Top News:
Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:
Spotify beats with Q1 revenue of €1.8B and net income of €1M, with MAUs up 31% YoY to 286M, premium users up 31% to 130M, and ad-supported MAUs up 32% to 163M — The coronavirus may be decimating some corners of the economy, but the impact on the digital music …
Discussion:
Spotify, Los Angeles Times, Variety, Ad Age, @ncsh, Fast Company, Hollywood Reporter, @ingridlunden, @thr, The Wrap, Engadget and @philipmorton, more at Techmeme »
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Kerry Flynn / CNN:
Spotify says TV and game console usage is up by 50% due to the pandemic, with increased consumption of wellness podcasts and searches for terms like “chill”
Spotify says TV and game console usage is up by 50% due to the pandemic, with increased consumption of wellness podcasts and searches for terms like “chill”
Discussion:
TechCrunch and @brianstelter
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
Spotify-owned Anchor introduces a feature that will allow creators to turn their video chats and virtual hangouts into podcast-ready audio
Spotify-owned Anchor introduces a feature that will allow creators to turn their video chats and virtual hangouts into podcast-ready audio
Discussion:
Nieman Lab, MediaPost, Mobile Marketer, @rfaughnder, @ivan_brussels, @leimer, @rverrier, Anchor, Engadget, The Verge, Marketing Land and Hot Pod News, more at Techmeme »
Dave McNary / Variety:
Cineworld joins AMC Theatres in refusing to show Universal Pictures films after NBCUniversal CEO's promise to open titles simultaneously on PVOD and in theaters — Cineworld, owner of the Regal Entertainment exhibition chain, is joining AMC Theatres in refusing to play any Universal Pictures films …
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Thom Geier / The Wrap:
Universal says Trolls World Tour on-demand release has netted ~5M downloads; source: it's made $77M in revenue from the 80% it retains from digital rental fees
Universal says Trolls World Tour on-demand release has netted ~5M downloads; source: it's made $77M in revenue from the 80% it retains from digital rental fees
Discussion:
Wall Street Journal, Variety, Business Insider, The Verge, The Streamable, /Film, MediaPost, @zeitchikwapo, @zeitchikwapo, @zeitchikwapo, @zeitchikwapo, @mortuaryreport, @bookishplinko, @scrawfish, @scott_tobias, @witneyseibold, @wsj, @frankpallotta, @edmundlee, @awallenstein, @mjsamps, @davidlsims, @cinematicbanter and @dkthomp
Tim Baysinger / The Wrap:
Amazon renews its NFL deal for 3 more seasons, with Amazon and Twitch getting exclusive global rights to one late-season Saturday game each season — Amazon will stream “Thursday Night Football” for three more seasons and get an additional game all to itself in a new deal with the NFL.
Discussion:
Variety, Axios, CNBC, The Streamable, Hollywood Reporter, @pkafka, @carlquintanilla, @sherman4949, @pkafka, @darrenrovell, @sherman4949, @pkafka, @claireatki and @latimesent
Brian Steinberg / Variety:
Nielsen: CNN saw an increase of 179% in viewers between the ages of 25 and 54 in April, while Fox News grew 83% and MSNBC grew 54% — Viewership for all three of the nation's main cable-news outlets soared in April as viewers tuned in at all hours for information on the spread of the coronavirus pandemic.
Discussion:
New York Times, The Media Nut, The Wrap, Poynter, @poynter, TVNewser, Mediaite and Raw Story
Jim Waterson / The Guardian:
BBC announces pay and hiring cuts as it predicts £125M lower income this year as revenue from its commercial arm dips and people stop paying the license fee — Boss Tony Hall says licence fee and commercial revenues have been hit by Covid-19 pandemic
Sam Stanton / Sacramento Bee:
Probation officials allege Matthew Keys violated the conditions of his supervised release from prison by deleting Comstock magazine's YouTube videos and account — Sacramento journalist Matthew Keys first came to notoriety because of his mastery of computers.
Discussion:
@nickmiller510 and @jowens510
Matthew Moore / The Times:
Facebook poaches Tony Close, director of content standards at Ofcom, as director of content regulation; Ofcom is preparing to regulate social media companies — A senior official at the watchdog preparing to regulate social media companies has been poached by Facebook to help it respond to the curbs.
Charlotte Tobitt / Press Gazette:
The Guardian says it had 821,000 readers making monthly contributions at the end of March, up 23% YoY; digital app subscriptions grew by 39% YoY to 265,000 — The Guardian's reader revenues have grown at record rates since the coronavirus crisis began and one of the UK's biggest regional dailies follows …
Discussion:
HoldtheFrontPage, The Guardian and Reuters Institute …
Elizabeth Williamson / New York Times:
Profile of Kayleigh McEnany, whose role as Trump's White House press secretary has become indistinguishable from her role as Trump campaign's spokeswoman — Kayleigh McEnany saw Donald J. Trump as her ticket to stardom. She has been fighting for him for much of her adult life, now as the president's fourth press secretary.
Discussion:
@dangillmor, @nytpolitics, @ericboehlert, @billkristol, @mehdirhasan, PRESS RUN, @mattgertz, New Republic, @tomscocca, @tomscocca, @brianstelter, @tomscocca and CNN
Patrick Brzeski / Hollywood Reporter:
Head of China's Film Bureau says cinemas are expected to reopen in early June; Chinese officials estimate lost box office revenue at $4.2B in total so far — Movie theaters in China, the world's second-biggest film market, have been closed since late January, weeks before they shut down in North America.
Discussion:
Variety, /Film, @bicaraboxoffice, The Playlist, @lucas_shaw and IndieWire
Scott Feinberg / Hollywood Reporter:
Motion picture academy eases qualifications for 2021 Oscars; eligible films won't have to screen for at least a week in a Los Angeles-area theater — The Academy's board of governors convened via a secure Zoom session on Tuesday morning. — The 93rd Academy Awards ceremony is still slated …
Discussion:
Oscars.org, Variety, @theacademy, @nicsperling, The Wrap, @perezhilton, @mgsiegler, Numlock News, Cord Cutters News, @benfritz, @gracerandolph, @variety, @enricomagrelli, @billkuchman, @kylebuchanan, @iwriteallday_, @heatherfink, @thatrebecca, Rolling Stone, Gizmodo, The Week, Mashable and The Verge
Todd Spangler / Variety:
Alphabet reports YouTube Q1 ad revenue of $4.04B, up 33% YoY, but says ad sales fell significantly in March — YouTube generated $4.04 billion in ad revenue for the first quarter of 2020, up 33% from the year prior. Alphabet, the parent company of Google and YouTube …
Discussion:
MediaPost, Digiday, MarketWatch, @larakiara and @xpangler, more at Techmeme »
Jim VandeHei / Axios:
Axios, which had qualified for a $4.8M PPP loan, will return the money after nearing a deal for other capital and after the program prompted divisive debate — Axios, which qualified for a federal Paycheck Protection Program loan to avoid layoffs, will return the money, after nearing a deal for an alternative source of capital.
Discussion:
Columbia Journalism Review, The Wrap, @film_girl, @jbarro, @media_evan, @bmorrissey, @harrysiegel, @emilydreyfuss, @bendreyfuss, @bendreyfuss, @thegrnadvocate, @bendreyfuss, @derricktperkins, @bendreyfuss, @carlquintanilla, @danprimack, @danprimack, @ryanmaue, @danprimack, @lanceulanoff, @bendreyfuss, @dylanbyers, New York Post, The Hill and bookforum.com
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Lisa Napoli / Vanity Fair:
An excerpt from Lisa Napoli's new book “Up All Night” on how the 24-hour news cycle was ushered in by CNN's coverage of Reagan's assassination attempt in 1981 — Ted Turner's upstart cable network beat the Big Three in reporting on the 1981 assassination attempt, though it …
Discussion:
@mlcalderone