Science-Centric Streaming Service Curiosity Stream is an AI-licensing Firm Now (arstechnica.com) 3
Curiosity Stream, the decade-old science documentary streaming service founded by Discovery Channel's John Hendricks, expects its AI licensing business to generate more revenue than its 23 million subscribers by 2027 -- possibly earlier. The company's Q3 2025 earnings revealed a 41% year-over-year revenue increase, driven largely by deals licensing its content to train large language models. Year-to-date AI licensing brought in $23.4 million through September, already exceeding half of what the subscription business generated for all of 2024.
The streaming service's library contains 2 million hours of content, but the "overwhelming majority" is earmarked for AI licensing rather than subscriber viewing, CEO Clint Stinchcomb said during the earnings call. Curiosity Stream is licensing 300,000 hours of its own programming and 1.7 million hours of third-party content to hyperscalers and AI developers. The company has completed 18 AI-related deals across video, audio, and code assets.
The streaming service's library contains 2 million hours of content, but the "overwhelming majority" is earmarked for AI licensing rather than subscriber viewing, CEO Clint Stinchcomb said during the earnings call. Curiosity Stream is licensing 300,000 hours of its own programming and 1.7 million hours of third-party content to hyperscalers and AI developers. The company has completed 18 AI-related deals across video, audio, and code assets.
Disappointing but not surprising (Score:3)
AI slop documentaries are becoming mainstream now, sadly. I can only imagine what History channel is like these days, not having watched any of that in years.
I'm not surprised Curiosity Stream has jumped on the AI gravy train. I hope a lot of their creators will withhold permission to sell their work for AIs to copy, but I don't know under what terms their creators publish on that platform. I had thought it different and better in how creators were treated than on youtube but perhaps not.
Re: (Score:2)
They're already making bank doing this, so it's pretty clear their terms already put them in charge of the decision.
I doubt any content creators are going to withhold from them, because what's the alternative? Publishing on youtube? They won't have enough views to make money, documentaries are niche.
Re: (Score:2)
My favourite streaming service is The Great Courses [thegreatcoursesplus.com]. It had a small hiccup when it rebranded as Wondrium for a few years and merged its content with Magellan etc, but the users complained loudly and the company went back to their core competency. I have no problem giving them my money even though I will never get through all the courses they have on offer.