Time Out US Magazine Unlikely to Resume Publishing in Print
Financial Times: Time Out has published its first magazine following a pandemic freeze, but warned that its free printed urban listings are likely to disappear from many of the 40 cities it used to serve. The brand plans to resume in print only in London, Madrid and...
Report: Self-Published Zines Make Return During Quarantines
Salon: All across the country, artists and amateurs are creating their own "quaranzines" to reflect the ways in which they see the current reality, and as a way to assert that creating and consuming art remains a balm in troubled...
AT&T’s WarnerMedia Axes Hundreds of Workers in Shakeup
Los Angeles Times: WarnerMedia began slashing its workforce Monday, laying off at least 600 employees as movie theater shutdowns and streaming competition ravage its film and TV business. The bulk of the job cuts came from Warner Bros....
Disney’s ‘Hamilton’ Streaming Audience Bests Netflix in July
Variety: How big was "Hamilton" for Disney+? Far bigger than anything on Netflix in July. A staggering 37% of US viewers watched the musical last month, almost three times the number that watched the second widest-reaching title of that month, Netflix's "Unsolved...
Comcast’s NBC Brings Late-Night to New Streamer Peacock
Associated Press: Peacock is launching a pair of weekly late-night comedy series with Larry Wilmore and Amber Ruffin to focus on current events. “We can’t wait to write sketches, songs and jokes about this terrible time we call now!” Ruffin said in a...
Disney Ditches ‘Fox’ Name in New Rebranding of TV Studio
The Verge: Disney's recently acquired 20th Century Fox TV studio is the latest to have the "Fox" name dropped, with the company announcing Monday that it will be rebranding the studio to just 20th Television, as part of a larger rebrand for all of Disney's TV...
Fox Corp News Expat Bill O’Reilly Nears New Deal on Radio
CNBC: Bill O'Reilly is on the brink of landing his own radio show at New York's 77 WABC, owned by John Catsimatidis, a longtime ally of President Trump who also owns the Gristedes grocery chain. O'Reilly's show is expected to debut in the...
Liberty Media Hits Pause on Boosting Stake in iHeartMedia
Hollywood Reporter: Greg Maffei addressed his company's interest in iHeartMedia after recently receiving antitrust approval to raise its stake. The Liberty Media CEO isn't in any hurry. "Clearly advertising is challenged in this environment and we want to watch and...
Disney to Screen Shelved ABC ‘Black-ish’ Episode on Hulu
Mediaite: A 2017 episode of "Black-ish," which ABC refused to air during the show's fourth season, will finally air on Hulu after the network relented to a request from series creator Kenya Barris. "Recognizing the importance of this moment, they listened and...
Amazon Relaunches Twitch Prime Service as Prime Gaming
TechCrunch: Amazon Prime is highlighting its offerings for gamers with the launch of a service called Prime Gaming. This is a new version of Twitch Prime, a service that Amazon launched four years ago tied to the popular game streaming platform that it acquired in...
IAC’s Barry Diller Places $1 Billion Bet on Digital Las Vegas
Financial Times: Barry Diller’s IAC has purchased a $1 billion stake in MGM Resorts, the gambling establishment business, for his most current bet in online media: video gaming. Diller revealed on Monday that he had collected a 12 percent stake in MGM...
Report: Podcasts Make a Comeback After Covid Slowdown
WWD: Listeners in the US of all podcasts dropped suddenly in March, when most of the country was on lockdown in an effort to control the rapid spread of the coronavirus. Since then, it seems podcast listening is on an...
Bloomberg Wants Woman to Give Up Anonymity in Lawsuit
WWD: Bloomberg LP thinks people should know the name of the person who is accusing it of fostering a "toxic" workplace for women along with instances of harassment. The company demanded in court last week that the woman who sued it in June reveal her full...
Meredith Unveils Data Studio to Help Power Brand Strategy
AdExchanger: Meredith introduced its Data Studio on Monday, a platform built out of its extensive first-party data set to help brands better understand their consumers both on and off the media company’s properties. “Data is one of our core...
Conde Nast Turns to Black Activism at UK Edition of Vogue
Associated Press: The British issue of Vogue is devoting its September issue to activism, with a cover featuring two Black activists and produced by a mostly Black team. Editor-in-chief Edward Enninful, who is Black, said 2020 is a "moment of necessary...
Maven CEO’s Moves Stir Worker Worries at Sports Illustrated
Daily Beast: The company that runs Sports Illustrated has in recent months made a series of moves that have left staffers more demoralized and dejected than ever — and worried about the financial health of the...
New York Times CEO Says Print Edition Unlikely in 20 Years
CNBC: Mark Thompson said he would be "very surprised" if there's a print New York Times newspaper in 20 years. As readers become more accustomed to reading the Times on smartphones, tablets and computers each year, a printed paper is clearly a dying form....
Gannett, New York Times, News Corp: ‘It’s All About Decline’
Adweek: Three of the biggest American media organizations continue to see massive traffic and record-breaking digital subscription growth, which has helped them navigate a drop in advertising brought on by the pandemic. "It's all about the pace of...
Block’s Pittsburgh Post-Gazette Workers Prepare for Strike
WTAE: Newsroom employees at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette have voted to authorize their union to call a strike.The Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh said the vote was 88-31 by secret ballot. The union has been without a contract for more than three...
Media, Tech Industry Bigwigs Reveal Summer Reading Lists
McKinsey: We find ourselves at that moment in August when, even in a pandemic, lives often slow down. It’s also the moment when McKinsey Global Publishing asks business leaders to share books they have recently read, plan to revisit, or look forward to...
Netflix Era Brings End to Movie-Theater Rules in Hollywood
Reuters: A federal judge on Friday granted the US government's request to immediately end the Paramount Decrees, a set of antitrust rules from the late 1940s and early 1950s that ended Hollywood's monopoly on producing, distributing and exhibiting...
AT&T’s WarnerMedia Set for Major Staff Cuts After Shakeup
Variety: WarnerMedia is expected to let go of at least 800 staffers at its Warner Bros. and HBO operations as part of a broad restructuring put in place by CEO Jason Kilar. Warner Bros. is expected to commence layoffs of around 650 people starting...
Disney Hikes ESPN Streaming Price as Sports Trickle Back
Bloomberg: Disney is raising the price of its ESPN+ streaming service for new subscribers by $1 to $5.99 a month, starting Aug. 12. It's the first price increase since the launch of the product in April 2018. The $50 cost of an annual subscription remains the...
Fox Corp’s News Channel Leads the Pack in Prime-Time TV
New York Times: In June and July, Fox News was the highest-rated television channel in the prime-time hours of 8 to 11 p.m. Not just on cable. All of television. Daily Beast: "Lachlan Murdoch is even more of a right-wing ultra than his old man."...
Dish Network Chief Sees Merger with DirecTV as ‘Inevitable’
Deadline: Dish Network chairman Charlie Ergen still believes a merger of his company's satellite operations with those of AT&T-owned DirecTV is "inevitable." The timing, though, is unclear. "Is it one month from now or two years from now? I don't...
ViacomCBS Scraps Indoor MTV Awards Due to Covid Threat
Associated Press: MTV is ditching plans for indoor performances for its Video Music Awards, opting for outdoor shows spread throughout New York City instead. Organizers had planned for some performances inside Brooklyn's Barclays Center for the Aug. 30...
AT&T’s WarnerMedia Eyes Shooting Restart on ‘Succession’
Variety: "Succession" could be back in production on season 3 before the end of the year (with a big emphasis on could), per creator Jesse Armstrong. The plan, at least for now, is “trying to think about starting shooting in New York before...
Google, Facebook Twitter ‘Getting Worked’ by Trump Allies
New York Times: Pro-Trump forces have revived the "working the refs" tactic and deftly employed it against the "powerful, befuddled new referees of public debate, Google, Facebook and Twitter," according to New York Times media columnist Ben...
Microsoft Still Front-Runner as Twitter Mulls Buy of TikTok
Wall Street Journal: Twitter has had preliminary talks about a potential combination with TikTok, the popular video-sharing app that the Trump administration has declared a national-security threat due to its Chinese...
iHeartMedia Faces ‘Severe’ Revenue Decline at Radio Giant
RBR: Covid-19 "had a severe, negative impact on our revenue in the second quarter." Those are the words of iHeartMedia CEO Bob Pittman, and he wasn't mincing them. The nation's largest audio media company experienced a nearly 50% revenue decline. But, podcasting is...