Microsoft Gets Out of the Movie and TV Business: How to Save Everything You Bought
Users are not eligible for refunds on content they've already bought, with Microsoft pointing to the Microsoft Store's Terms of Sale. However, you can continue to access content you've previously purchased in the Movies & TV app on your Xbox or Windows devices. Microsoft also says it will continue providing tech support for any film and TV content you've already purchased through its official stores.
The good news is that if you're in the US, you can sign up for the Movies Anywhere platform to connect your Microsoft-purchased movies with other Movies Anywhere retailers, including iTunes, Amazon Prime Video, Fandango at Home, Google Play, YouTube, Vudu, and Comcast's Xfinity. Launched in 2014, Movies Anywhere is a cloud-based digital rights locker and streaming platform that allows users to stream, download and store movies they've purchased elsewhere.
Microsoft didn't provide any details about what motivated its decision to shut down the storefront, but the move shouldn't come as a huge surprise. Though it remains an unavoidable player in the world of video games, Microsoft has already shut down most of its platforms providing traditional media content. Microsoft Groove, which started life as Zune Music, was discontinued in 2017 after struggling to compete with rivals like Spotify, Google Play Music, and Apple's iTunes.
If you're interested in moving your media library to Movies Anywhere, head to its website or open the Movies Anywhere app, available on the App Store or Google Play. In the mobile app, tap your profile picture, then tap the Settings (gear) icon. If you're using the website, click the arrow next to your profile name and select Settings. Then choose Manage Retailers, and tap Connect next to the digital retailer you want to link.
You'll be directed to Microsoft to complete the process—just follow the on-screen instructions to connect your accounts. Once you're done, return to Movies Anywhere to confirm that your accounts are connected.
Unfortunately, it's important to note that not all major streaming platforms are integrated with Movies Anywhere. If your preferred platform is Netflix, Hulu, Disney+, Max, Paramount+, or Peacock, you might have to settle for your second choice when exporting your Microsoft library.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
6 minutes ago
- Yahoo
DeepSeek, Trump's Plan Steer Agenda at China's Top AI Forum
(Bloomberg) -- Star founders, Beijing officials and deep-pocketed financiers converge on Shanghai by the thousands this weekend to attend China's most important AI summit. At the top of the agenda: how to propel Beijing's ambitions to leapfrog the US in artificial intelligence — and profit off that drive. Trump Awards $1.26 Billion Contract to Build Biggest Immigrant Detention Center in US The High Costs of Trump's 'Big Beautiful' New Car Loan Deduction Can This Bridge Ease the Troubled US-Canadian Relationship? Salt Lake City Turns Winter Olympic Bid Into Statewide Bond Boom The World Artificial Intelligence Conference, which has featured Elon Musk and Jack Ma in years past, was devised to showcase the cutting-edge of Chinese technology. This year's attendance may hit a record as it's taking place at a critical juncture in the US-Chinese tech rivalry. This week, US President Donald Trump unveiled his so-called AI Action Plan — a sort of call to arms to ensure the country keeps its lead in the post-ChatGPT epoch. At the same time, the emergence of DeepSeek in January galvanized a generation of Chinese developers to ride a nationwide investment and innovation wave. From Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. to fledgling firms such as Minimax, the country's aspirants in the field have since moved aggressively to try and close the gap with the likes of OpenAI and Google. 'While many recognize DeepSeek's achievements, this represents just the beginning of China's AI innovation wave,' said Louis Liang, an AI sector investor with Ameba Capital. 'We are witnessing the advent of AI mass adoption, this goes beyond national competition.' The Shanghai conference rundown for now remains largely unknown — as it has in years past just days before kickoff. Chinese Premier Li Qiang will attend, and tech leaders from Tencent Holdings Ltd. to ByteDance Ltd. and startups like Zhipu AI and Moonshot are likely to turn out in force. Here's what we can expect from the summit starting Saturday. DeepSeek's Aura Neither the startup nor its reclusive founder Liang Wenfeng feature in the advance literature for the event. And yet, the two-year-old firm is likely to be one of the topics du jour. Since its low-cost, high-performance AI model humbled much of Silicon Valley, the industry has watched China closely for another seismic moment. In a field notorious for splashing billions of dollars on Nvidia Corp. chips and data centers, DeepSeek's no-frills approach inspired a re-think of traditional models. And it challenged what till then was unquestioned US supremacy in bleeding-edge technology: Xi Jinping himself turned out in public in February to congratulate Liang and his fellow tech entrepreneurs. China craves another big breakthrough. Downloads and usage of DeepSeek models have slowed, as has the pace of new model rollouts that peaked over the spring at once every few days. Now, much of the industry talk centers on why DeepSeek's R2 — the followup to its seminal R1 — hasn't yet emerged. Local media have blamed everything from Liang's perfectionist streak to performance glitches. Trump's, and Xi's, Ambitions The conference gets underway days after the US leader signed executive orders to loosen regulations and expand energy supplies for data centers. 'From this day forward, it'll be a policy of the United States to do whatever it takes to lead the world in artificial intelligence,' Trump told executives and lawmakers at a DC event. Among the attendees was Jensen Huang, whose Nvidia is one of the companies at the heart of the global AI movement. Much has been made in Washington of China's seemingly meteoric ascent in AI, with observers saying the country is now perhaps just months behind the US in terms of AI sophistication. That's a wafer-thin margin compared with sectors such as semiconductors, where America is regarded as many years or even generations ahead. Trump's newly announced action plan is likely to spur Chinese companies into accelerating their own plans to go global, in part by aggressively open-sourcing their platforms. Beijing wants AI to become a $100 billion industry by 2030. At the Communist Party's April Politburo study session, Xi emphasized that China must push for breakthroughs in critical areas like high-end chips and AI research. Rise of the Robots Chinese humanoid makers are expected to showcase their most advanced models. Last week, UBTech posted a video of its Walker S2 humanoid walking to a battery station, removing the pack from its back, placing it on the recharge pad before fitting itself with a new battery. While obviously edited and choreographed, it encapsulated the advances that Chinese firms have made in a wide-open field — and their lofty ambitions. Unitree teased a bargain-basement price of under $10,000 for its androids. And just this week, TikTok-owner ByteDance posted a video of its ByteMini robot painstakingly hanging a shirt on a clothes rack — a simple human exercise yet an intricate dance for a machine. They join the likes of AgiBot and UBTech in collectively driving a promising field in which American companies have so far failed to stake out a clear lead, despite decades of effort. The Chinese companies 'are targeting hundreds to thousands of units to be delivered this year, racing to establish the ecosystem,' Morgan Stanley analyst Sheng Wong said in a note this week. Show the Money Venture capitalists and dealmakers will be hunting for emerging tech leaders. And not all of them are Chinese. China's largest venture capital houses are tapping the market for at least $2 billion in new funds. At least six of the country's most prominent VC firms — including Lightspeed China Partners and Monolith Management — are creating dollar-denominated funds designed to allow overseas investors to pool bets on Chinese companies. That's a wave of fundraising that hasn't been seen among Chinese VCs for years. It's unfolding as global investors reassess the country's startup landscape and economy, which are showing signs of revival after years of Covid-era stagnation and regulatory headwinds. Organizers promise a breakout event that will feature startup pitches and live demos for dealmakers. Startups by the hundreds are expected to fill a 70,000 sq-meter exhibition hall, showing off everything from autonomous delivery drones to machines that dispense toilet paper. Missing Global Touch Attendees are unlikely to spot US companies — at least not in major fashion. In 2024, Tesla Inc. popped up with its Cybertruck and Optimus robot. This year's speaker lineup doesn't (yet) include Musk but does list industry pioneer Geoffrey Hinton and Yoshua Bengio, the Canadian scientist who pioneered artificial neural networks. With the US-China tech rivalry accelerating, many American companies remain wary of drawing the spotlight. Still, Beijing is likely to take the opportunity to continue pushing its international agenda. One of the conference centerpieces is a 'High-Level Meeting on Global AI Governance' to discuss the challenges in deploying AI responsibly. To many observers, it's also emblematic of China's overarching goal of setting global standards. 'Since 2018, China has used WAIC to stake its claim on global AI technical and political leadership,' said Tom Nunlist, associate director of the Beijing-based consultancy Trivium. 'With the race to AI now neck and neck between the US and China, that play is more compelling than ever.' --With assistance from Vlad Savov. (Updates with video of ByteDance's mini-robot from the 14th paragraph.) Burning Man Is Burning Through Cash Elon Musk's Empire Is Creaking Under the Strain of Elon Musk It's Not Just Tokyo and Kyoto: Tourists Descend on Rural Japan Confessions of a Laptop Farmer: How an American Helped North Korea's Wild Remote Worker Scheme A Rebel Army Is Building a Rare-Earth Empire on China's Border ©2025 Bloomberg L.P.
Digital Trends
37 minutes ago
- Digital Trends
This heartbreaking drama is an underrated Netflix movie to watch this weekend (July 25-27)
Every time I open Netflix, I feel a mild sensation of both excitement and dread. There's plenty of stuff to check out, but I actually have to pick something in order to get started. This weekend, I've pulled together three movies that are all great whether you've seen them once or hundreds of times. They're also movies that, for one reason or another, are underrated at the moment. Give them a look. Recommended Videos We also have guides to the best new movies to stream, the best movies on Netflix, the best movies on Hulu, the best movies on Amazon Prime Video, the best movies on HBO Max, and the best movies on Disney+. Friday Night Lights (2004) One of the great football movies ever made, Friday Night Lights tells the story of a small Texas town where high school football is the only thing that matters. When the star tailback hurts himself and is out for the season, all hope of the team making it to the state championship seems lost. The team's coach must then push his kids and the town to remember how important it is to believe in themselves. As cheesy as that might sound, Billy Bob Thornton knows how to turn the material into something genuinely revelatory. There's a reason a whole show was based on the story at the center of this film. You can watch Friday Night Lights on Netflix. His Three Daughters (2024) A genuinely heartbreaking movie, His Three Daughters follows three sisters as they navigate the death of the father they all shared. Carrie Coon, Natasha Lyonne, and Elizabeth Olsen all delivered textured performances here, and part of the point of the movie is that their dad meant very different things to each of them. His Three Daughters is a movie about how easy it is to judge the people in your life and how hard it is to navigate difficult periods together without driving one another insane. Crucially, each actor receives plenty of breathing room. You can watch His Three Daughters on Netflix. Instant Family (2018) Family comedy has largely been relegated to Netflix, but Instant Family is a reminder of how great this genre can be. The film stars Rose Byrne and Mark Wahlberg as a couple who decide to foster children after agreeing to start a family. When they find themselves fostering three siblings, including a rebellious 15-year-old, they begin to realize how chaotic and complicated fostering children really is and how much they still have to learn. Byrne and Wahlberg are excellent and remarkably game. Instant Family is surprisingly sweet without losing any of its laughs. You can watch Instant Family on Netflix.
NBC News
38 minutes ago
- NBC News
Microsoft's Satya Nadella says job cuts have been 'weighing heavily' on him
Microsoft has laid off over 15,000 people so far in 2025. The stress of the belt-tightening has gotten to CEO Satya Nadella. 'Before anything else, I want to speak to what's been weighing heavily on me, and what I know many of you are thinking about: the recent job eliminations,' Nadella wrote in a memo to employees Thursday. After Microsoft's latest labor reductions, investors pushed the stock's closing price above $500 for the first time on July 9. The company announced the layoffs of about 9,000 people a week earlier. Microsoft employed 228,000 people as of June 2024. It hasn't provided a new figure that takes into account its layoffs this year, but Nadella wrote that headcount is basically flat. 'This is the enigma of success in an industry that has no franchise value,' he wrote. 'Progress isn't linear. It's dynamic, sometimes dissonant, and always demanding. But it's also a new opportunity for us to shape, lead through, and have greater impact than ever before.' The cuts at Microsoft are reflective of an overall trend across the tech industry, with over 80,000 positions eliminated to date in 2025, according to one count. Recruit Holdings announced earlier this month that it would lay off 1,300 people from its human resources technology segment that includes the Indeed and Glassdoor websites. The company's CEO pointed to artificial intelligence in a memo, Bloomberg reported. On social media in recent months, some Microsoft employees have become disheartened about the company's cutbacks, given its stature. 'I have loved working for this company, still do, but this has done so much damage to that loyalty because it has shown that Microsoft's espoused values do not apply to business decisions at the macro level,' a person who lists themselves as a Microsoft directed on LinkedIn posted last week. Microsoft is the world's most valuable public company after Nvidia, whose chips have become a critical piece of the AI arms race. Microsoft's Windows and Office franchises remain dominant, and its Azure cloud services have seen faster growth in recent years as OpenAI and other companies rent out Nvidia graphics cards to run AI models. In the memo, Nadella touched on Microsoft's mission for the past 10 years, which has been to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more, and how the rise of AI is changing it. 'We must reimagine our mission for a new era,' he wrote. 'What does empowerment look like in the era of AI? It's not just about building tools for specific roles or tasks. It's about building tools that empower everyone to create their own tools. That's the shift we are driving — from a software factory to an intelligence engine empowering every person and organization to build whatever they need to achieve.'
