Top News:
Todd Spangler / Variety:
Memo: in 2018, BuzzFeed generated $100M+ from business lines that didn't exist in 2017; Facebook video platform revenue grew from $500K in Q1 to $3M in Q4 2018 — - BuzzFeed CEO Says Company Is Generating Over $200 Million Annually From Businesses That Didn't Exist Two Years Ago
Discussion:
Nieman Lab, Business Insider, Digiday, Adweek, BuzzFeed, @lucas_shaw, @xpangler, MediaPost and ZDNet, more at Techmeme »
New York Times:
Sources: Amazon teams up with the NY Yankees, Sinclair Broadcasting, and others in a bid to buy the YES sports network from majority owner 21st Century Fox — Amazon is coming to New York — to grab a piece of the Yankees sports network. — Jeff Bezos' tech giant has teamed …
Discussion:
Fox Business, The Wrap, Associated Press, @darrenrovell, Bleacher Report, Broadcasting & Cable, Awful Announcing and New York Post
RELATED:
Alex Sherman / CNBC:
An overview of Amazon's media strategies, which include partnering with channels, expanding sports rights, and connecting content to products it sells — - Jeff Bezos gives the Amazon Studios team a massive budget to win “Lord of the Rings” and even sends Echo speakers to the Tolkien estate.
New York Times:
White House Communications Director Bill Shine has resigned to serve as senior adviser on Trump's re-election campaign — Bill Shine, the former Fox News executive who joined the White House staff last summer to manage President Trump's communications operation, has resigned and will move …
Discussion:
TVNewser, Bloomberg, @clarajeffery, @elianayjohnson, Vanity Fair, Mediaite, @gabrielsherman, @tripgabriel, New York Magazine, @maggienyt, The Daily Beast, KNSD-TV, @poniewozik, CNBC, @timobrien, Boing Boing, Politico, CNN, @timobrien, The Wrap, Wall Street Journal, Ad Age, @karenyourish, @acosta, The Week, Fortune, Splinter, Newsy and Washington Post
The Conversation:
Australian court case puts media outlets on notice that they could face large compensation claims, after The Age was found liable for a reporter's PTSD — A landmark ruling by an Australian court is expected to have international consequences for newsrooms, with media companies on notice …
Discussion:
Nieman Lab, @lindsaycohen, @seanrobinson1e4, @jbenton and NEWS.com.au
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
Jeffrey Katzenberg and Meg Whitman share content plans for Quibi, their streaming service launching in April 2020, including a show on Evan Spiegel and Snapchat — Jeffrey Katzenberg and Meg Whitman today announced a slate of new series and projects heading to their forthcoming video streaming service, Quibi.
Discussion:
Adweek, Fast Company, The Wrap and Hollywood Reporter, more at Techmeme »
Alison Weissbrot / AdExchanger:
Product manager says Google is building a podcast app and hopes to surface podcasts in search results by using speech-to-text to understand audio content — Google, a sleeping giant in the podcast space, is starting to open its eyes and stretch. — Since launching its native podcast app …
Mathew Ingram / Columbia Journalism Review:
Facebook's shift to more private sharing will make misinformation harder to track and raises questions about the company's liability for its diffusion — On Wednesday, in what seemed like a major shift, Mark Zuckerberg wrote that he wants to reorient Facebook around private, encrypted …
Discussion:
Nieman Lab, @zeynep, New York Times, American Press Institute, New York Times, The Guardian, OneZero, New York Times, MIT Technology Review, @alexstamos, The Verge, @jayrosen_nyu, @evanselinger, @jason_kint, @sivavaid, @sivavaid, Parse.ly, @jessefelder, @willoremus, Techdirt, @_maditla, Memex 1.1, Stratechery, The Verge, @jayrosen_nyu, Wired, Wired, ClickZ, WIRED UK and Business Insider, more at Techmeme »
Anthony Ha / TechCrunch:
Serial Box, a digital publisher of serialized fiction that publishes stories in text and audio formats, raises $4.5M in seed funding, led by Boat Rocker Media — Serial Box, a startup bringing back the tradition of serialized fiction, has raised $4.5 million in seed funding.
Mia Galuppo / Hollywood Reporter:
In memo, Warner Bros. CEO Kevin Tsujihara apologizes for “personal actions” that embarrassed company and staff after leaked texts show entanglement with actress — “I deeply regret that I have made mistakes in my personal life that have caused pain and embarrassment to the people I love the most.
Discussion:
The Wrap, Variety, Deadline, The Week, @katiekilkenny7, @maxapotter and @joebelbruno
Max Willens / Digiday:
NBC News and MSNBC plan to expand their podcasts team; one goal is a podcast focused on the 2020 election, starting out weekly and expanding into a daily show — NBC News and MSNBC are spending more to make podcasts. — On Monday, NBC News is announcing the first of several hires this year …
Joe Berkowitz / Fast Company:
Q&A with Barstool Sports CEO Erika Nardini on Miel Brudow's fight with the site after it posted Brudow's video without credit: “we really botched” the response — On Monday, writer and performer Miel Bredouw took to Twitter to disclose publicly how her content had been misappropriated …
Discussion:
Awful Announcing, Deadspin, Deadspin, @onlxn, @rezac1 and The Daily Beast