Top News:
Jon Lafayette / Broadcasting & Cable:
Negotiations break down as YouTube TV drops the YES Network along with some, but not all, Sinclair RSNs — YES Network said it is no longer on YouTube TV, which might signal a breakdown in talks between Sinclair Broadcast Group, which acquired a group of regional sports networks …
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Todd Spangler / Variety:
YouTube TV and Sinclair sign a deal for 19 RSNs, but the streamer won't carry the YES Network, Fox Sports Prime Ticket, and Fox Sports West, which airs LA games — YouTube TV and Sinclair Broadcast Group reached a deal covering most of the Fox regional sports networks …
Discussion:
sbgi.net, Awful Announcing, Tubefilter, Engadget, @xpangler and @randball
Financial Times:
UK's Independent is profitable for a third consecutive year with profit of £2.3M on revenue of £27M, up 9% YoY; it ended its print edition four years ago — Digital-only strategy pays off for first major UK newspaper publisher to close printing presses
Discussion:
Press Gazette, @tiagodf, @paulwrblanchard, @jeffjarvis, @jbenton, @jamesrbuk, @markdistef, @rasmus_kleis and @stevejonespa
Ryan Lillis / Sacramento Bee:
Sacramento's mayor is recruiting a group to try to buy McClatchy's Sacramento Bee, convening a forum March 27 to discuss structure with a goal of raising $20M+ — Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg is working to form a local ownership group that could purchase The Sacramento Bee …
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Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
Twitter expands its rules around hateful conduct to include language that dehumanizes people on the basis of their age, disability, or disease — Last year, Twitter expanded its rules around hate speech to include dehumanizing speech against religious groups.
Discussion:
Twitter, @_cingraham and Engadget, more at Techmeme »
Mark Wilson / Fast Company:
MIT study: when some news stories are labeled as fact-checked and disputed, stories with the same design but no labels are validated and seen as more accurate — In 2016, after coordinated propaganda on Facebook helped Trump win the election, the social media giant introduced a program …
Elaine Low / Variety:
Source: Netflix cancels five film screenings and a panel planned for SXSW, joining others who have canceled screenings, including Apple and Amazon Studios — Netflix is the latest company to pull out of SXSW 2020, a source familiar with the situation tells Variety, canceling five film screenings and a panel for #BlackExcellence.
Discussion:
/Film, Hollywood Reporter, NPR, Broadcasting & Cable, CNN, Multichannel News, @jasonosia, @drericding, The Playlist, @joeleydon, @martyswant, @wajahatali, @kelseymsutton, @xpangler, @kerrymflynn, NME, The Week, Deadline, Variety, @thr, @kerrymflynn, The A.V. Club, IndieWire, Variety, The Wrap and San Antonio Current
Casey Michel / The Daily Beast:
Portable.TV, a news streaming app available in the App Store, masks its ties to RT, whose content it runs exclusively and with which it shares a parent company — The app bills itself as a “one-of-a-kind free streaming service & TV library of news programs.” But every single show is from Kremlin-backed TV channel.
Discussion:
@noahshachtman, @walker_ct and Raw Story
Joe Otterson / Variety:
Pop TV cancels three original TV shows that were produced by outside studios as ViacomCBS prioritizes IP owned by the company — Pop TV is paring down its scripted programming commitments as dust continues to settle from the Viacom-CBS merger. Variety has learned exclusively that three original series …
Discussion:
TV Insider, @brianstelter, The Wrap and Variety
MediaPost:
Patch Media, which publishes 1,200+ hyper-local news sites, says its sites now have a total of 32M MAU and newsletters have 2M subscribers — Patch Media, the publisher of more than 1,200 hyper-local news sites, is a comparable bright spot among publishers of local news; it's having been profitable for the past four years.
Anna Nicolaou / Financial Times:
James Murdoch's Lupa Systems and Betaworks to fund an accelerator for start-ups to tackle disinfo; they plan to invest $100K in 10-20 projects in the first year — The former Fox CEO commits millions to battle against disinformation — James Murdoch, the younger son of Rupert Murdoch …
Discussion:
@lisatozzi, @k8em0, @brooklynmarie, @christinemc6, @melissameehanau, @markdistef, @moorehn, @yashar and @tiagodf
Danny Ross / Forbes:
Interview with Jeremy Erlich, Spotify's new co-head of music strategy, about its 3,000 curated playlists, Spotify's role in playlisting and editorial, and more — Whether it's New Music Friday or Ultimate Indie, a Spotify playlist selection can quite literally change an artist's career overnight and reel in significant revenue.
Michael H. Keller / New York Times:
Five Eyes nations release guidelines for platforms to fight child porn; US senators introduce a bill to remove Section 230 for failure to police such content — Legislation announced on Thursday aimed at curbing the spread of online child sexual abuse imagery would take the extraordinary step …
Brian Stelter / CNN:
Chris Matthews abruptly announces his retirement amid his MSNBC talk show Hardball, after a string of recent controversies — (CNN Business)Chris Matthews, one of the country's best-known political talk show hosts, is retiring from MSNBC, effective immediately, after a string of recent controversies on and off the air.
Discussion:
New York Times, Vox, Vogue, Vulture, The Hill, @juliezebrak, Vox, New York Post, @sarahellison, Variety, Reason, @howardfineman, @amandamarcotte, Breitbart, @martina, @nprinskeep, @digiphile, @stevesilberman and @jayrosen_nyu
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