Mediagazer: Ali Watkins deserves a reprimand if she slept with a source, and a second chance, given that male reporters have escaped punishment over the years (Jack Shafer/Politico)

9:15 AM ET, June 20, 2018

Top News:

Daniel Holloway / Variety:

Modern Family's Steve Levitan revises statement about not re-upping with Fox, says he'll “take some time” to see where studio executives land after Fox sale — “Modern Family” co-creator Steve Levitan reversed course Tuesday after initially saying he would leave Fox …

Discussion: New York Times, LAist, Deadline, Ad Age, Consequence of Sound, TVLine, Contemptor, Fortune, Vanity Fair, The Daily Caller, Business Insider, Adweek, Mashable, The Wrap, The Wrap, @gdanielholloway and The A.V. Club

Nellie Andreeva / Deadline:

Modern Family co-creator Steve Levitan says he will not be re-upping his contract with 20th Century Fox TV due to the studio's ties with Fox News — UPDATED with Levitan's statement: After Steve Levitan tweeted last night that he was “disgusted” to work for Fox following a controversial statement …

Discussion: @stevelevitan, @stevelevitan, @paulfeig, C21Media, RAPPLER, The Wrap, EW.com, HuffPost, @juddapatow, @davidfolkenflik and TV Tattle

Nellie Andreeva / Deadline:
Days after criticizing Fox News' Tucker Carlson, Seth MacFarlane donates $2M to NPR and $500K to NPR member station KPCC in Los Angeles

Discussion: @stevelevitan, Los Angeles Times, @juddapatow, @jeffbercovici, @juddapatow, @elisewho, @radiofinn, @inajaffenpr, TVWeek.com, Mediaite, @dabeard, @jeffjarvis, @kairyssdal, @davidfolkenflik, The A.V. Club, Variety and TV Tattle

Alex Heath / Cheddar:

Sources: AT&T in talks to acquire AppNexus, which operates one of the largest independent ad exchanges; source says AppNexus won't sell for less than $2B — AT&T is in talks to acquire the advertising company AppNexus, Cheddar has learned. — Privately-held AppNexus operates …

Discussion: Wall Street Journal, AdExchanger, @alexeheath, @alexeheath, The Drum and @aexm, more at Techmeme »

Alexis C. Madrigal / The Atlantic:

Dissecting how the US family-separation policy for immigrants became big news after percolating for months as reporters probed and legislators asked questions — How the many-chambered heart of the internet turned the Trump administration's family-separation policy into a different kind of scandal.

Discussion: NPR, The Texas Tribune, Snopes.com, @marklittlenews, @evanchill, @healthcommphd, @charliebeckett, @urilf, @rojospinks, @adriennelaf, Media Matters for America, Vox and The Hill

Erik Wemple / Washington Post:

When DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen told a sheriffs' association, “Don't believe the press”, she was following her boss's lead to discredit the media — Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen on Monday abandoned precision in bashing media coverage of the Trump administration's immigration policies.

Discussion: Washington Post, Bloomberg, @sulliview, @nora_kelly, @mediaite, CNNMoney and Media Matters for America

CNBC:

Walt Disney Company has raised its bid for 21st Century Fox's film and TV assets to $38 a share, up from $28 in December — - The new bid rivals Comcast's $35 a share all-cash bid last week, in a deal that would be valued at $65 billion. — Fox's Rupert Murdoch said in statement …

Alex Sherman / CNBC:
Sources: Endemol Shine, the TV producer of Black Mirror that is co-owned by 21st Century Fox and Apollo Global Management, has hired bankers to pursue a sale

Discussion: Deadline

Georg Szalai / Hollywood Reporter:
UK has indicated it's ready to approve 21st Century Fox's purchase of Sky, after Disney promised to commit $2B to Sky's annual budget over 15 years

Discussion: The Wrap and Press Gazette

Josh Constine / TechCrunch:

Facebook debuts game-show platform that lets creators add quizzes, polls, and more to live and on-demand video; Facebook tests ability to award prize money — Rather than build its own HQ trivia competitor, Facebook is launching a gameshow platform. Today the company announced a new set …

Discussion: Facebook, Facebook Media, RAPPLER, What's New in Publishing, Gizmodo, Fortune, Digiday, Tubefilter, Business Insider, The Verge, VentureBeat and Adweek, more at Techmeme »

Josh Constine / TechCrunch:
Facebook launches Brand Collabs search engine to connect brands and creators for sponsoring and product placement deals; Facebook is not currently taking a cut

more at Techmeme »

Michelle Castillo / CNBC:
Facebook says it's opening Watch to more types of content, including non-episodic long-form, in bid to capture YouTube stars, and is adding polls, quizzes, more

Discussion: TechCrunch and Peter O'Kelly's Reality Check, more at Techmeme »

Jack Shafer / Politico:

Ali Watkins deserves a reprimand if she slept with a source, and a second chance, given that male reporters have escaped punishment over the years — Why shouldn't reporters have sex with the people they cover? — The answer, everybody will tell you, is orgasmically obvious …

Discussion: @erikwemple, @hollyvhays, @kantrowitz, @byrontau, @blowryontv, BuzzFeed and Wall Street Journal

Caroline O'Donovan / BuzzFeed:

Medium and GitHub scrub posts and database containing ICE employee LinkedIn data citing rules against doxxing; Twitter suspends bot tweeting info from database — Medium and GitHub say posting the LinkedIn data of a targeted group of employees constitutes doxing. The artist who made the database disagrees.

Discussion: @ceodonovan, @corporacallosa, @beschizza, @joftius, Gizmodo, @rienzokennedy, @a_man_in_black, @mmasnick, @ceodonovan, @joemacare, @generativist, @ceodonovan, @joftius, The Verge and New York Times, more at Techmeme »

Sara Boboltz / HuffPost:

NYT agreed not to use audio recordings of an on-the-record interview with Trump advisor Stephen Miller for its podcast The Daily after the White House objected — As the immigration crisis rages on, a key adviser's voice has been hushed. — Bowing to pressure from the White House …

Natasha Lomas / TechCrunch:

EU Parliament committee votes for tougher copyright rules that could force tech firms to bear liability for copyright infringement in user generated content — In a key vote this morning the European Parliament's legal affairs committee has backed the two most controversial elements …

Discussion: EDRi, The Verge and The Next Web, more at Techmeme »

The Daily Beast:

About 50 newspaper executives flew in to Washington last week to lobby against newsprint tariffs; 24 senators now co-sponsoring a bill to suspend the tariffs — Brandon Cox, an editor and publisher based in Scottsboro, Alabama is watching, in real time, the destruction of his newsrooms.

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More News:

Brooks Barnes / New York Times:
Disney names Jennifer Lee to lead Walt Disney Animation Studios and veteran Pixar director Pete Docter to lead Pixar, filling John Lasseter's dual roles

Discussion: Ad Age, Scroll.in, Hollywood Reporter, CNNMoney, EW.com, IndieWire, Deadline and io9

Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
Starz rolls out 14 channels on YouTube TV as a $9 add-on to the $40/month basic package

Discussion: Variety, FierceCable, Broadcasting & Cable, PR Newswire and The Verge

Pew Research Center:
Study: US adults who are politically aware, digitally savvy, and trust reporting are more likely to identify factual statements in media

Discussion: @gottfriedjeff, NPR, The Hill, @jboren4507, @greta, @michaelbarthel, @pewjournalism, @kubremner, @kabir_here, @brendannyhan, @pewresearch, Trust, Media and Democracy and The Next Web

Will Robinson / Jacksonville Business Journal:
Newsroom organizers at the Florida Times-Union, bought by GateHouse in 2017, announce their intent to unionize with the NewsGuild-CWA

Discussion: Poynter, your community and @tessaduvall

Jessica Davies / Digiday:
Speaking at Cannes, New York Times CEO Mark Thompson praised Google for listening to the paper's concerns but said Facebook was “difficult”

Discussion: @bmorrissey

Earlier Picks:

Shan Wang / Nieman Lab:
IAB study: 65% of viewers said they intend to watch the World Cup via livestream, versus just 71% who said they would view it on television

Jim Waterson / The Guardian:
BBC's Director of Education and Radio James Purnell says the corporation faces an existential threat from Netflix and Spotify, must reach younger listeners

Sara Fischer / Axios:
Vox Media is folding Racked, the retail and fashion site it acquired in 2013, into a vertical within the Vox website called The Goods

Discussion: Mediawire, @notorioustib, @chavielieber, @chaykak, @voxmediainc, @manymanywords and @racked

Lesley Goldberg / Hollywood Reporter:
Netflix signs first European overall deal with creators of breakout hit “Dark”, Jantje Friese and Baran bo Odar, similar to deals with Rhimes and Murphy

Discussion: Decider

Sara Fischer / Axios:
Antitrust experts argue several major acquisitions have given Facebook and Google dominance over the ad market, with the DoJ failing to regulate them

Discussion: @baekdal

From Techmeme:

Michael Kan / PCMag:
OpenAI makes the ChatGPT desktop app for Windows available to all users, following an October release limited to paying ChatGPT subscribers

Financial Times:
Sources: the US FTC plans to investigate allegations that Microsoft is abusing its market power in productivity software to prevent customers from leaving Azure

Decrypt:
Eighteen US states, led by Kentucky, sue the SEC and its commissioners, including Chairman Gary Gensler, over its crackdown on the crypto industry

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