Mediagazer: Modern Luxury Media, publisher of 40+ regional magazines, is furloughing staff and suspending some executive pay through June, aiming to avoid permanent cuts (Greg Dool/Folio)

7:30 PM ET, April 14, 2020

Top News:

WH press corps reporters discuss risking their health to attend daily press briefings that have provided the most direct access to the president in modern times — The White House briefing room is a low-ceilinged claustrophobic space. Built on top of a swimming pool where Franklin Delano …

Discussion: Press Watch, @olivianuzzi, @froomkin, @froomkin, @iraflatow, @seungminkim, @maggienyt, @jayrosen_nyu, @bencjacobs, @jayrosen_nyu, @brianstelter, @boutrousted, @mehdirhasan and PressThink

Erik Wemple / Washington Post: Photographers, confined to seven spots in the WH briefing room due to social distancing, get creative in capturing historic moments during COVID-19 briefings

Ty Pendlebury / CNET:

Sling TV debuts Happy Hour Across America, which lets new users stream its 50+ channel Sling Blue package for free from 5pm ET to midnight — Live TV streaming service Sling TV has been rolling out a bunch of promotions in response to coronavirus stay-at-home orders nationwide, and the newest one could be its best yet.

Discussion: Variety, Light Reading, Mashable, The Streamable and Fortune

Jon Lafayette / Broadcasting & Cable:

Scripps' board members and executives including the CEO are taking 10% to 15% pay cuts with the money saved going to the company's COVID-19 employee relief fund — Top executives and director of the E.W. Scripps Co. are taking voluntary salary and fee reductions as the Coronavirus crisis continues.

Discussion: Cincinnati Business Journal and PR Newswire

Tamar Lapin / New York Post:

On his SiriusXM show, Chris Cuomo says he doesn't want to spend his time “trafficking in things that I think are ridiculous” regarding his CNN show — Chris Cuomo's coronavirus-induced fever may have subsided but the CNN anchor was red hot on Monday.

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Reuters:

Iraq suspends Reuters' license for 3 months and orders it to apologize, after it published a story saying there were more COVID-19 cases than the official tally — LONDON (Reuters) - Iraq has suspended the licence of the Reuters news agency after it published a story saying the number …

Discussion: @mcculloughirvin, @sanamf24, @leloveluck, @missy_ryan and @rawyarageh

Todd Spangler / Variety:

NBCUniversal's ad-supported Peacock Premium tier launches for Xfinity X1 and Flex customers on Wednesday; the bulk of Peacock's originals are delayed until 2021 — NBCUniversal's Peacock is ready to start rolling out to Comcast cable customers starting this week as scheduled …

Discussion: CNET, The Wrap, Multichannel News, TechCrunch, The Streamable, CNET, The Verge, @xpangler and Hollywood Reporter

Taylor Lorenz / New York Times:

Amid the pandemic, demand for newsletters, Instagram accounts, and YouTube channels focused on good news has grown, from NatGeo to Upworthy — The coronavirus pandemic has driven interest in uplifting headlines way, way up. — Though it can be hard to see past the daily deluge of devastating headlines …

Discussion: @drewharwell, @washpostpr, @sophiasgaler, @dubois, @marklittlenews, @michatagana, 9to5Google, @alliklein, @rasmus_kleis and @taylorlorenz

Megan Graham / CNBC:

Roku withdraws 2020 financial outlook, expects higher Q1 revenue after Q1 streaming hours grew 49% YoY and net users rose to an estimated 39.8M, up 3M from Dec. — - Roku said Monday that it was withdrawing its full-year 2020 financial outlook due to economic uncertainties around the Covid-19 pandemic.

Discussion: The Streamable, Forbes, Multichannel News, The Week and Deadline, more at Techmeme »

Kali Hays / WWD:

Memo: LA Times is furloughing some non-union, business-side employees up to 16 weeks, and some editorial staff and managers will get pay cuts from 5% to 15% — A company executive told staff that the coronavirus has caused an “unprecedented” decline in revenue for the paper.

Todd Spangler / Variety:

Verizon Media is giving away $10M in digital ad inventory to groups responding to the COVID-19, with a focus on mental health, as well as to the CDC and WHO — Telco's digital media division also launches Yahoo Life wellbeing-focused vertical — Verizon Media is giving away $10 million …

Discussion: MediaPost, Multichannel News and @diegoscotti

Rebecca Rubin / Variety:

Universal says Trolls World Tour had the biggest opening day and weekend for a digital title, generating around ten times what the next largest VOD release had — Universal announced Monday that “Trolls World Tour,” a sequel to 2016's animated musical, landed the biggest debut for a digital release.

Discussion: Fast Company, The Ringer, @ashleyesqueda, @mediamuseum, @fb_bmb, @laviejoem, @chrisvfeil, @matthewacherry, /Film, Vanity Fair, Deadline and The A.V. Club

Adam Liptak / New York Times:

SCOTUS plans to provide a live audio feed of the arguments it will hear by telephone in May to media and to the public, a first — For the first time, the nation's highest court will open a live audio feed as it hears arguments in 10 sets of cases. — WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court announced …

Discussion: Washington Post, @kodykinsley, @riogringa, @erikwemple, CNN, The Hill, Supreme Court …, The Wrap, The Verge and Politico

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More News:

Greg Dool / Folio:
Modern Luxury Media, publisher of 40+ regional magazines, is furloughing staff and suspending some executive pay through June, aiming to avoid permanent cuts

Annie Palmer / CNBC:
Amazon will cut commission rates for its affiliate program starting April 21; amount of drop dependent on category, rates for grocery products dropping 5% to 1%

Discussion: @joshsternberg, @kifleswing, @robaeprice and The Verge, more at Techmeme »

Abner Li / 9to5Google:
YouTube Music replaces “Hotlist” with new “Explore” tab, which has a “New albums and singles” section and “Moods & genres” section for finding playlists

more at Techmeme »

The Guardian:
The UK-based Daily Telegraph stops publishing its long-running China Watch section, which was funded by China Daily and written by Chinese state journalists

Discussion: @rasmus_kleis, @methorley, @methorley, @methorley, @methorley, @methorley, @frasermatthew and @methorley

Sara Fischer / Axios:
Bloomberg launches Screentime, an entertainment vertical, around four pillars: TV and movies, music and podcasting, esports and video games, and influencers

Discussion: Bloomberg, MediaPost and Talking Biz News

Jonathan Stempel / Reuters:
Lawrence Lessig withdraws suit accusing NYT of “clickbait defamation” after the paper made changes, including making its online headline match the print edition

Discussion: Lessig and Techdirt

Jon Allsop / Columbia Journalism Review:
Following Trump's talk to “reopen America”, media's framing around saving either lives or jobs is dangerous, as public health is necessary in a healthy economy

Discussion: Reason, New York Post, Poynter and The Hill

Earlier Picks:

Dave Itzkoff / New York Times:
The comic book industry has been hit hard by COVID-19 as stores close and the distribution of new titles grinds to a halt, creating uncertainty about the future

Discussion: @peterbakernyt, @ademillo, @thecruzader, Melville House Books and IndieWire

William J. Broad / New York Times:
Investigation finds a decade-long health disinformation campaign by Russia, using social media and news outlets like RT, to sow confusion and hurt institutions

Discussion: @yaffaesque, @moscow_project, Never Just Science, @nytscience, @kenroth, @acgrayling, Metaviews, @samanthajpower, @politidope, @rasmus_kleis, @ballouxfrancois, @nytimes, Mother Jones, Boing Boing and Breitbart

Alex Weprin / Hollywood Reporter:
Filing: Disney signs a one-year $5B revolving credit agreement with Citibank; the company now has access to $13B+ following similar credit agreements last month

Discussion: Axios, The Kingdom Insider, Seeking Alpha, Deadline, Variety and New York Times

Cristiano Lima / Politico:
Reddit's new transparency hub discloses the identities of its political advertisers since Jan. 2019, how they target users, and amount spent on each campaign

Discussion: The Hill, Adweek, Protocol, @viacristiano, The Daily Dot, TechCrunch, Mashable, Reddit Help, The Verge and reddit, more at Techmeme »

Ben Smith / New York Times:
Interview with NYT's Dean Baquet on why the paper waited weeks to cover a sexual assault allegation against Biden and edited the article to appease his campaign

Alex Sherman / CNBC:
Sources: Vox Media to announce furloughs of ~100 employees this week, with possible pay cuts for highest earners and other cuts including freelancers, vendors

Discussion: Business Insider, American Press Institute, The Hill, The Wrap, @raju, New York Post, Talking Biz News, @freeblackgirl, @sherman4949, @sdkstl and New York Magazine

John Ourand / Sports Business Daily:
ESPN confirms it is asking about 100 commentators to take a temporary pay cut; sources: ESPN is asking talent to take a 15% pay cut over the next three months

Discussion: New York Post, Poynter, Ad Age, @andrewmarchand, @andrewmarchand, @ourand_sbj, Variety, CNN, The Hill, Broadcasting & Cable, TVNewser, Awful Announcing, The Wrap, Hollywood Reporter and Chicago Sun-Times

From Techmeme:

Stephanie Palazzolo / The Information:
An undisclosed 2023 agreement between Microsoft and OpenAI defines achieving AGI as the point when OpenAI develops AI systems that generate $100B+ in profits

Noah Smith / Noahpinion:
How H-1B workers from India and other countries help the US remain dominant in tech, as some on the new “Tech Right” discover MAGA's racial-nationalist bigotry

Shubham Sharma / VentureBeat:
DeepSeek releases DeepSeek-V3, an open-source MoE model of 671B total parameters, with 37B activated per token, claiming it outperforms top models like GPT-4o

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