Top News:
Todd Spangler / Variety:
Spotify Q2: revenue of €2.3B, up 23% YoY, ad revenue up 110% YoY to €275M; paying subscribers reached 165M, up 20% YoY, total MAUs reached 365M; stock down 6%+ — Spotify, citing ongoing headwinds from the COVID pandemic, fell short of its total monthly user growth goal in the second quarter of 2021.
Lucas Shaw / Bloomberg:
NBA partners with iHeartMedia to develop a slate of daily and weekly podcasts using NBA's audio archives — - Basketball league will mine its archive for rare audio clips — Radio giant will handle sales, distribution and production — The National Basketball Association is developing …
Discussion:
Variety, Awful Announcing, insideradio.com, @lucas_shaw and AllAccess.com
Erik Pedersen / Deadline:
PBS leads the nominations for the News & Documentary Emmy Awards, with 52 nominations; CNN is second with 41, CBS with 30, ABC with 22, and Vice with 20 — PBS leads the nominations for the 42nd annual News & Documentary Emmy Awards, as it usually does, this year scoring 52 noms over last year's 48.
Discussion:
@brandyzadrozny, The Emmys, TVNewser, @jonathanvswan, @ftpressoffice, @normanswan, @blowbacktv, @oneunderscore__, @oliviasolon, The New York Times Company, @banikarim, @taylorlorenz, @margarettalev, @fxmatt4, @andreabnyc, @smfrogers, @mattodocs, @nanagongadze, @liveanthony, @bryfitz, @fergusonnews, @joanwalsh, @corinnechin, @bellingcat, @cbsnewspress, @margbrennan, @hannahkuchler, @ajcontrast, @michaelrstrain, @scottgottliebmd, @joannastern, LaughingPlace.com, Variety and Talking Biz News
Todd Spangler / Variety:
YouTube reports $7B in Q2 ad revenue, up 84% YoY from $3.81B, and says its Shorts feature now has 15B global daily views, up from 6.5B in March — YouTube accelerated back into high growth for the second quarter of 2021, as ad revenue hit a record $7.0 billion for the period.
Discussion:
CNBC, Insider, The Wrap, Tubefilter, @jowens510, @ashkan, @jasoncosta, @adamsinger, @kyleorl, MediaPost, insideradio.com, Hollywood Reporter, The Wrap and The Wrap, more at Techmeme »
K.J. Yossman / Variety:
Comcast-owned British broadcaster Sky announces a major rebrand of its channel portfolio, including the retirement of flagship channel Sky One after 30+ years — Comcast-owned British broadcaster Sky has announced a major rebrand of its channel portfolio, including the retirement of its flagship channel Sky One.
Discussion:
NME, @sothcott, @vk_hm, @thebarrylad, @adammaguire, @scottygb, Hollywood Reporter, @grifftannen, @_jamieogrady, @mohammedali_93 and Deadline
Maria Sheahan / Reuters:
Swiss publisher Ringier buys out Axel Springer in Hungary, Serbia, Slovakia, Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania; Ringier and Axel Springer's Poland JV will remain — BERLIN (Reuters) - Swiss publisher Ringier is buying out its partner Axel Springer in Hungary, Serbia, Slovakia, Estonia …
Discussion:
Press Gazette and @jeffjarvis
Alex Wilhelm / TechCrunch:
Contentful, which offers APIs to let companies manage content, raises $175M Series F led by Tiger Global at a ~$3B valuation, after a $80M Series E in June 2020 — Contentful this morning announced a $175 million Series F round of capital, led by Tiger Global, valuing the unicorn at around $3 billion.
Discussion:
@chiefmartec, more at Techmeme »
Katie Robertson / New York Times:
Internal email: WaPo will require all employees to show they are vaccinated against COVID-19, starting when workers return to the office, planned for Sept. 13 — The Washington Post will require all employees to show that they are vaccinated against the coronavirus, the newspaper's publisher said on Tuesday.
Discussion:
@travislylesnews, American Press Institute, The Wrap, Breitbart, @alexanderrusso, @ericfidler, @n_yang, @katie_robertson, @stevegreenlee, @palafo, CNN, @dangillmor and The Hill
Luppe B. Luppen / Pawprints:
Memo: Politico is naming its White House Correspondent Anita Kumar to the newly-created position of Senior Editor, Standards and Ethics, starting this fall — A quick bit of media news this morning: Politico is naming its White House Correspondent Anita Kumar to the newly-created position of …
Discussion:
@nycsouthpaw and @nycsouthpaw
Georg Szalai / Hollywood Reporter:
UK's ITV says its ad revenue grew 29% YoY in H1 2021, up 87% in May and 115% in June; ITV now has 3M global subs and BritBox International has 2M subs — CEO Carolyn McCall said the U.K. TV giant is “emerging from the worst effects of the pandemic.” — U.K. TV giant ITV reported …
Max Willens / Digiday:
Sources: LinkedIn is testing LinkedIn Premium News, which gives Premium members access to paywalled content published by sites that use Piano's paywall tech — LinkedIn would like to broaden the base of people shelling out money for its premium membership, and it's hoping that access …
Kate Kaye / Digiday:
In letters to companies, CA AG says data sharing via analytics trackers, like cookies, for ad and analytics purposes fits CCPA's definition of a data “sale” — “Why would I care about cookies?” — The question was one privacy lawyer Odia Kagan heard from a client …
Discussion:
@moonalice, @jason_kint and @jason_kint