Top News:
Gene Maddaus / Variety:
The WGA urges antitrust regulators to stop M&A in streaming, saying that Netflix, Amazon, and Disney amassed market power that depresses wages and limits choice — The Writers Guild of America issued a report on Thursday calling Netflix, Amazon and Disney the “new gatekeepers” …
Discussion:
@jbflint, @wgawest, @slack2thefuture, IGN, Los Angeles Times, IndieWire, The Wrap, Writers Guild of America West, The Hollywood Reporter and Deadline
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Jay Peters / The Verge:
Microsoft's Start, which uses AI to summarize news and other content, lists the Ottawa Food Bank as a tourist site and suggests visiting on “an empty stomach” — Microsoft published an AI-generated travel article about Ottawa, Canada that prominently recommended tourists visit …
Hanaa' Tameez / Nieman Lab:
Columbia's journalism school begins offering graduates in nonprofit news $5K to $10K forgivable loans each year, with a max total of $50K, to pay student loans — “It takes away a little bit of anxiety about pursuing a degree in journalism if you know that there is a path through which the cost can be covered.”
Discussion:
@guacamayan@journa.host
Taylor Hatmaker / TechCrunch:
Twitch plans to roll out a long-requested anti-harassment feature in the next few weeks, letting streamers block banned users from watching streams — Twitch's chat ban tools have been around for ages, but the platform is about to hand streamers a way to control who can watch a stream to begin with.
Discussion:
Kotaku, Tubefilter, IGN and The Guardian, more at Techmeme »
Kim Zetter / Zero Day:
How Timothy Burke accessed video from Fox News and why his lawyer says Florida prosecutors are using a “novel and unsupported” interpretation of the CFAA — But attorneys for Timothy Burke say a raid on his home and office exhibit government over-reach and misuse of the federal hacking law …
Discussion:
@snlyngaas, @bubbaprog, @kimzetter, @kimzetter, @kimzetter@infosec.exchange and @steve@s.yelvington.com
Oliver Darcy / CNN:
Sources: news publishers in the US say Meta made changes that cut their Facebook referral traffic; one publisher said traffic fell by 30%+ YoY, another by ~40% — Editor's Note: A version of this article first appeared in the “Reliable Sources” newsletter. Sign up for the daily digest chronicling the evolving media landscape here.
Discussion:
@mgeist, @jason_kint, @davidclinchnews, @blackamazon, Pugpig, @johnbattelle@threads.net and @johnbuckley.bsky.social
Reuters:
How major advertisers have adopted AI: WPP is using AI in Nestle and Mondelez campaigns, citing 10x-20x savings; Unilever developed its own generative AI — Some of the world's biggest advertisers, from food giant Nestle (NESN.S) to consumer goods multinational Unilever (ULVR.L) …
Manish Singh / TechCrunch:
Netflix partners with Jio Platforms, India's largest telecom operator, to bundle its Netflix Basic streaming tier with two of the carrier's pay-as-you-go plans — Netflix has inked a “first-of-its-kind” deal with Jio Platforms, India's largest telecom operator, to bundle the streaming service …
Lucas Manfredi / The Wrap:
Trustees of NYC's pension funds send letters to the CEOs of Disney, Comcast, and Paramount Global, calling on them to negotiate and end the Hollywood strikes — Brad Lander and five pension fund trustees call on Paramount, Comcast and Disney executives to “end the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes promptly”
Discussion:
Deadline
ACA Blog:
Nine, which owns The Sydney Morning Herald and others, plans to stop publishing comic strips, after News Corp and Australia Community Media did the same in 2022 — The Australian Cartoonists Association notes with disappointment that the Nine newspapers (including The Age, the Sunday Age …
Brian X. Chen / New York Times:
Surveys: ~50% of Americans watch TV with subtitles on most of the time, as sound quality suffers from compressed audio and tiny, relatively weak TV speakers — Many of us stream shows and movies with the subtitles on all the time — and not because it's cool.
Discussion:
TVLine, @jalefkowit@octodon.social, @michellemanafy@journa.host and @voron@mstdn.party
Ashley Carman / Bloomberg:
Internal doc: Spotify weighed removing white noise podcasts and redirecting users to “talk” content, which would boost the company's annual gross profit by €35M — An internal document shows that white noise podcasts account for 3 million daily consumption hours on the platform
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