iHeartMedia Lands $500 Million Private-Equity Investment Offer
Wall Street Journal: Private-equity firm Silver Lake has reached out to iHeartMedia and its largest creditor group with an offer to invest about $500 million in the radio station operator, according to people familiar with the...
Netflix Enters Radio Business with New Channel on SiriusXM
CNBC: Netflix will soon be streaming on the airwaves thanks to a partnership with Sirius XM. The company said on Wednesday it will be creating a comedy channel for the satellite radio provider. The radio channel's focus is going to be stand up excerpts and highlights...
Comcast Former Staffers Test the Limits of #MeToo Movement
Bloomberg: The #MeToo movement is based on a basic premise: Speak up. For a lot of women, that’s gotten results. Many of the alleged perpetrators have been fired or exiled. Harvey Weinstein is facing criminal prosecution. But as a trio of former Comcast workers are...
Disney’s ESPYs Give Stage to Gymnasts Who Survived Abuse
Reuters: More than 100 survivors who went public with emotional stories of abuse by former USA Gymnastics doctor Larry Nassar appeared on stage together to accept an award for courage on Wednesday at the annual ESPYs...
Viacom Leads $15 Million Funding in Kid Platform Pocket.watch
TheWrap: Pocket.watch, a kids media brand and entertainment platform touting new digital stars, said on Wednesday that it has closed a $15 million funding round led by Viacom. Pocket.watch and Viacom have already kicked off other content initiatives together, the...
Fox News Website Exceeds CNN, New York Times in Page Views
MediaPost: From April through June, FoxNews.com had more total page views than CNN.com. While Fox News has ranked as the most-watched cable news network for 16 years, its digital site trailed CNN's online audience numbers....
Netflix Redesigns TV Interface with New Sections for Film, Series
TheVerge: Netflix just announced that it has given a major overhaul to the user experience on its TV apps. “The new interface was based on rigorous research and testing around how we can make it easier to find titles on TVs, where navigation can feel a bit tougher...
Report: Teenagers Now Watching an Hour of YouTube Every Day
Sky News: Teenagers are now watching around an hour of YouTube every day, according to a new report which reveals a dramatic change in people's TV viewing habits. Ofcom found UK subscriptions to streaming giants such as Netflix and Amazon have overtaken traditional...
BuzzFeed Opens Standalone Website for Brand ‘BuzzFeed News’
TechCrunch: BuzzFeed's own research has found that some readers “don’t completely understand” that while the company is famous for GIF-filled lists, it also produces “deeply researched and fact-checked” journalism. So BuzzFeed is making that distinction a clearer with...
Conde Nast Leans a Lot from Millennial Foodie Brand ‘Basically’
AdAge: A year ago today, Bon Appétit launched Basically, a digital foodie brand for millennials. The thinking behind the vertical was pretty simple: "It's amazing how passionate twentysomethings are about food and restaurants. But that doesn't necessarily mean they...
Netflix is Punished by Wall Street, Remains Envied in Hollywood
CNNMoney: Wall Street is punishing Netflix for a mediocre quarter. But don't feel too bad for it just yet. Netflix is still the one to beat in Hollywood, where traditional entertainment and media companies are racing to catch up to its enormous head start in streaming...
Walmart Plots Video Streamer to Take On Netflix, Amazon Prime
The Information: Walmart is said to be considering launching a subscription streaming video service to compete with Netflix and Amazon Prime Video. Such a move could be enormously costly for the retailer but would demonstrate its determination to compete on multiple...
Ofcom Says Video Streaming Services Overtake Pay-TV in Britain
Reuters: The number of Britons subscribing to TV services like Netflix, Amazon and Sky’s NOW TV, has overtaken traditional satellite and cable TV for the first time, media regulator Ofcom said on Wednesday. Netflix, Amazon and NOW TV attracted 15.4 million subscribers...
Survey: Over 5 Million US Consumers Will Cut the Cord in 2018
MarketWatch: Over 5 million U.S. consumers will cut the cord in 2018, a move that will cost the pay-TV industry billions in lost subscription revenue, according to a survey published Tuesday by cg42. The New York consulting firm estimates a total of 5.4 million U.S....
Comcast Targeted in Cord-Cutting Effort from Consumer Reports
Multichannel News: Consumer Reports magazine and its advocacy affiliate Consumers Union are ganging up this month on cable fees and bundling. They've launched a "What's the Fee" (WTF) online assault on system operators, with Comcast as its first...
Fox Flops in World Cup Final Ratings as US Audiences Tune Out
Financial Times: France’s football World Cup victory shattered television ratings records in Europe, but US audiences were not quite as captivated. About 11.3 million people in the US tuned in to the final match, down a third from 2014’s World Cup final. Overall, the...
Comcast-NBC to Pursue Direct-to-Consumer Video with Bluprint
MediaPost: NBCUniversal';s cable entertainment unit is rebranding the subscription offering from its crafting brand Craftsy Unlimited as “Bluprint,” marking a new foray into direct-to-consumer video offerings. The subscription service will be bulking up its content...
Viacom to Stay Independent Amid CBS Merger Push, CEO Says
Hollywood Reporter: Viacom CEO Bob Bakish on Tuesday didn't directly address his company's legal tug-of-war with CBS, but he did predict Shari Redstone's push for a recombination of the companies will not happen anytime soon. "My guess is, yes, we will be independent...
Fox’s Murdoch Gets Another Win from Imperiled Sinclair-Tribune
Bloomberg: Things in Washington just keep going Rupert Murdoch’s way. The 21st Century Fox chairman stands to be a big winner after rival Sinclair Broadcast Group’s plan to buy Tribune Media was thrown into jeopardy on...
Univision, Televisa Content Chief Departs for Production Venture
Bloomberg: Isaac Lee, the executive who unified the programming at Spanish-broadcasting giants Univision and Televisa is stepping down from his role of content chief for both companies. Lee decided to resign after “successfully completing the mandate of aligning the...
Spotify, Snapchat, Drudge Go Offline in Issue with Google Cloud
TheWrap: Popular right-leaning sites Breitbart.com and Drudge Report both went offline at about 3:30 p.m. ET on Tuesday, as several other sites and apps hosted on Google Cloud Platform went down. Breitbart and Drudge were up and running again within about 30 minutes...
Snap Launches Snapchat News Partnerships to Help Journalists
Axios: Snapchat is launching a news partnership initiative with the goal of helping journalists and news organizations better mine the billions of public videos and photos shared daily on Snapchat for news and...
BuzzFeed, HuffPost Execs Say Facebook Defers to Conservatives
Wall Street Journal: At a private meeting late last week, some publishing executives criticized Facebook for being overly accommodating to conservative outlets, days before social-media executives are to appear on Capitol Hill to discuss how content is displayed on...
Vox to Begin Licensing Its Publishing Technology to Other Media
Wall Street Journal: Digital publisher Vox Media is trying out a new money-making strategy: Selling the software that it uses to produce stories. The company is beginning to license Chorus, the technology that underpins the portfolio of sites it owns and operates,...
New York Times Under Fire for ‘Homophobic’ Trump-Putin Cartoon
Reuters: A viral cartoon depicting Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin as gay lovers has been condemned as “homophobic,” with mental health charities warning it sent a negative message to vulnerable young LGBT people. Activists said the satirical animation implied...
News Corp Australia to Team with Fairfax on Printing Newspapers
Reuters: Fairfax Media said on Wednesday it had agreed with rival News Corp.’s Australian unit to collaborate on printing newspapers to curb costs. The publisher of the Sydney Morning Herald and Australian Financial Review newspapers said the move would result in the...
Tronc Looks to Slash More Editorial Jobs at New York Daily News
New York Post: Rumors are flying that Tronc is pressuring Daily News editor-in-chief Jim Rich to institute sweeping cuts across the newsroom. “They are bracing for a massive editorial staff cut,” said one former staffer of his...
Meredith Top Exec in Native Ad Division Mysteriously Leaves Job
New York Post: At Meredith, the chief creative officer of The Foundry, a video and native advertising division, was out rather mysteriously recently. Chris Hercik, a former creative director at Sports Illustrated, moved into the Foundry job only in November as the...
Comcast Might Pull Out of War with Disney for 21st Century Fox
CNBC: Comcast is unlikely to make another bid for 21st Century Fox's movie and television assets, focusing on a bid for Britain's Sky television. Comcast was engaged in a bidding war with Disney over the Fox assets. Recently Disney threw some cash into its own bid,...
Disney Says 21st Century Fox Might Not Increase Its Bid for Sky
Bloomberg: For the first time, Disney spelled out for investors that Rupert Murdoch’s 21st Century Fox may choose not to increase its takeover offer for British broadcaster Sky. The U.K. company is at the center of an international bidding war that involves Fox,...