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Wall Street Journal:
Russia frees Evan Gershkovich, RFE/RL reporter Alsu Kurmasheva, and others as part of a prisoner swap involving 24 prisoners and at least six countries — Release of 32-year-old American from Russia secured as part of largest East-West prisoner swap since Cold War
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Wall Street Journal:
A detailed timeline of Evan Gershkovich's arrest and release and the months of negotiations involving spy agencies, billionaires, politicians, and his mother — The secret negotiations to free The Wall Street Journal's Evan Gershkovich unfolded on three continents, involving spy agencies …
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Washington Post, @davidgura@threads.net, Mediaite, The Hill, New York Post, Fox News, Reuters, Talking Biz News, Ben Eisen on LinkedIn, @Nonilex@masto.ai, The Sun, New York Times, Radio Free Europe/Radio …, Semafor, NPR, Slate, ABC7, @efindell, Associated Press, Florida Phoenix, Jamie Heller on LinkedIn and @mikeisaac
Wall Street Journal:
WSJ Editor Emma Tucker thanks the Biden administration, other governments, especially Germany's, and Evan Gershkovich in the effort to release him and others — Today is a joyous day for the safe return of our colleague Evan Gershkovich, who left a Russian aircraft moments ago in Turkey's capital …
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Kate Conger / New York Times:
Don Lemon sues Elon Musk and X, arguing Musk refused to pay him after a $1.5M/year exclusive X content deal fell apart; Lemon did not sign a formal contract — The former CNN reporter said in a lawsuit that X had refused to pay him after a testy interview with its billionaire owner.
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MediaPost, The Verge, Business Insider, The Hill, Vibe, Barrett Media, TVLine, The Wrap, Financial Times, Variety, Reuters, CBS News, Los Angeles Times, Engadget, Bloomberg, The Daily Beast, Rolling Stone, TMZ.com, Mediaite, Quartz, TVNewsCheck, CNN, Page Six, The Guardian, The Hollywood Reporter, @kurtwag8@threads.net, Newser and Deadline, more at Techmeme »
Bill Donahue / Billboard:
Court filings: AI startups Suno and Udio respond to copyright lawsuits from major music labels, saying their use of proprietary music to train AI is fair use — In their first responses to the sweeping copyright lawsuits that could define AI music, lawyers for Suno and Udio don't exactly hold back.
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Suno, Axios, TorrentFreak, Reuters, CMU and Rolling Stone
Alex Weprin / The Hollywood Reporter:
Apple reports Q3 revenue from Services, which includes Apple TV+ and Apple Music, rose 14% YoY to $24.21B, vs. $23.96B estimated, an all-time record — The company is seeing double digit year growth in its services division, which includes Apple TV+.
Lucas Manfredi / The Wrap:
Roku reports Q2 revenue up 14% YoY to $968.2M vs. $935.3M estimated, a net loss of $33.95M vs. $107.6M in Q2 2023, and 83.6M streaming households, up 2M from Q1 — Shares rose over 6% in after-hours trading as the company posted a smaller than expected loss of 24 cents per share and better than expected revenue of $968 million
Akash Sriram / Reuters:
Snap reports Q2 revenue up 16% YoY to $1.24B vs. $1.25B est., DAUs up 9% YoY to 432M, and forecasts Q3 revenue below expectations; SNAP drops 15%+ after hours — Snap (SNAP.N) forecast current-quarter sales and adjusted core earnings below market expectations on Thursday as the Snapchat owner grapples …
Discussion:
Ad Age, Snap Inc. and Deadline, more at Techmeme »
Annie Palmer / CNBC:
Amazon misses Q2 estimates, reporting $147.98B in revenue vs $148.56B expected, $12.8B in ad revenue vs $13B estimated, and gives weaker-than-expected guidance — Amazon missed on revenue in its second-quarter earnings report on Thursday and issued a weaker-than-expected forecast for the current period.
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Wall Street Journal, The Wrap, Variety and Quartz, more at Techmeme »
Noah Shachtman / Vanity Fair:
Entertainment news outlets like Pop Base, the Shade Room, and more have been posting nonstop about Kamala Harris, and her campaign aims to leverage the coverage — Celeb-news-only accounts like Pop Crave are suddenly coconut-pilled, posting religiously about the Harris campaign to their millions of followers.
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@noahshachtman, @dougheye and Cartoons Hate Her
Brian Steinberg / Variety:
WBD, Disney, and Fox plan to launch their joint sports streaming venture Venu for $42.99 per month initially, with a seven-day free trial, expected in fall 2024 — Streaming sports on a stand-alone basis won't be cheap. … The service is expected to debut in the fall in conjunction with the start of the next NFL season.
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The Desk, CNBC, StreamTV Insider, The Verge, Engadget, CNBC, The Hollywood Reporter, The Streamable, Front Office Sports, Quartz, Barrett Media, Deadline, Consequence, Radio & Television …, The Wrap, 9to5Mac, IndieWire, Associated Press, Next TV, Business Insider, ESPN Press Room U.S., Los Angeles Times, Newser, TVLine, CBS News and Media Play News, more at Techmeme »
Jesse Whittock / Deadline:
Ligue de Football Professionnel confirms a five-year deal with DAZN to broadcast the majority of France's Ligue 1 soccer; BeIN has rights to one match per week — Sports streamer DAZN is the new home of top-division soccer in France after tying up a five-year deal worth a reporting €500M ($540M).
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