After months of teasing, Formula E and the Federation Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) announced today they will finally unveil their new Gen3 all-electric car at an event in Monaco on April 28th. The two organizations said fans would be able to watch the unveiling through their associated digital channels. Formula E teams will begin using the car at the start of the 2022-2023 season, with testing expected to begin this spring.

The FIA first shared details on the Gen3 at the end of last year, revealing it would feature a motor capable of outputting 350kW of power (about 470 brake horsepower) and a top speed of 200 miles per hour. It will also include front and rear powertrains, a first for a formula car. With a total of 600kW of power, the Gen3 will feature more than double the regenerative capability of Formula E’s current Gen2 vehicle. The FIA has also promised the Gen3 will be its most sustainable vehicle to date, with a net-zero carbon footprint thanks to recyclable carbon fiber parts and other design considerations.

Nine years after it first emerged a live-action Halo TV series was in the works, the show is only a few days away from premiering on Paramount+. To celebrate its debut, Microsoft is giving Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscribers a free 30-day trial to the streaming service via Perks.

The offer will be available on March 23rd, the day before Halo arrives. There's a catch, though. Given that only one installment of the nine-episode season is scheduled to drop each week, you might need to subscribe to Paramount+ to watch the entire season (unless you activate the offer a bit later). Paramount+ costs $5 per month with ads or $10 per month to go commercial free and gain access to a feed from your local live CBS station.

Earlier this week, Paramount+ released the final trailer for the show, which has a separate plot from the games and is already renewed for a second season. Along with some story beats, the two-minute clip shows an Elite with an Energy Sword and several shots of Master Chief in action.

FC Barcelona might be one of the most famous names in soccer, but the club is in bad financial shape. So much so, it couldn't afford to hang on to talisman Lionel Messi, who moved to Paris St Germain last summer. Overall, Barcelona is in debt to the tune of well over $1 billion. The club’s dire finances are being somewhat alleviated, though, with the help of a new sponsor: Spotify.

The audio streaming platform’s name will replace Rakuten on the front of men’s and women's team shirts (and replicas that fans buy) as part of a long-term partnership that starts in July. Spotify says it will work with Barcelona to “create opportunities for the iconic shirt to be a space that celebrates artists from across the world.” The team’s famed stadium will be rebranded as Spotify Camp Nou as well. It’s the first time Barcelona has renamed the stadium after a sponsor.

On top of that, as long as the Barcelona Members Assembly approves the deal next month, Spotify plans to draw attention to artists from around the world with the help of Barcelona, “giving a global stage to players and artists at Spotify Camp Nou.” Spotify believes the partnership and worldwide renown of the club will help it “create a new platform to help artists interact with Barcelona’s global community of fans.” More specifics will be announced later this year.

Reports suggest Spotify will pay Barcelona around $307 million over the course of the partnership. Spotify has been criticized for sponsoring Barcelona in a nine-figure deal instead of increasing payouts to artists and supporting them more at a grassroots level.

TV broadcasters are trying all sorts of new tactics to spice up live coverage, including some truly wild things for sports. The NFL made games kid friendly with Nickelodeon-style slime cannons, for example. For tonight's NBA matchup between the Mavericks and Nets, ESPN is trying something with more universal appeal. The network says that for the first time ever, 3D volumetric video will be used for a live full-game broadcast. 

The project is the result of a collaboration between ESPN Edge, Disney Media & Entertainment Distribution (DMED) Technology teams, the NBA and Canon. The experimental setup uses Canon's Free-Viewpoint Video (FVV) system with over 100 data capture cameras positioned around the basketball court. The result is a live sports broadcast merged with multi-dimensional footage — something that looks very much like you're watching a real-life video game. 

While ESPN says this is the first time the technology has been used for a full live production of a sporting event, it has been used before. With their “Netaverse," the Brooklyn Nets — in collaboration with the NBA, Canon and the YES Network — have used the dimensional footage for replay clips and other post-production content. The Nets are also the first team from any of the four major US pro leagues to utilize the system, first capturing game action with it in mid-January. The clips you see here are from early use of the system, but ESPN said it worked with DMED Technology to build on top of what Canon, the NBA, the Nets and YES had done, making several enhancements so it worked better for live games. The still image above doesn't really do this justice, so you really need to see the video clips, even in their early form, to get a real sense of what this looks like.

Six separate feeds are sent to ESPN's control room in Bristol, CT, essentially offering six virtual cameras that are each able to move in three dimensional space to any spot on or around the court. Each feed has a dedicated "camera" operator who controls the view. The alternate broadcast will also have its own production team, as well has dedicated commentators, piping in the natural arena audio from Barclays Center in Brooklyn. ESPN says the broadcast isn't totally reliant on volumetric video as it can integrate traditional cameras, replays and other content into the 3D environment via a rendered version of the jumbotron. 

Last April, ESPN offered an alternate Marvel-themed "Arena of Heroes" broadcast during an NBA game. While that bent more towards the cartoony aspect of video games, tonight's effort is more about showing the action with a immersive dimensional quality. The network says the experiment shows new ways emerging technology can be used to offer something beyond what we're used to seeing on TV, expanding what's possible for production in the future. 

The alternate broadcast will be available on ESPN+ and ESPNEWS when the Mavericks and Nets tip off at 7:30PM ET tonight. 

Google might come to your rescue the next time you need to write a carefully-worded email. The company is rolling out a Google Docs update that lets Workspace and legacy G Suite users collaborate on Gmail drafts. Open the email draft template (Insert > Building Blocks > Email draft) and your colleagues can comment or make suggestions. You won't always need to know recipients' email addresses, either, as you can mention people by name.

When you're ready to send the email, you just need to click a button to open a Gmail compose window and finalize the message. Docs will automatically populate all the relevant fields.

The feature will take up to 15 days to reach companies on Rapid Release domains, and will start reaching more cautious Scheduled Release customers on March 22nd. There's no mention of availability for personal use. At work, however, this could prove very handy — lawyers could use it to produce an airtight email to a client, while marketers might work together on their ideal sales pitch.

You won't have to invite friends over to share an ESPN sports stream. The network has added SharePlay support to the ESPN app for iOS and iPadOS, letting US viewers watch live and on-demand programming with up to 31 other people. Everyone watching will need either ESPN (via TV Everywhere) or ESPN+ access, but it might be worthwhile to share an exciting shot or questionable referee call in the heat of the moment.

As with SharePlay in other apps, the functionality requires at least iOS 15.1 or iPad OS 15.1. You'll have to wait until an Apple TV update sometime later in March to use the feature on the big screen in tandem with an iPhone or iPad.

ESPN is relatively late to SharePlay when some services have had the feature since late 2021. Its sibling service Disney+ has had group viewing (albeit using a custom approach) since 2020. This may be one of the more important implementations, however. Live sports are a huge draw for co-viewing features like this, and ESPN's large audience might introduce SharePlay to many people who otherwise wouldn't realize it existed.

Skydivers Luke Aikins and Andy Farrington will attempt a feat that has never been done before (and likely for good reason): The two cousins and professional daredevils will each fly their own Cessna 182 “experimental aircraft” to an elevation of 14,000 feet, simultaneously pitch the planes into a vertical nosedive and then proceed to leap into each other's' respective aircraft. Hulu will be livestreaming the aeronautical feat, courtesy of Red Bull TV, on April 24th.

Both Aikin and Farrington regularly perform aerial acts that are not for the faint of heart as members of the Red Bull Air Force, the members of which are some of the best professional skydivers and wingsuit flyers in the world. Aikin made history in 2016 by becoming the first person to jump 7600 meters without a parachute, engineers designed what amounts to a human-sized fish net to break his fall. Andy Farrington’s career highlights include winning the Red Bull ACES championship — a global wingsuit racing competition — twice. Despite being the youngest member of the Red Bull Airforce, the 39-year old has more skydives, BASE jumps and flying hours under his belt than any other member of the team.

The act of plane swapping wouldn’t be technically possible without significant alterations to the aircraft themselves. Aircraft engineer Dr. Paulo Iscold designed a custom airbrake system that allows for both planes to maintain a controlled vertical descent after the cousins disembark. In other words, both planes will descend in a more controlled fashion, roughly at the speed of the skydivers’ descent.

Plane Swap will be livestreamed on Hulu on Sunday, April 24th at 4:00 pm PT/7:00 pm ET.

Conference tournaments are over and the brackets are set. Sixty-eight teams on both the men’s and women’s sides are about to begin a nearly month-long journey that could culminate with them hoisting a National Championship trophy and cutting down the nets in either New Orleans or Minneapolis. It’s the most wonderful time of the year for basketball fans, and all of the March Madness games are available to stream if you know where to look and have a TV provider log-in to unlock full access. Even if you don’t, there are some options so that you can catch a few games for free. Here’s what you need to know about streaming March Madness.

When does March Madness begin?

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Depending on who you ask, the 2022 NCAA Tournament either begins Tuesday or Thursday. On March 15 and 16, the First Four or four “play-in” games take place. These allow four more teams to “make the tournament” than if the selection committee just filled the slot with one in each spot. Some people argue the entire event doesn’t really start until Thursday and Friday, March 17 and 18, when the First Round officially tips off.

No matter which side you land on, the First Four games will start at 6:40PM ET each night on truTV while Thursday and Friday games begin at 12:15PM ET with the first game on CBS. The latter two days are the busiest and some of the most popular of the tournament as 16 games take place on each. Yes, these are two of the least productive days of the entire year in the US. Action continues with the Second Round on Saturday and Sunday, March 19 and 20, before a break until next Thursday. This is when the Sweet Sixteen and Elite Eight rounds are played over the course of the second four-day weekend of the tournament. The Final Four is set for Saturday, April 2 while the National Championship Game will go down on Monday, April 4.

How to stream the 2022 Men’s NCAA Tournament

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Unlike during the regular season when you need to know which network your team’s conference has a broadcast deal with to find most of the games, Turner Sports holds the rights to the entire Men’s NCAA Tournament. This means you’ll be able to watch all 67 games, including the First Four, on CBS, TBS, TNT and truTV. If you have cable, you’re all set. If you pay for a live TV streaming service like YouTube TV or Hulu, you’re also in good shape. If you don’t have either, don’t worry, you can still watch a good chunk of the tournament.

Turner Sports will allow anyone to watch the games that are broadcast on CBS on the web and mobile devices without a TV provider log-in. Paramount+ users will be able to do the same through that streaming app. If you do have credentials from your TV plan, you can stream everything through the March Madness Live app that’s available on a host of devices. You can find it on Amazon, Android and iOS for mobile and macOS on the desktop. For streaming gadgets, it’s on Apple TV, Fire TV, Google TV, Roku and Xbox and the app also supports some LG smart TVs.

WarnerMedia

With some of those home entertainment devices, Turner will give you a very handy feature. On Apple TV, Amazon Fire TV, Google TV and Xbox One, the March Madness Live app will allow you to stream two games at once. Sure, in an ideal world we would get the ability to stream up to four like ESPN’s app goes on an everyday basis, but two is certainly better than one. If you opt for the desktop, mobile or tablet versions, you’ll get picture-in-picture viewing while you browse away from the main game view.

You can certainly use your cable interface or streaming TV service of choice, but Turner has made March Madness Live a centralized hub for the tournament. If you have log-in credentials that get you access to everything, using those will allow you to jump from game to game much faster than scrolling through a guide. And Turner also gives you all of the alerts and stats you could ask for, including the ability to easily follow picks from your bracket if you filled it out on NCAA.com.

Streaming the 2022 Women’s NCAA Tournament

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As if one National Championship tournament in March wasn’t enough, the Women’s edition takes place at the same time. It’s March Madness, after all. The First Four is scheduled for Wednesday and Thursday, March 16 and 17, with the First and Second rounds playing out between Friday, March 18 and Monday, March 21. Sweet Sixteen and Elite 8 runs Friday to Monday again, starting March 25, and the Final Four and National Championship Game are set for April 1 and 3.

If you notice there are some scheduling differences so that there are only women’s games on Mondays and both the Final Four and championship are slotted between the same events for the men. So when it comes down to crunch time, you can watch the conclusion of both tournaments live without having to sacrifice viewing the other.

ESPN has the rights to the Women’s NCAA Tournament, so you can expect games to show up on ABC, ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNU and ESPNEWS. The first two of the First Four games will be broadcast on ESPNU at 7PM ET and 9PM ET each night. First Round matchups begin at 11:30AM ET on Friday and Saturday on ESPN2, with subsequent games on those days expanding to the other networks.

Once again, if you have a cable plan or streaming TV service with Disney’s sports channels you’re all set. However, the best place to watch all of the action will be the ESPN app. Here, you’ll get access to the aforementioned Multicast feature that will give you up to four games at once. It will be especially handy during those first four days of the tournament when there’s lots of action happening at the same time. However, it's only available on Apple TV and Xbox One.

As the name implies, the NCAA's March Madness (aka the Division I men's basketball tournament) is chock full of games that may be difficult to follow — thankfully, that might not be an issue if you have the right device. The sports association, Turner and CBS Sports are expanding a feature in the NCAA March Madness Live app that lets you watch two games at once (one without audio) on more platforms. It was already available on Android TV, Apple TV and Fire TV, but should now be an option on Google TV and Xbox One. This isn't completely novel and will only help so much on the busiest match days, but you should have 20 percent lower latency and 5.1-channel surround sound.

The desktop, mobile and tablet versions of March Madness Live are limited to picture-in-picture viewing while you browse the app. The software is also available without these viewing perks on Roku players and some LG TVs. Everyone has access to an upgraded "Fast Break" feature that overlays and breaks down vital stats during games.

The new March Madness Live experience should be available on March 17th, right after the "first four" games on the 15th and 16th. You can also watch the tournament through CBS, TBS, TNT and truTV platforms, including Paramount+ if you're a subscriber. While you'd ideally have more than two streams, this is likely to be the best viewing option you'll get on a big screen during the college competition.

For the first time, live sports are coming to Apple TV+. Apple announced today during its Peek Performance event it will carry Friday Night Baseball. Once Major League Baseball and the MLB Players Association agree to a new collective bargaining agreement, Apple will stream two games per week that will only be available on the company's streaming platform. The weekly doubleheader will be available in eight countries and you won't have to worry about local blackouts. In the US, Apple will also stream MLB Big Inning, a live show featuring highlights from regular season games. US fans, in addition to their Canadian counterparts, will also have access to a 24/7 livestream featuring game replays, news, analysis and more. For a limited time, Apple said Friday Night Baseball would be available through Apple TV+ without the need for a subscription. 

Rumors that Apple was bidding on a baseball package came out in January. By that point, the League had been in a lockout since the start of December, but it didn't seem like it would cancel any games. That was then. Now, it's unclear if there will even be a 2022 season.   

Catch up on all of the news from Apple’s Peek Performance event right here!