YouTube sends notice to content creators about upcoming ad-free subscription service

We’ve heard for quite some time now that YouTube wanted to explore an ad-free subscription service. The concept is simple: you pay money, you don’t get annoying ads at the beginning, end or sometimes middle of a video.

Google has been hesitant come out and confirm anything, but it looks like they’ve finally let the cat out of the bag. Several partnered YouTubers have reported receiving emails from the company informing them of a forthcoming subscription service that will allow their viewers to pay good coin to dodge those annoying ads that play when you watch a video.

The email was scarce on any details about the service such as cost, but Google did note that partners would be able to get in on the new revenue stream (which was the whole reason for them sending this notice — it will create significant changes to the company’s standing terms of service policies).

Google is already providing a similar option in the same ballpark called the YouTube Music Key. It’s a per month service that lets users access music videos ad-free, as well as cache them for offline viewing should an internet connection fail to be available. Extending a similar service for the entirety of the video content on YouTube would be a big deal for those who absolutely loathe having to view ads (even if most of them can be skipped after 5 seconds).

The timing of the announcement might indicate that Google is getting ready to pilot the service this year, though without any hard details your guess is just as good as ours. We imagine any formal announcements will be saved for Google IO so stay tuned!

[via Bloomberg]

Sprint Direct 2 You sends company representatives to you to help setup new smartphones

While Sprint is busy putting up new towers to help improve their network and trying to match T-Mobile in the value game, they’ve come up with another unique strategy to help retain your business: personal visits to help you set your new smartphones up.

It’s called Direct 2 You, and a fleet of more than 5,000 vehicles driven by Sprint representatives will be on-hand to meet up with you at your home, office or any other location you desire — at whichever time you desire (within reason, we imagine) — to help you get going on your phone. This includes transferring content and contacts from one phone to another, with great emphasis placed on the Android to iPhone conversion or vice versa.

This is a process typically done in-store, but Sprint feels time is too precious to have you waiting in long lines at the point of sale. The best part? It’s all absolutely free. Take it from someone whose most recent upgrade took more than 3 hours of waiting inside the stuffy corners of a Verizon store — this is awesome.

The service will begin in major areas of Miami and Chicago starting April 20th (testing has already started in Sprint’s backyard of Kansas City), and will spread to more major cities as 2015 rolls on.

[via Sprint]

HTC sends invites for HTC One M9+ revelation April 8th in Beijing, new images leak

HTC had a big shindig in Barcelona a couple of weeks ago to unveil the HTC One M9, and now the variant we were really hoping to see could be due April 8th. The company is sending invites to Chinese press to show that they have “More Than One” device on tap this year, and they’ll be unveiling the latest in Beijing.

The invitation shows a device that looks to be similar to the rear of an HTC One M9, except it has the same dual camera setup we’ve seen on previous leaks instead of the lone camera featured on the company’s 2015 flagship — this, folks, is likely the HTC One M9 Plus.

That’s all we can tell from the company’s official teaser, though we know the device will have a couple of key differences up front. The main one is that there will be a physical home button smack dab in the middle of the bottom set of BoomSound speakers and will have dual functionality as a fingerprint scanner. The display is also a tad bigger, though at 5.2 inches (if OnLeaks’ most recent information is to be believed) it’s not the phablet-sized monster we were expecting.

The device is expected to have Quad-HD resolution at 2560 x 1440, 3GB of RAM and a 20 megapixel camera sensor. It might also have MediaTek’s 64-bit Octa-Core MT6795T.

Oh, and it looks like the mockup made by @OnLeaks was about as accurate as accurate can be — the in-the-wild shots seen below definitely show a device that looks like a slightly bigger HTC One M9 with a fingerprint scanner.

Its Chinese debut might suggest this device won’t be made available for many other regions to start, though we’ll have to wait for official word from HTC to be clued in on their exact plans.

[Weibo, Nowhereelse.fr via Engadget]

Huawei sends out invites for June 2nd event in New York

Huawei is gearing up to announce a new handset and unlike the recently launched Huawei P8, this one is bound for the US. The Chinese manufacturer has just sent out invites to a June 2nd event in New York City and although it doesn’t reveal much, you can see some sort of smartphone press render peeking out from behind the invite.

With the tag line “See what we’re unlocking next,” it only makes sense that this could be an unlocked version of the P8 with US carrier bands. We’ll keep you posted as we bring you the latest from the event.