the bitrate on its live channels over the past week. The change arrived without a formal announcement, a marketing campaign, or an update to the app's settings screens, and customers began noticing cleaner images on ordinary televisions before industry observers could document the shift. The higher data rate applies to the company's internet-delivered linear streams, covering news, entertainment, and sports channels that make up the bulk of daily viewing. Bitrate is the amount of video data sent each second. Live TV services like DIRECTV compress each channel so it can travel over home internet connections, and that compression throws away detail the encoder judges least important. When the allowed rate is low, the discarded information shows up as blocky patches in dark scenes, smeared backgrounds behind moving players, soft faces, and color that bands instead of grading smoothly. Raising the bitrate gives the encoder more room to keep that information, so the same resolution can look sharper and more stable without any change to the television or the streaming device. For the average viewer, the difference is most obvious in motion. A football broadcast that previously softened yard lines and player numbers during a fast play should hold those edges more cleanly. Camera pans across a studio set or a city skyline should show less of the shimmering, mosquito-like noise that low-rate compression often leaves on fine textures. Darker programming, including evening dramas and night games, should show fewer large flat blocks in shadows and more separation between similar shades of black and gray. Gradients in skies, stage lighting, and graphics should step less visibly from one color to the next. Static detail also benefits. Hair, fabric weave, grass, and on-screen text that looked slightly soft or noisy can regain definition once the stream is no longer starved for bits. Graphics overlays and scoreboards, which are easy for compression to damage, tend to look more solid. The improvement is not a jump to a higher resolution label, and it will not turn a standard high-definition channel into 4K. It is a cleaner version of the picture the service was already sending, closer to the look of a well-provisioned broadcast feed. The gain depends on the connection at home. Adaptive streaming still lowers quality when bandwidth is tight, so a household on a congested Wi-Fi link may see little change until the network can sustain the higher rate. Viewers on a stable wired connection, or on strong wireless near the router, are the ones most likely to see the fuller image. Recordings made after the change should inherit the improved stream, because cloud DVR copies follow the quality of the live encode. The quiet nature of the rollout fits a pattern in live television streaming, where encoding ladders are adjusted in the background as capacity and codec efficiency change. DIRECTV has not announced the new target rates or said whether every channel and every device received the same increase. What subscribers can judge for themselves is the picture on screen: fewer artifacts in motion, steadier color, and more retained detail in the programs they already watch. Please add Cord Cutters News as a source for your Google News feed HERE. Please follow Cord Cutters News on Facebook and X for more news, tips, and reviews. Need cord cutting tech support? Join its Cord Cutting Tech Support Facebook Group for help.