Top News:
Louise Matsakis / Wired:
Twitter says over the next week it will adjust users' follower counts to no longer include locked accounts, dropping Twitter's combined follower count by ~6% — Perhaps a healthier Twitter is one with smaller follower counts—even if that comes as a blow to your ego. That's what the company is hoping, anyway.
Discussion:
New York Times, Washington Post, VentureBeat, Twitter, @keithweed, Fast Company, @wexler, The Verge, Los Angeles Times, USA Today, @benimmo, @nxthompson and The Guardian, more at Techmeme »
Sara Fischer / Axios:
Facebook will roll out news shows for Facebook Watch from July 16, with the lineup including shows from CNN, Fox News, Quartz, Bloomberg, Univision, ATTN:, Mic — Facebook will launch a slate of video shows on its video platform, Watch, on July 16. — Why it matters: The tech giant …
Discussion:
@juddlegum, Facebook Watch, The Wrap, Tubefilter, Engadget, @mcclatchy, @xeni, @newsmary, @lpolgreen, @cwarzel and @kevinroose, more at Techmeme »
Bloomberg:
Comcast increases its offer for Sky to £14.75 per share, valuing Sky at £26B, following Fox's increased bid to £14 per share — Comcast Corp. increased its takeover bid for Sky Plc, topping an offer from Rupert Murdoch's 21st Century Fox Inc. and escalating a global standoff between the media giants.
Discussion:
@hadas_gold, Variety, @tictoc, Broadcasting & Cable and The Wrap
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Joe Mayes / Bloomberg:
21st Century Fox Inc. boosts its bid for Sky TV, offering £14 per share and valuing the company at £24.5B, topping Comcast's offer of £22B — - Offer is now 12 percent higher than Comcast's bid for Sky — Sky is part of a wider battle between Comcast and Disney
Discussion:
Ad Age, The Wrap, Broadcasting & Cable, BloombergQuint, TVWeek.com, Press Gazette, Fortune and Reuters
Tim Baysinger / The Wrap:
John Amato, CEO of Hollywood Reporter-Billboard Media, leaves after probe into whether he derailed stories on harassment claims against record exec Charlie Walk — Investigation looked into John Amato's friendship with record executive Charlie Walk — John Amato has stepped down as CEO …
Discussion:
Hollywood Reporter, Deadline, Variety, TVWeek.com, Fortune and hypebot
Georg Szalai / Hollywood Reporter:
Writing in the BBC's annual report, the corporation's Chairman David Clementi says British content faces a threat from the “west coast of America” — The U.K. public broadcaster in its annual report says BBC Worldwide, which after the end of the fiscal year was merged with its production arm …
Discussion:
The Guardian
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Paul Farhi / Washington Post:
Mark Halperin and John Heilemann are in negotiations over material for a follow-up “Game Change” book and TV-mini series, most of which Halperin holds — Until their split last year, Mark Halperin and John Heilemann were the golden boys of American political journalism.
Discussion:
@dankennedy_nu, @grahamdavida, @owillis and Mediaite
Steven Perlberg / BuzzFeed:
Sources: Sinclair to launch STIRR, a new streaming VOD app, which would include a 24/7 news channel, TV shows, movies, and sports, by year-end — The local TV giant expects to release the streaming app this year, according to sources familiar with the project.
Discussion:
The Hill, FierceCable and @amy_siskind
Karen Weise / Bloomberg:
Facebook research group Social Science One to offer scholars access to a petabyte of anonymized user data to understand the role of misinformation in elections — An independent research initiative that Facebook Inc. announced in the wake of the Cambridge Analytica scandal is launching its first study …
Discussion:
Wired, @kerrymflynn and TechCrunch, more at Techmeme »
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Washington Post:
UK watchdog gives Facebook a preliminary fine of about $664,000, the maximum allowed, for letting Cambridge Analytica access data about millions of people
Discussion:
Information Commissioner's …, Media Matters for America, @donie, @kevinroose, CNNMoney, The Verge, The Daily Caller, Adweek, @amy_siskind, @profcarroll, @katestarbird, @sivavaid, @justinhendrix, @donie, BBC, The Hill, CNNMoney, Engadget, @themediaisdying and @stevekopack, more at Techmeme »
Todd Spangler / Variety:
YouTube TV went down during a crucial World Cup match, the second such outage since it went down during an NBA game in May — YouTube TV, Google's internet-delivered subscription TV service, was hit with nationwide outages — right in the middle of the 2018 World Cup semifinal match between England and Croatia.
Sarah Hagi / Hazlitt:
Ex-Vice journalist and Canadian writer Sarah Hagi recounts her experience of being laid off from a large media company — When I need comfort and familiarity, I cycle through five or so different movies I've seen at least a half dozen times each. Nora Ephron's 1998 classic You've Got Mail is a frequent go-to.
Discussion:
@mattdpearce and @nicole_soojung
Lucas Matney / TechCrunch:
Penrose Studios, which makes narrative-based VR content, raises $10M Series A led by TransLink Capital with Marc Benioff, Will.i.am, and others participating — It's been an interesting past few years for the virtual reality industry and while there is still plenty for insiders to pin …
Discussion:
VentureBeat and Variety, more at Techmeme »
Lucia Moses / Digiday:
The relationship between The New York Times and Facebook has been fraught, with the Times' CEO Mark Thompson repeatedly attacking the social network — Facebook has been taking fire from all sides lately, but few have been more outspoken and consistent of late than Mark Thompson, CEO of The New York Times.
Discussion:
@jason_kint, @bmorrissey and @digiday
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