Stirr is an American ad-supported video streaming service owned by

Sinclair Broadcast Group Sinclair Broadcast Group, Inc. (SBG) is a publicly traded American telecommunications conglomerate that is controlled by the descendants of company founder Julian Sinclair Smith. Headquartered in the Baltimore suburb of Cockeysville, Maryland, ...

. The streaming service is available on the web and via apps for iOS, Android devices and various streaming TV devices, including

Amazon Fire TV Amazon Fire TV (stylized as amazon fireTV) is a line of digital media players and microconsoles developed by Amazon. The devices are small network appliances that deliver digital audio and video content streamed via the Internet to a connected ...

Roku Roku ( ) is a brand of hardware digital media players manufactured by American company Roku, Inc. They offer access to streaming media content from online services. The first Roku model, developed in collaboration with Netflix, was introduced ...

Apple TV An apple is an edible fruit produced by an apple tree (''Malus domestica''). Apple trees are cultivated worldwide and are the most widely grown species in the genus '' Malus''. The tree originated in Central Asia, where its wild ancesto ...

, and

Android TV Android TV is a smart TV operating system based on Android (operating system), Android and developed by Google for television sets, digital media players, set-top boxes, and soundbars. A successor to Google TV (operating system), Google TV, it fe ...

. Stirr's slogan is, "the new free TV."

History

Sinclair Broadcast Group began developing its technological infrastructure for the service before July 2017. The Stirr streaming service was announced by Sinclair in October 2018. Sinclair hired Scott Ehrlich to head up the service and hired staff in

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world ...

and

Seattle Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest region o ...

. Ehrlich is the Vice President of Emerging Platform Content at Sinclair. Stirr was launched on January 16, 2019 via a website and apps for iPhones, Android devices and various streaming TV devices, Amazon Fire TV, Apple TV and Roku. With the pending acquisition of the

Fox Sports Networks Fox Sports Networks (FSN), formerly known as Fox Sports Net, was the collective name for a group of regional sports channels in the United States. Formed in 1996 by News Corporation, the networks were acquired by The Walt Disney Company on Ma ...

, Sinclair indicated that they were looking at synergies between Stirr and those RSNs.

Channels

Stirr draws on programming from the Sinclair TV stations and other streaming live channels although some programming is available

on demand On-demand or on demand may refer to: Manufacturing * Build-on-demand * Just-in-time manufacturing, a methodology for production * Print on demand, printing technology and business process in which new copies of a document are not printed until an ...

. Although there are several US city regions to choose from when navigating the service, users do not have any geographic restrictions on what they can view. There were 20 national channels at launch on January 16, 2019 with expectations of having 50 by the end of the year. Stirr City is the primary streaming channel which pulls content based on the location/station selected. When network programming runs on the local OTA channel, Stirr City carries an alternate schedule drawing from the other Stirr channels. WJLA-TV of Washington, D.C. is set as the default if no Sinclair news-carrying station is nearby. Second feeds can also be added to a local station's 'channel' during

breaking news Breaking news, interchangeably termed late-breaking news and also known as a special report or special coverage or news flash, is a current issue that broadcasters feel warrants the interruption of scheduled programming or current news in orde ...

or severe weather events, as is done for WBMA-LD's Stirr channel, where meteorologist James Spann's live coverage of tornadic events in the

Birmingham, Alabama Birmingham ( ) is a city in the north central region of the U.S. state of Alabama. Birmingham is the seat of Jefferson County, Alabama's most populous county. As of the 2021 census estimates, Birmingham had a population of 197,575, down 1% f ...

market and

Alabama (We dare defend our rights) , anthem = " Alabama" , image_map = Alabama in United States.svg , seat = Montgomery , LargestCity = Huntsville , LargestCounty = Baldwin County , LargestMetro = Greater Birmingham , area_total_km2 = 135,7 ...

in general is popular nationwide. Additionally, Stirr has a number of private label channels, which at launch consisted of Stirr Movies, Stirr Sports and Stirr Life. In addition, the service carries TV networks that Sinclair owns or hold a stake in like

Comet A comet is an icy, small Solar System body that, when passing close to the Sun, warms and begins to release gases, a process that is called outgassing. This produces a visible atmosphere or coma, and sometimes also a tail. These phenomena ...

Stadium A stadium ( : stadiums or stadia) is a place or venue for (mostly) outdoor sports, concerts, or other events and consists of a field or stage either partly or completely surrounded by a tiered structure designed to allow spectators to stand o ...

and The T. Also, Stirr has TV series based channels. Some outside-produced channels are present on the platform, including

Buzzr Buzzr is an American digital broadcast television network owned by Fremantle North America, a unit of the Fremantle subsidiary of RTL Group. The network serves as an outlet for the extensive library of classic game shows owned by Fremantle. B ...

and

Circle A circle is a shape consisting of all points in a plane that are at a given distance from a given point, the centre. Equivalently, it is the curve traced out by a point that moves in a plane so that its distance from a given point is cons ...

(the latter Owned by a rival of Sinclair,

Gray Television Gray Television, Inc. is an American publicly traded television broadcasting company based in Atlanta, Georgia. Founded in 1946 by James Harrison Gray as Gray Communications Systems, the company owns or operates 180 stations across the United St ...

), which Stirr stated was the most popular channel on the platform as of July 2019.

Business

Stirr general manager is Adam Ware. Sinclair vice president of emerging platform content is Scott Ehrlich, under whom the streaming service was built. While free, Sinclair's leaders plan on adding a premium pay tier of programming. Sinclair Digital, Compulse and Sinclair’s local stations would coordinated between them with ad revenue shared with content partners. Sinclair promotes Compulse, Sinclair's digital advertising unit, through its local stations. Although Stirr is composed of Sinclair owned streams and stations, Sinclair has its own streaming platform, Hummingbird, as well.

References

External links

* {{SBGI Internet television channels Internet properties established in 2019 American entertainment websites Subscription video on demand services Internet television streaming services Sinclair Broadcast Group