Netflix Holds Sway Over Media Industry Stocks in Early 2019
MediaPost: Nearly three weeks into the new year, media stocks have posted consistently rising share prices after mid-single-digit percentage declines in 2018. Big digital media players have benefited the most. Netflix, perhaps the best media company performer overall,...
Fox is Forecast to Rake In Ads with New ‘Netflix-Proof’ Model
Bloomberg: Famed money manager Mario Gabelli is telling investors to go all in on the new Fox. Gabelli expects a tsunami of advertisers for broadcasters in 2020, a good sign for the Fox television network, its TV stations, Fox News and Fox Business. “You can’t get all...
Viacom Seeks Buy of Pluto TV in Deal Valued at $300 Million+
The Information: Viacom is said to be in talks to acquire Pluto TV, an ad-supported streaming service, in a deal that could be valued between $300 million and $500 million. The media giant, which owns Nickelodeon, Comedy Central and MTV, had also held talks with Pluto...
Disney Loses $1 Billion from Investments in Video Streaming
CNBC: Disney isn’t launching its new streaming service until later this year, but investors are already learning the economic challenges. The media company said in a filing that its investment in Hulu was the primary contributor to a $580 million loss in equity...
AT&T’s Otter Media Shutters Machinima Channel on YouTube
Kotaku: With no public announcement, the entire Machinima channel on YouTube has been effectively wiped from the internet. All videos on the channel are now private, making them unable to view. Said owner Otter Media: "We are focused on creating new content, which...
Comcast’s New Tech Tower to Display ‘Sphere’ by Spielberg
Philadelphia Magazine: Comcast unveiled its new 60-story Philadelphia technology center last fall, and since then, we’ve been free to waltz in to marvel at the various art installations in the lobby. But one imposing structure has been off limits — a giant white...
Liberty to Dominate Music if Media Giant Grabs iHeartMedia
Rolling Stone: Liberty Media is said to be seeking to acquire a 35 percent stake in iHeartMedia, owner of radio giant iHeartRadio. This would be seismic news for the music industry. Liberty might just end up owning a stake in no less than seven (seven!)...
Spotify Plans Voice-Controlled Music Player for Automobiles
Financial Times: Spotify has a new target as it makes a break for independence from devices made by Apple, Google and Amazon: the car dashboard. The music-streaming pioneer is planning to roll out a voice-controlled in-car music player later this year, marking its...
Snap Forces Out Two Execs Over Inappropriate Relationship
MarketWatch: Snap forced out two of its execs because one of them had an inappropriate relationship with a contractor. The Snapchat parent fired Francis Racioppi, its director of global security, because he had hired an outside contractor, had a relationship with her,...
Craigslist Surpasses $1 Billion Revenue Mark for First Time
MediaPost: Craigslist surpassed the $1 billion revenue mark for the first time in 2018, according to estimates released by the AIM Group’s Classified Intelligence Report. “Large markets accounted for the vast majority of the revenue - $981 million. Mid-size markets...
News Corp Looks to Combine Times Newspapers in London
BBC News: Rupert Murdoch newspapers the Times and the Sunday Times are asking the government for permission to share resources, including journalists, between the two titles. The application to the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport is necessary as legal...
Tribune’s CEO Exit Suggests a Possible Tie-Up with Gannett
Nieman Lab: The suddenness of Tribune CEO Justin Dearborn’s removal suggests that bigger moves are imminent. One theory: Tribune seizes the moment made present by Alden’s Sunday night bid for Gannett. As Gannett scrambles to fend off Alden, both Tribune and Gannett...
Hearst Eyes Acquisition of Smaller Newspapers from Tribune
New York Post: Hearst is said to be angling to buy a chunk of Tribune Publishing. In a twist, sources said Hearst doesn’t appear to be interested in Tribune’s biggest papers. Hearst instead is mainly eyeing smaller outfits like the Orlando Sentinel and South Florida’s...
Meredith Hooks Up Magazines a Year After Buying Time Inc
Adweek: Nearly a year after Meredith finalized the acquisition of Time Inc., two magazine titles, Allrecipes and People (formerly a Time Inc. brand) have formed an editorial partnership on a package or awards season. Future partnerships are being...
Essence Magazine Publisher Plans Headquarters in Brooklyn
Crain's New York Business: Essence Communications, publisher of Essence magazine and owner of the Essence Festival, will soon move to a new headquarters in industry City, Brooklyn. The media company, a voice for African-American women for nearly five decades, has...
Radar Founder is Named New Editor of Los Angeles Magazine
Vanity Fair: Maer Roshan, a deputy editor at New York magazine in the 1990s before he moved on to join Tina Brown’s Talk, and then to found his own dishy glossy, Radar, has been named editor in chief of Los Angeles magazine. The appointment will be formally announced...
Group Nine’s NowThis Launches Division for Original Videos
Business Insider: Group Nine Media's NowThis video news outlet is the latest publisher to launch an original video programming division. The division, called NowThis Originals, will develop and produce original shows for distribution across social, streaming and...
Bustle at War with Fired Mic Staffers Over Unfinished Stories
Daily Beast: Six weeks after Bustle Digital Group bought the digital website Mic and fired all of its staff, many of the former employees are seething and ready to wage a publicity battle on the site’s new...
BuzzFeed News Under Fire After Dispute of Bombshell Report
New York Times: Whether BuzzFeed’s reporting can stand up to scrutiny is now at the center of a test of the news media’s credibility. President Trump seized on Robert Mueller's denial of BuzzFeed's report on the investigation by the special counsel to continue making...
Study: Adults Say Media Doesn’t Understand ‘People Like Us’
The Hill: A majority of Americans believe "the news media do not understand people like them," according to a new analysis released by the non-partisan Pew Research Center. Overall, 58 percent of U.S. adults said they do not feel understood by the media....
Analysis: Does Journalism Have a Future in Social Media Age?
New Yorker: In the past two decades, journalism itself has changed, including in ways that have made possible the rise of fake news, and not only because of mergers and acquisitions, and corporate ownership, and job losses, and Google Search, and Facebook and...
Netflix Claims 10% of US TV Time, Sees New Rival in Fortnite
CNBC: Netflix said it serves about 100 million hours of video per day, earning an estimated 10 percent of all time spent in front of the TV in the U.S. Also, Netflix said it isn’t too concerned with streaming video competitors like Disney+. Netflix’s focus is winning...
Disney’s New Streamer to Benefit from Netflix Price Increase
CNBC: Disney will have a competitive advantage over Netflix when the entertainment conglomerate launches a competing video streaming platform later this year, according to Wall Street analyst David Trainer. Netflix's newly announced increase in subscription prices...
Viacom’s Paramount Studio Fighting for Life in Age of Netflix
New York Times: Almost slapstick mismanagement by Viacom has left the historic Paramount studio on life support. Paramount racked up nearly $900 million in losses between 2016 and 2018. It has placed last at the domestic box office for seven years running. The...
CBS Ex-Chief Moonves to Fight Denial of $120 Million Payout
MarketWatch: Les Moonves, the former chairman and CEO of CBS who resigned amid accusations of sexual harassment last September, is challenging the company’s decision last month to deny him his severance package of $120 million. CBS’s board said there were grounds to...
Comcast’s CNBC, Drudge Hit by Effort to Rig Polls for Trump
Wall Street Journal: In early 2015, a man who runs a small technology company showed up at Trump Tower to collect $50,000 for having helped Michael Cohen, then Donald Trump’s personal lawyer, try to rig online polls in his boss’s favor before the presidential...
Vice’s TV Network to Revamp in Prime Time with ‘Vice Live’
Variety: The Viceland cable network will revamp its primetime lineup next month to launch a nightly two-hour live show that will serve as a showcase of sorts for all things Vice. The new “Vice Live” will air Mondays through Thursdays, and reps Viceland’s most...
Amazon’s Bezos is Expected to Attend Oscars with Girlfriend
New York Post: Jeff Bezos is set to accept an award Friday night in his first public appearance since his relationship with Lauren Sanchez was revealed — but we hear that the couple is still deciding whether they’ll attend the event together. They will, however, be at...
Twitter’s Dorsey Raises Eyebrows with ‘Disorienting’ Interview
HuffPost: A conversation with Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey can be incredibly disorienting. Dorsey is just hard enough to follow that it’s easy to assume that any confusion is your own fault. Whether Dorsey does this all deliberately or not, the reason his impassioned...
Facebook: We’ve Shut Hundreds of Russia-Linked Accounts
Associated Press: Facebook said it removed hundreds of Russia-linked pages, groups and accounts that it says were part of two big disinformation operations targeting users outside the U.S. The social media company said its latest effort to fight misinformation came...