SAN FRANCISCO & TEL AVIV, Israel--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Feb 13, 2026--
AI media technology company Chronicle Studios and Academy Award-nominated animation production company The Hive Studio (“Letter to a Pig”) have entered into a YouTube channel partnership on two animated series: goth musical comedy “The Vampair,” from creator Daria Cohen (“Hazbin Hotel”); and teen comedy “The Normal MFer,” from CC0 Studios, Joe McNaney and Alex Orrelle (“Space Jam: A New Legacy”). The announcement was jointly made today by Aaron Sisto, Co-Founder and CEO of Chronicle Studios, and Amit Russell Gicelter, Founder and CEO of The Hive Studio.
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Chronicle Studios’ AI-driven social content intelligence platform will oversee YouTube channel strategy, content optimization, global audience discovery and monetization for both original series. Built to autonomously identify and match content with high-value audiences and grow engagement for top global creators and brands, Chronicle Studios’ AI platform uses cross-platform, multimodal AI agents to automate the full content lifecycle on social, including viewer acquisition, distribution, growth and monetization across social platforms.
Regarding the announcement, Sisto said, “Daria, Joe and Alex are fast-rising stars in the animation arena. ‘The Vampair’s’ distinct style, charming stories and irresistible music, along with ‘The Normal MFer’s’’ irreverent commentary on young adult life, have helped make these two digital-first series stand out in an incredibly crowded space. We're honored to be partnered with them, Amit and CC0 Studios to help grow their global awareness and position them for even greater success on YouTube and beyond.”
Expressing his excitement about the partnership, Gicelter said, “Chronicle’s technology is exactly the innovative solution we need to grow our audience and expand the reach of our series globally. We’re excited to partner with a team led by such experienced professionals who truly understand our industry and share our vision for scaling bold, creator-driven content.”
Cohen added, “I'm really happy for the opportunity to collab with a studio like Chronicle. In a world where creators get their stories constantly tampered with by various industries, I'm happy I was able to find a studio that supports my work and allows me the freedom to tell my story the way I intended it to be told. With Chronicle’s support, I can see ‘Vampair’ making it further than I ever thought it was capable of and my hope is for the community to get to see the story unfold in its fullest potential.”
“The Vampair” originated on YouTube in 2016 as a collection of animated music videos about the adventures of the vampire Duke (voiced by goth singer/songwriter/animator Aurelio Voltaire, “Land of the Dead”) and his teenage friend Missi (Lauren Jennings, “The Dolls of New Albion”). The first video, “ The Night,” has generated more than 60 million views to date. Cohen, who has more than one million subscribers on YouTube, and The Hive have since launched a Kickstarter campaign that has raised over $270,000 to develop a pilot based on the original concept for a full animated series that will reunite Voltaire and Jennings and is planned to premiere late August. The project will feature all-new music by Voltaire and composer Paul Shapera (“The Dolls of New Albion”), with Krystal LaPorte (“Hazbin Hotel”) also starring and Emmy and Annie Award nominee Maxwell Atoms (“The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy”) co-writing with Cohen.
“The Normal MFer,” created by CC0 Studios and co-produced with The Hive Studio, centers on a terminally online man’s desire to grow up against the forces that keep him from leaving home: video games, web-influencers, unreasonable wealth expectations, social anxieties, a disappointed father, a mother who treats him like he’s 11 and pets who secretly harvest his data for an AI startup. The series was created by Alex Orrelle (“Space Jam: A New Legacy”), who serves as Showrunner and Supervising Director, and CC0 Studios founder Joe McNaney, and is written by Emmy Award nominee Jennifer Skelly (“The Lion Guard”), with Amit Gicelter’s team producing.
In addition to animation, Chronicle Studios is identifying and partnering with content creators, studios and brands throughout the creative community worldwide, spanning animation, live action comedy and drama, lifestyle, video games, music, video podcasts and consumer brands, to name a few.
Last year, the company entered its first YouTube creator channel partnership with animator Gabe Hordos (“How to Train Your Dragon”) on his animated short film series “The Old Knight.” In under one month, Hordos’ YouTube channel grew from approximately 500,000 monthly impressions to more than six million, resulting in two million new views, 41,000+ watch hours and a 100x increase in brand revenue with virtually zero ad spend.
ABOUT THE HIVE STUDIO
Founded in 2010, The Hive Studio is a world-renowned animation studio, specializing in the development and production of animated episodic programming, short films, and commercial content. With four branches in the Mediterranean region, the studio is powered by a team of 40 highly skilled artists, led by founder Amit Russell Gicelter, an Oscar®-nominated producer with over two decades of industry experience. The Hive Studio is a creative hub known for visually diverse, technically accomplished animation, internationally acclaimed and broadcast worldwide. Alongside developing original IPs, the studio also provides high-quality service work for partners and clients around the globe.
ABOUT CHRONICLE STUDIOS
Chronicle Studios is an AI-driven media company that automates social media audience growth for content creators, brands and studio partners across animation, gaming, music, podcasts and more. The company’s agentic AI platform autonomously manages the full content lifecycle, including channel strategy, audience discovery, content optimization and cross-platform distribution – driving audience acquisition and unlocking revenue streams. Founded in 2025 with backing from Patron, Point72 Ventures, Z Ventures, Sands Capital and other prominent investors, Chronicle Studios is based in San Francisco, with offices in Los Angeles, New York and London. For more information, please visit https://www.chronicle.studio.
The Vampair, from Daria Cohen and The Hive Studio
Luka Doncic is almost certainly going to win the NBA scoring title this season. And it's now very possible that he doesn't make the All-NBA team.
That's rare, but it might be this season's reality.
The roster of award-caliber players who won't be winning awards this season continues to grow, with Doncic — the Los Angeles Lakers standout guard and MVP candidate — now out with a Grade 2 left hamstring strain that will force him to miss the rest of the regular season. Minnesota guard Anthony Edwards is certain to miss the league's 65-game award eligibility threshold as well after he was held out Thursday because of illness.
Doncic has played 64 games, one shy of the threshold. It's worth noting that BetMGM Sportsbook, among others, took Doncic off the list of MVP betting options following his injury Thursday.
“At this juncture of the season, it’s the last thing you want to see,” Lakers star LeBron James told reporters in Oklahoma City after Thursday's game, long before an MRI was performed Friday to determine the extent of Doncic's injury. “Especially anybody on our team, but when you have an MVP candidate on your team, the last thing you want to see is somebody go down with a hamstring injury."
Edwards can now only reach a maximum of 64 games as well, so he won’t be on the ballot for most major NBA awards either.
It was collectively bargained — meaning the league and the players association agreed on the terms — and this is the third season of it being part of the NBA rules.
It applies to player eligibility for five awards — MVP, Defensive Player of the Year, Most Improved Player, the All-NBA Team and the All-Defensive Team. Players have to either play in 65 regular-season games (with some minutes-played minimums in there as well), or at least 62 games before suffering a “season-ending injury."
But even with Doncic's hamstring hurt badly enough that he'll miss the rest of the regular season, it wouldn't be classified as “season-ending” unless a doctor — jointly selected by the NBA and the National Basketball Players Association — says he wouldn't be able to play again through May 31.
There is a grievance process and even a way to challenge the rule citing extraordinary circumstances, but neither would be easily utilized.
Five of the league's six highest-paid players this season — Golden State's Stephen Curry and Jimmy Butler, Philadelphia's Joel Embiid, Milwaukee's Giannis Antetokounmpo and Boston's Jayson Tatum — aren't eligible for awards. Denver's Nikola Jokic is the exception on the highest-paid list, and he'd likely be ineligible if he misses more than one more game down the stretch.
There were 23 players on the list of those winning MVP, MIP, DPOY, All-NBA and All-Defense last season. Of those, at least 10 are out of the running for honors this season: Antetokounmpo, Curry, Edwards, James, Tatum, Detroit's Cade Cunningham, Indiana teammates Tyrese Haliburton and Ivica Zubac, Utah's Jaren Jackson Jr. and Oklahoma City's Jalen Williams. (Most of those 10 have been out of the awards mix because of injuries for some time; Tatum and Haliburton both tore Achilles in last season's playoffs and it was obvious then that they wouldn't hit 65-game marks this year.)
Another four award winners from a year ago — Jokic, Oklahoma City's Lu Dort, Golden State's Draymond Green and Cleveland's Evan Mobley — aren't at 65 games yet this season but, for now anyway, seem on pace to get there.
Never say never. The union wants changes to the policy, and it's certain to come up in their conversations with the league office. But many players — and even Andre Iguodala, now the head of the players' association — have said in recent years that the 65-game rule is a good thing.
The league doesn't seem inclined to make a change based solely on what would appear to be an extraordinary number of award candidates not hitting the threshold in one year.
“I think it is working,” NBA Commissioner Adam Silver said last month. “I think if you look at the numbers, the pre-implementation of this rule, numbers were going in the wrong direction. I may have this a little bit off: I think the three years before we adopted this rule, almost a third of the All-NBA players had not played 80% of the games. That was a huge issue for the league.”
As we said, it's rare, but it has happened. Twice, to be exact.
— 1968-69: Elvin Hayes won the scoring title as a rookie, then wasn't even All-NBA — and didn't win Rookie of the Year, either.
— 1975-76: Bob McAdoo won his third consecutive scoring title and was second in the MVP race — but didn't make All-NBA. Players voted for MVP in those days, and McAdoo was an extremely close second behind Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. Dave Cowens was third in the MVP vote but got the second-team All-NBA nod at center, with Abdul-Jabbar the first-team pick.
Doncic now seems likely to join that list. It's not mathematically certain yet that he wins the scoring title, but it would take something extraordinary for it not to happen.
He's averaging 33.5 points per game, with Gilgeous-Alexander at 31.6 per game. For Gilgeous-Alexander — last season's scoring champion — to overtake Doncic, he would need to go on an unbelievable run. An example: He'd need to score 292 points over the final five games to take over the top spot, and nobody other than Wilt Chamberlain has had a five-game run like that.
Of the previous 79 scoring champions, 64 were first-team All-NBA and 13 were second-team.
Jokic is going to win the league's rebounding and assist titles, while averaging a triple-double yet again. But he's also not assured yet of being on the award ballots.
The thresholds are different.
While the award mandate is 65 games in most cases, players are eligible for most statistical awards if they play in 58 games (or 70% of the season). There are different standards for some stat awards, such as field-goal percentage (minimum 300 made), free-throw percentage (minimum 125 made) and 3-point percentage (minimum 82 made).
A player can win a stat award while appearing in less than 58 games.
For example, last season, San Antonio's Victor Wembanyama played only 46 games but still won the blocked shot title. Even if he played in the minimum 58 games and recorded no blocks in the 12 games needed to reach that number he still would have been ahead of the runner-up, Utah's Walker Kessler.
AP NBA: https://www.apnews.com/hub/NBA
Los Angeles Lakers guard Luka Doncic (77) looks to make a shot-attempt in the fourth quarter of a loss to the Detroit Pistons in an NBA basketball game Monday, March 23, 2026, in Detroit. (AP Photo/Duane Burleson)
Denver Nuggets center Nikola Jokic warms up before an NBA basketball game against the Utah Jazz, Wednesday, April 1, 2026, in Salt Lake City. (AP Photo/Rob Gray)
Detroit Pistons forward Ronald Holland II (5) talks with guard Cade Cunningham (2), who did not play due to an injury, during the second half of an NBA basketball game against the Toronto Raptors Tuesday, March 31, 2026, in Detroit. (AP Photo/Duane Burleson)
Los Angeles Lakers forward/guard Luka Dončić (77) drives against Oklahoma City Thunder guard Cason Wallace (22) during the first half of an NBA basketball game Thursday, April. 2, 2026, in Oklahoma City. (AP Photo/Gerald Leong)
