Mediagazer: The New York Times, The Boston Globe, and CNN are seeing engagement grow on Threads, while the BBC, the Guardian US, and others stopped posting on the platform (Sara Guaglione/Digiday)

9:55 AM ET, December 5, 2023

Top News:

Jake Kanter / Deadline:

Amazon fails to renew its live English Premier League rights deal, as part of Sky and TNT's new £6.7B TV rights deal for four soccer seasons from 2025/2026 — - BBC Names Royals Accused In Omid Scobie Book Of Commenting On Skin Color Of Harry & Meghan's Son

Discussion: @aquinas82nd, @frankdalleres, @jackgen0vese, @novy_williams, @rltsports, Daily Mail, London Evening Standard, @dantracey1983, The Desk, @seaningle, @philblundell, @graemebailey, Awful Announcing, Financial Times, Broadband TV News and Bloomberg, more at Techmeme »

Paul MacInnes / The Guardian:
The English Premier League signs a new deal with Sky and TNT Sports under which the soccer competition will receive £6.7B over four years for its UK TV rights

Discussion: Bloomberg, Broadband TV News, @skysports, @robharris, @sam__carp, @willohara, The Information, @sistoney67, @tariqpanja, @simonlester24, @david_conn, BBC and Sky News

Ashley Carman / Bloomberg:

Spotify plans to cancel the Gimlet Media podcasts Heavyweight and Stolen after their current seasons, as the company retreats from in-house productions — - Shows will finish out work on current, in-production seasons — Programming decision coincides with company's latest job cuts

Discussion: @thejakewarren, @dada_drummer, @craftworksxyz, @mmegdriscoll, @amil, @ashleyrcarman, @cady_stanton, @ashleyrcarman, @ashleyrcarman, @kallipearl, The Verge, The Hollywood Reporter and TechCrunch

Manish Singh / TechCrunch:
Spotify lays off ~17% of its workforce, or ~1,500 staff, to “rightsize” its costs, citing slow economic growth and rising capital costs, its third cut in 2023

Perry Bacon Jr / Washington Post:

MSNBC should be careful not to become the TV arm of the Democratic Party leadership, as shown by some of its recent moves, like canceling Mehdi Hasan's show — The cancellation of Mehdi Hasan's show is the latest in a series of recent moves by MSNBC that are pushing the network in the direction …

Discussion: Poynter, @kenhuur, @drericding, @jayrosen_nyu and @froomkin

Catharine Tunney / CBC News:

CBC/Radio-Canada plans to cut ~10% of its workforce, or 600 workers, and cut CA$40M in programming over the coming year to cope with a CA$125M budget shortfall — Public broadcaster says most cuts will take effect over the coming year — The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation/Radio-Canada announced Monday …

Discussion: CBC News, @melissambarki, @mickeydjuric, @parismarx, @cbcdaveseglins, @maritstiles, @mickeydjuric, @mickeydjuric, @jonkay, @keithdunnenl, @carolemacneil, The Desk, Reuters and Rehak/Stuebing Mostly Media

Press Gazette:

Editors at the UK's biggest commercial regional news publishers call for the BBC to stop “suffocating” their businesses and ditch its rollout of 34 local sites — In a rare joint public statement, senior editors at the UK's five biggest commercial regional news publishers …

Discussion: HoldtheFrontPage

Sara Guaglione / Digiday:

The New York Times, The Boston Globe, and CNN are seeing engagement grow on Threads, while the BBC, the Guardian US, and others stopped posting on the platform — This editorial series examines industry trends across the media, media buying and marketing sectors as 2023 closes and the new year begins.

Discussion: @mkarolian@threads.net, more at Techmeme »

Committee to Protect Journalists:

In 10 days in November, eight Mexican journalists were abducted or shot at in four separate incidents; three regularly report on crime, security, and politics — Mexico City, December 4, 2023 - The Committee to Protect Journalists is alarmed by a spate of violent abductions and attacks …

Discussion: @pressfreedom

Jody Rosen / New York Times:

Behind the scenes of a Sunday Night Football broadcast, which is one of the most inventive and artful uses of the TV medium — Months of preparation, hundreds of staff, convoys of cutting-edge gear: inside the machine that crafts prime time's most popular entertainment.

Discussion: @fordm, @jodyrosen, @canonusa, @brianstelter, New York Post, Awful Announcing and Syracuse Post-Standard

Bron Maher / Press Gazette:

The Sun publisher News Group Newspapers pays out “substantial damages” to a group of celebrities and apologizes over unlawful information-gathering practices — News Group Newspapers apologised to the claimants, who include Mel C and Catherine Tate.

Timmy Shen / The Block:

Sources: as part of its January 2023 merger with CryptoSlam, Forkast Labs laid off the majority of its editorial staff and suspended operations in November — - The crypto news site wound down editorial operations on Nov. 30, sources close to the matter said.

Discussion: Web3 is Going Just Great

Will Sommer / Washington Post:

Ex-Fox News employee Andrew Delancey sues the network and top producer Justin Wells over an alleged sexual assault; Wells now works on Tucker Carlson's X show — A former Fox News staffer is suing the producer — who was fired last spring along with the host — over the alleged assault …

Discussion: The Messenger, Rolling Stone, Variety, Business Insider, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, Mediaite, The Daily Beast and Boing Boing

Max Tani / Semafor:

An interview with Megyn Kelly about co-hosting the Dec. 6 GOP presidential primary debate on NewsNation, her pivot to audio, being “un-cancellable”, and more — The News — After Megyn Kelly left her high-profile Fox News perch for a $69 million, three-year NBC contract …

Discussion: Associated Press, Los Angeles Times, @stevekrak, @jeremymbarr, Adweek, Mediaite, The Hill, New York Post, al.com and Poynter

Mark Kleinman / Sky News:

Source: Ofcom CEO Melanie Dawes will remain recused from the watchdog's probe into the sale of The Daily Telegraph as the Lloyds Banking employs her husband — Dame Melanie Dawes will play no role in Ofcom's inquiry even after Lloyds, which employs her husband, is repaid a £1.16bn loan later on Monday, Sky News learns.

Discussion: Bloomberg

Rob Davies / The Guardian:
The Barclay family regains control of Telegraph, after an Abu Dhabi-backed consortium helped pay off its £1.2B debt; the deal still requires government approval

Discussion: Press Gazette, Telegraph, Reuters, Financial Times and Media Makers Meet

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More News:

Carl Franzen / VentureBeat:
NYC-based generative AI video startup Runway partners with Getty Images on an AI video model, shipping in the coming months for use in Hollywood and advertising

Discussion: WinBuzzer, PetaPixel, The Decoder and Runway, more at Techmeme »

Todd Spangler / Variety:
Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos says the company didn't see much of an “interruption” from Hollywood's strikes and is still targeting a $17B content budget for 2024

Discussion: @tvgrimreaper, MacRumors, The Wrap and The Hollywood Reporter, more at Techmeme »

Etan Vlessing / The Hollywood Reporter:
Nexstar CEO Perry Sook says The CW may break even by the end of 2025 after Nexstar achieved about $100M in annual savings

Discussion: @benmillermke and @tvgrimreaper

Alex Weprin / The Hollywood Reporter:
Comcast president Mike Cavanagh says Peacock now has 30M paying subscribers, with an ARPU of $10 per month, and saw $2.8B in losses in 2023

Discussion: Broadband TV News, @aaronklein, @lmoses, @sherman4949, BGR, MediaPost, The Desk, Simon Rice on LinkedIn, Next TV, Deadline, Media Play News, The Wrap, Streaming Better, Variety, Tv Technology and Cord Cutters News

Alex Weprin / The Hollywood Reporter:
Streaming services seem to be increasingly open to bundling with rivals, as Verizon announces a $10 per month deal for Netflix and Max's ad tiers

Discussion: Broadband TV News, The Verge, MacRumors, Ars Technica, The Wrap, 9to5Google, BGR, Ann Dragovits on LinkedIn, The Streamable, Tv Technology, 9to5Mac, Streaming Better, Media Play News, Deadline, Reuters, The TV Answer Man! and Cord Cutters News

Etan Vlessing / The Hollywood Reporter:
GroupM forecasts global ad spending to grow 5.8% YoY to $889B in 2023, excluding US political ads, and US political ad spending in 2024 to reach a record $15.9B

Discussion: Inside Radio, Next TV, Tv Technology, MediaPost, VideoWeek, Wall Street Journal, Deadline and AdExchanger

Earlier Picks:

Peter Walker / The Guardian:
UK Culture Secretary Lucy Frazer confirms that the BBC will receive a below-inflation license fee increase; the £159 annual fee has been frozen for two years

Discussion: CMU, BBC, Mediaite, Broadband TV News and The Guardian

Charlotte Tobitt / Press Gazette:
James Dyson loses his £1M libel case against Mirror Group after a High Court judge rules Dyson was not caused “serious harm” by a January 2022 Mirror article

Discussion: @jolyonmaugham, @kevin_maguire, @healthreglawyer, @shipbrief, @pressgazette, @pollyrippon, BBC and The Guardian

Reuters:
A group of 83 Spanish media outlets files a lawsuit against Meta, citing unfair competition in the ad market due to its “massive” and “systematic” use of data

Discussion: VideoWeek, New York Post and TechCrunch

Sam Buckingham-Jones / Australian Financial Review:
The Guardian's senior editors issue a rare joint message to staff, warning them on signing letters and posting messages that “risk compromising” its integrity

Discussion: Crikey, @s_mitchell, @jonkudelka, @markdistef, @_claireconnelly and @samebjones

Kellen Browning / New York Times:
Kick, a Twitch rival that has generous creator deals, online gambling, and lax moderation, tries to move beyond edgy content amid public and regulatory pressure

Discussion: The Information, @psuitenetwork and @dannygroner

From Techmeme:

Lee-Anne Mulholland / The Keyword:
Google files its proposed remedies in the DOJ's search antitrust lawsuit, including letting browser companies have multiple default agreements across platforms

Reuters:
Albania bans TikTok for a year from January 2025, part of a broader plan to make schools safer following the killing of a 14-year-old near a school in November

Timothy B. Lee / Ars Technica:
Exploring the scaling challenges of transformer-based LLMs in efficiently processing large amounts of text, as well as potential solutions, such as RAG systems

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