Top News:
Dave McNary / Variety:
Casey Affleck, accused of sexually abusive conduct in 2010, withdraws from customary role of prior year's best actor presenting best actress award at Oscars — Casey Affleck has withdrawn from presenting the best actress award at the March 4 Academy Award ceremonies.
Discussion:
Deadline, Hollywood Reporter, The Guardian, TVWeek.com, /Film, Washington Post, Business Insider, The New York Observer, Mediaite, Fast Company, NPR, Rolling Stone, New York Times, Vox, Vanity Fair, thecut, The A.V. Club, Glamour, Consequence of Sound, The Daily Caller, TVLine, @alexburnsnyt, Decider, @_celia_marie_, The Ringer, Mashable, IndieWire, PAPERMAG, Slate and Splinter
Steven Perlberg / BuzzFeed:
CNN is closing Beme and Casey Neistat is leaving following 2016 buyout, which sources say valued it at $20M+; CNN will continue to develop some of its products — CNN acquired Beme in late 2016 with hopes that it would become a major piece of its digital business. Now Neistat's leaving the company.
Discussion:
YouTube, TechCrunch, @katienotopoulos, CNNMoney, Business Insider, TVWeek.com, @justinkownacki, Tubefilter, @morewillie, @timcast, @jenchung, @johnnydollar01, Forbes, The Verge, Variety, @perlberg, Ad Age, The Daily Caller, The Wrap, Mashable, @srabil, @alyssabereznak, Engadget, Gizmodo, @rrhoover, @niemanlab, Mediaite and Hollywood Reporter, more at Techmeme »
Steven Perlberg / BuzzFeed:
How Axios used Mike Allen and distilled news to become influential quickly, with 260K+ newsletter subscribers and more; source says Axios AM fetches ~$75K/week — Every morning, Washington wakes up to Axios AM — Mike Allen's top 10 stories of the day, filled with short bits of breaking news …
Reuters:
Sources: Viacom CEO Bob Bakish and CBS CEO Leslie Moonves held “exploratory” discussion on merging companies; boards expected to discuss merger in coming weeks — (Reuters) - Viacom Inc (VIAB.O) Chief Executive Bob Bakish and CBS Corp (CBS.N) CEO Leslie Moonves …
Discussion:
Broadcasting & Cable, Radio & Television … and Engadget
RELATED:
Kim Masters / Hollywood Reporter:
Analysis of behind-the-scenes maneuvers to merge Viacom and CBS and the futures of CEOs Bob Bakish and Leslie Moonves, as Shari Redstone pushes for scale — The mogul faces a delicate negotiation with CBS CEO Leslie Moonves, who wants to be at the helm of the united company.
Ryan Glasspiegel / The Big Lead:
Source: ESPN is exploring options for FiveThirtyEight, including a potential sale to an outlet like The Atlantic or moving the site under ABC News — By the time mid-term election season really heats up, Nate Silver and FiveThirtyEight will in all likelihood have a different platform than ESPN.
Discussion:
@rafat, Politico, Variety, @nbj914, @bmorrissey, @danwolken, @mylesudland and The Wrap
Chris Roush / Talking Biz News:
Reports: Kimi Yoshino, business editor at the LA Times and an editor on the Pulitzer-winning Bell corruption scandal stories, was suspended for two days — Kimi Yoshino, the business editor of the Los Angeles Times, has been suspended for two days, according to multiple reports.
Ashley Cullins / Hollywood Reporter:
Former assistant for Harvey Weinstein sues him and Weinstein Company for discrimination and harassment, detailing required tasks to support his liaisons — Sandeep Rehal claims she was required to clean up after his “extremely prolific sexual encounters.” — Harvey Weinstein's former …
Discussion:
Variety, The Guardian, Mediaite, BuzzFeed, Variety, The Daily Caller, Hollywood Life and The Daily Beast
Selina Wang / Bloomberg:
Sources: Twitter is working on a Snapchat-style tool to more easily share videos and photos on the network, but its design and launch aren't yet finalized — Social network is experimenting with new products to woo users — Company seeks to streamline process of posting photos, videos
Discussion:
The Next Web, Engadget, Business Insider, The Verge, Mashable, Daily Mail, MacRumors, Los Angeles Times, New York Magazine, Fast Company, 9to5Mac and TechCrunch, more at Techmeme »
Mattie Kahn / ELLE:
Meager TV coverage of women's marches highlights imbalance as journalists fail to contextualize and investigate the movement as they have for Trump voters — in women's marches around the world this weekend. But blink, and you'll miss all the attention paid to them on Sunday's top five political talk shows.
Discussion:
@laurenarankin and @b_b_baconator
Register-Guard:
GateHouse Media is buying The Register-Guard in Eugene, Oregon, from the Baker family; GateHouse now has publications in 36 states, 130 daily newspapers — - Colorado-based marijuana company not buying One East Broadway in downtown Eugene, after all; it has already bought another downtown building for a pot shop
Discussion:
@dgtedford, @dlboardman, @francescamarief, @mrcampbell17 and The Rural Blog
Howard Amos / The Calvert Journal:
The Bell, a US-based, Russia-focused media startup, illustrates a trend of building Russian news orgs independent of owners vulnerable to Kremlin pressure — Screenshot of The Bell's English-language homepage — Two important news stories emerged in December on a topic …
Discussion:
@howardamos
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