Top News:
Kim Masters / The Hollywood Reporter:
A look at the men allied with Nelson Peltz and their histories with Disney: Ike Perlmutter, the ousted Marvel chairman, and former Disney CFO Jay Rasulo — As ousted Marvel mogul Ike Perlmutter and activist investor Nelson Peltz enlist former Disney exec Jay Rasulo in their quest to reshape the studio …
Discussion:
@kimmasters, @thr and @erik_hayden
RELATED:
Variety:
Blackwells nominates three candidates to Disney's board to rival Nelson Peltz's proxy fight, and says Disney's ValueAct deal is “a disappointing defensive move”
Blackwells nominates three candidates to Disney's board to rival Nelson Peltz's proxy fight, and says Disney's ValueAct deal is “a disappointing defensive move”
Discussion:
GlobeNewswire News Room, @xpangler, Radio & Television … and Reuters
Michael Flaherty / Axios:
Hedge funds vie for power at Disney: ValueAct supports Disney's board slate, Trian and Ancora support Nelson Peltz, and Blackwells pushes other board candidates
Hedge funds vie for power at Disney: ValueAct supports Disney's board slate, Trian and Ancora support Nelson Peltz, and Blackwells pushes other board candidates
Discussion:
Los Angeles Times, The A.V. Club, UPI, Reuters, IndieWire, New York Post, Wall Street Journal, The Information, The Wrap and Bloomberg
Oliver Darcy:
Internal note: Alex MacCallum, who became The Washington Post's chief revenue officer in July 2023, is leaving; sources: she's in talks to join CNN — News: Alex MacCallum, the digital product whiz who I've confirmed is in discussions with CNN about joining the org under network chief Mark Thompson …
Discussion:
Puck, @dylanbyers, Oliver arcy and @benmullin
RELATED:
Brian Steinberg / Variety:
Athan Stephanopoulos plans to leave as CNN's chief digital officer at the end of January, the second turnover of digital executives at CNN since WBD took over
Athan Stephanopoulos plans to leave as CNN's chief digital officer at the end of January, the second turnover of digital executives at CNN since WBD took over
Discussion:
@dylanbyers, @pressgazette, @bristei, Adweek, @dylanbyers, Financial Times, Deadline, The Wrap, trading as wdr and The Hollywood Reporter
Aditya Kalra / Reuters:
Sources: Disney and Reliance executives signed a non-binding term sheet in December and both have hired law firms to do antitrust due diligence for their merger — Indian billionaire Mukesh Ambani's Reliance Industries (RELI.NS) and Walt Disney (DIS.N) have appointed law firms …
Discussion:
Variety
Spencer Soper / Bloomberg:
BOA analysis: Amazon's video ad push will boost annual revenue by up to $5B, comprising $3B in video ad sales and $1.8B in Prime users paying to avoid ads — - Subscribers can pay extra $3 per month for ad-free streaming — Amazon.com Inc.'s push into video advertising will boost annual revenue …
Discussion:
Beyond Search
Georg Szalai / The Hollywood Reporter:
MPA: the Asia Pacific video industry grew 5.5% in 2023 to hit $145B in revenue, with a 13% jump in online video sales to $57B; TV revenue grew under 1% to $98B — The video industry in the region grew by 5.5 percent in 2023 to hit $145 billion in revenue, says research firm MPA.
Discussion:
Livemint, @livemint and WORLD SCREEN
Advanced Television:
Nielsen: Prime Video's Thursday Night Football averaged 11.86M viewers per game in the US during the 2023 season, up 24% from 2022 season's 9.58M viewers — Prime Video's second season of exclusive Thursday Night Football (TNF) in the US saw substantial viewership gains and set multiple …
Discussion:
Amazon Studios, The Streamable, Awful Announcing, MediaPost, Media Play News and Barrett Media
Max Tani / Semafor:
Sources: The Messenger's board weighed shutting the site down at a December 29 meeting, and Jimmy Finkelstein has expressed a willingness to sell the site — The Scoop — The board of the startup news organization The Messenger weighed shutting the publication down at a meeting on Friday …
Kari Paul / The Guardian:
Q&A with Jacob Bakkila, who ran the popular @Horse_ebooks Twitter account for two years, on the inspiration for the language bot, AI chatbots, and more — By reusing and repurposing existing writing into viral fragments on Twitter, the account functioned like today's chatbots.
Michael Schneider / Variety:
After a WGA protest, the Television Academy and Fox reverse an earlier plan and return the Emmy for variety series outstanding writing to the Emmys telecast — In a joint release sent out today, the Television Academy, Fox and the WGA said they were “happy to announce they have reached …
Discussion:
The Wrap, The Hollywood Reporter, IndieWire and @wgawest
Winston Cho / The Hollywood Reporter:
In a lawsuit, a Disney employee claims she was sexually assaulted by former VP of distribution Nolan Gonzales and that management didn't escalate concerns to HR — The plaintiff, suing as a Jane Doe, claims she was assaulted by former vice president of distribution Nolan Gonzales …
Discussion:
Bloomberg Law and Deadline
Jay Peters / The Verge:
Twitch changes its sexual content policies again and says the platform won't allow streamers to “imply or suggest that they are fully or partially nude” — Twitch is changing its sexual content policies again, this time to prohibit implied nudity on the platform.
Discussion:
Gizmodo, TechCrunch, safety.twitch.tv, Forbes, @carnage4life@mas.to, ClutchPoints and @MikeElgan@mastodon.social, more at Techmeme »
Marc Schneider / Billboard:
UMG and Tencent Music Entertainment renew their licensing agreement, allowing Tencent to distribute UMG content on QQ Music, Kogou Music, Kuwo Music, and WeSing — “UMG will continue to work with TME to bring the very best in music to these passionate music consumers.”
Discussion:
Variety, Tencent Music Entertainment … and Music Business Worldwide