Comcast’s NBCU Taps Head of TV, Streaming Content
New York Times: As part of a restructuring, NBCUniversal has named Susan Rovner as its chairman of entertainment content, a job that gives her creative control over the company's TV and streaming properties. The appointment is yet another move in a monthslong...
Liberty Media Makes Investment in Auto Racing Team
Motor Sport: Meyer Shank Racing says that Liberty Media has made a minority equity investment in the Ohio-based team, which is attributed to the Formula One Group. MSR became a full-time one-car IndyCar team this year after gradually building up its number of outings...
Facebook Tests Shopping on Instagram Video Service
CNBC: Facebook-owned Instagram will start testing shopping through its short-form video feature Reels later this year in an effort to monetize the recently launched TikTok clone. Instagram will also add shopping to its IGTV, where users can watch longer...
Amazon’s Audible in Podcast Deal with Conan O’Brien
Hollywood Reporter: Conan O'Brien's Team Coco has inked a first-look audio development and production deal with Audible. The pact encompasses scripted and unscripted projects and will also include non-fiction documentaries. Kicking off the multi-project relationship...
Verizon Faces Big Challenges in Effort to Sell HuffPost
Ad Age: When's the best time to sell a high-profile media property? Well, probably not during a pandemic-induced recession. And also maybe not amid the systemic, long-term decline in publishing — a sector that was challenging even pre-Covid. And also probably not when...
WWE Adds Barstool Sports CEO to Board of Directors
Broadcasting & Cable: WWE has elected Erika Nardini, CEO of Barstool Sports, to its board of directors. Nardini became Barstool Sports' first CEO in 2016. Before joining Barstool, Nardina held posts at Microsoft, AOL, Demand Media and...
Craigslist Quietly Adds Fees in Three Major US Markets
AIM Group: Craigslist has quietly changed its fees for apartment rentals, adding new charges in Boston and Chicago and significantly expanding them throughout the New York metropolitan area. At the same time, it also cut the fee for posting apartments in New York from...
News Corp CEO, Chief See Pay Dip in Nod to Pandemic
Hollywood Reporter: Rupert Murdoch's pay for his role as executive chairman of News Corp amounted to $3.35 million for the fiscal year that ended in June, compared with $5 million in the previous year. CEO Robert Thomson's pay amounted to $12 million, compared with...
New York Times Reporter Talks About Covid Diagnosis
CNN: Michael Shear of the New York Times, one of the White House reporters who has come down with coronavirus, is pretty sure he was infected on the day President Trump announced his pick for the Supreme Court. "Nobody from the White House has said 'boo' and asked...
Los Angeles Times to Begin Search for New Top Editor
Los Angeles Times: Norman Pearlstine says he will soon step down as executive editor of the Los Angeles Times and that the paper is launching a search for a new top editor to chart a digital future and unite a newsroom that has been torn by controversies. Pearlstine...
Hearst Expat Plans Silicon Valley Drama for Television
Deadline: ABC has given a production commitment to "Valley of the Gods," a new drama from a producer group including Joanna Coles, the former chief content officer of Hearst Magazines. Coles joined Hearst in 2006 as editor-in-chief of Marie Claire and was named...
Conde Nast Agrees on Clause with Union at New Yorker
WWD: The New Yorker Union and the magazine's owner Conde Nast reached an agreement over a "just cause" clause in the union's contract following 35 hours of negotiation. Unionized staffers at The New Yorker have been negotiating for more than a year for a "just cause"...
Meredith in Trouble After ‘Overachieving’ in Magazines
Poynter: Meredith was for years the under-the-radar magazine company from Des Moines that financially outperformed its flashier New-York based rivals. That relatively low profile changed three years ago when Meredith acquired Time Inc. and its cluster of famous legacy...
American Media to Shutter More Enthusiast Magazines
Adventure Journal: The magazines Bike, Powder, Snowboarder, and Surfer are being shut down by owner A360 Media, née American Media, which also owns Men’s Journal. This includes both print and digital products for Bike, Powder, and Surfer, and print for...
Fortune Magazine Top Editor to Depart for Several Gigs
Medium: "After 19 glorious, rewarding, life-changing years, I am leaving Fortune," writes Adam Lashinsky. "I am pleased to tell you I’ll have a lot going on in my post-Fortune life. For starters, I am becoming editor in chief of World 50, an organization that builds...
Alphabet, Facebook, Twitter to Testify Before Congress
CNBC: Sundar Pichai, Mark Zuckerberg and Jack Dorsey have agreed to testify virtually before the Senate Commerce committee on Oct. 28. The CEOs will testify on Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which protects tech companies from liability over the content...
Facebook, Twitter, TikTok Ban Death Wishes for Trump
CBS News: Following President Trump's positive Covid-19 diagnosis, social media companies have voiced a clear message: Any content that wishes for the death of anyone, including the president, will be removed. Facebook, Twitter and TikTok have all announced that posts...
Disney-ABC News Staffers in Quarantine After Debate
Variety: ABC News staffers who came in contact with former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie when he served as an analyst for the first presidential debate last week will have to quarantine for two weeks after Christie acknowledged Saturday that he had tested...
Fox Corp CEO Potentially Exposed to Covid at Debate
New York Times: A son of Rupert Murdoch and some of the biggest stars at Fox News were potentially exposed to the coronavirus after attending Tuesday's presidential debate in Cleveland, and the network is planning for its anchors, reporters and staff to be tested out...
US Supreme Court to Eye FCC Media Ownership Rules
Reuters: The US Supreme Court said on Friday it will take up a long-running legal dispute over whether the Federal Communications Commission can loosen US media ownership rules. A lower court has thwarted the FCC's efforts to revise the rules since 2003 in a series of...
AT&T Chief Mulls Possible Divestitures at WarnerMedia
Wall Street Journal: AT&T CEO John Stankey is working to convince investors that the deal making executives pursued to fortify AT&T in lean times won’t end up weighing it down. Stankey is in the meantime scanning assets for potential divestiture. “There’s...
MGM Delays Release of James Bond Film to April 2021
Bloomberg: The next big Hollywood movie release, MGM's James Bond flick "No Time to Die," is being delayed until next year, a result of the woeful economics that studios are facing because of the pandemic. "No Time to Die," starring Daniel Craig, will now be released...
Netflix Social-Media Film Stirs Rebuttal from Facebook
CNBC: Facebook on Friday offered a rebuttal to the hit Netflix documentary-drama, “The Social Dilemma.” The movie revealed, perhaps for the first time to some viewers, how social networks use algorithms to keep people coming back. Some viewers said they were deleting...
Comcast Launches News Shows for Streamer Peacock
Mediaite: Peacock announced two news shows featuring political commentators Mehdi Hasan and Zerlina Maxwell set to launch on October 5. “Zerlina” will air weekdays at 6:00 pm and “The Mehdi Hasan Show” will follow right after at 7:00 pm on Peacock’s latest news...
Vice Media Names Ogilvy Veteran for Marketing Officer
Variety: Vice Media has named Nadja Bellan-White, an ad agency and marketing exec with more than two decades of experience, to lead its brand-storytelling efforts globally. Bellan-White, previously based in the UK, will work from Vice’s Brooklyn headquarters and will...
New York Times Under Fire For Trump Diagnosis Story
Fox News: The New York Times was slammed on Friday for suggesting that President T rump might not be able to remain on the ballot following his positive coronavirus test. While many critics have sent the president well wishes, the Gray Lady was quick to float the idea...
McClatchy Taps Veteran for President of Miami Herald
Miami Herald: Nancy Meyer will join the Miami Herald as president, McClatchy announced Friday. She will be responsible for the business operations of the Miami Herald and el Nuevo Herald. A media industry veteran with nearly two decades of experience, Meyer has worked...
Hearst Erects Paywall for Community News in Houston
Chron: Local news coverage from 12 suburban newspapers serving more than half a million homes in the greater Houston area has a new home on HoustonChronicle.com, the exclusive subscriber website of the Houston Chronicle. The coverage appeared previously on the...
Conde Nast Reveals 75% of Senior Leadership is White
Digiday: Last month Conde Nast released its first ever diversity and inclusion report which showed the legacy magazine publisher, like so many other large media companies, has a diversity imbalance, particularly in upper management. Per the report, at least 75% of...
Maven Ends Publisher Guarantees at Sports Illustrated
Awful Announcing: New CEO Ross Levinsohn has brought in some dramatic changes for Maven's independent publishers, including the publishers of the Sports Illustrated team sites. Changes involve removing guaranteed payouts, switching the publishers to a fully...