Top News:
New York Times:
Sources: Barack and Michelle Obama are nearing a content deal with Netflix for a series of shows; Apple and Amazon also expressed interest — WASHINGTON — Former President Barack Obama is in advanced negotiations with Netflix to produce a series of high-profile shows that will provide …
Discussion:
The New York Observer, /Film, CNBC, CNNMoney, Business Insider, Washington Post, The Ringer, Tubefilter, Glamour, Slate, Vanity Fair, Fortune, The Daily Beast, Gizmodo, C21Media, MacRumors, The Daily Caller, NPR, TechCrunch, thecut, Fast Company, IndieWire, @shearm, 9to5Mac, The FADER, Variety, The A.V. Club, @kateyrich, @peterhamby, Jezebel, Hollywood Reporter, The Verge, The Wrap, Engadget, Mashable, Deadline, TV Tattle, Consequence of Sound, Mediaite, @brianstelter, @daveleebbc, @sloiaconi and TMZ.com, more at Techmeme »
Maxwell Tani / The Daily Beast:
In a leaked tape, Newsweek CCO blamed BuzzFeed report on ad fraud for Newsweek operating at “50% of the revenue needed to cover costs”; gave outlet 5 weeks — Two weeks ago, Newsweek Media Group Chief Content Officer Dayan Candappa said the company had just five weeks to turn around …
Discussion:
@maxwelltani, Mediaite, @maxwelltani, @maxwelltani, @craigsilverman, @craigsilverman and Wall Street Journal
Scott Soshnick / Bloomberg:
Facebook and Major League Baseball reach a deal giving Facebook exclusive rights to stream 25 afternoon games; sources estimate price at $30M-$35M — Social network is said to pay $30 million to $35 million — First time a major U.S. league has given Facebook exclusivity
Discussion:
Recode, ESPN, CNBC, Awful Announcing, FierceCable, The Verge, Engadget and Seeking Alpha
Erik Wemple / Washington Post:
U.S. News & World Report is shutting down its opinion section as part of a shift in coverage from Washington, DC., to health, education, and the economy — U.S. News & World Report announced on Thursday that it would be shutting down its opinion section.
Discussion:
@rschles, @pat_garofalo, @laurenonthehill, @jilldlawrence and @tierney_megan
Charlie Warzel / BuzzFeed:
Sources: Jared Kushner talked to David Brock and Univision chair Haim Saban about buying New York Observer in January 2017; source says $20M price ended talks — Just days before heading to a West Wing job, Donald Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, was secretly engaged in talks to sell …
Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:
Facebook strikes a licensing deal with Warner Music, the last major label holdout, to use Warner's music in videos and messages on Facebook — Just weeks after signing a large licensing deal with leading indy label representative ICE, Facebook has continued its march into the world of music …
Discussion:
Hollywood Reporter, Financial Times, Variety, @pkafka, Engadget and Seeking Alpha, more at Techmeme »
Mike Fleming / Deadline:
Netflix buys rights to Extreme Universe comics from Rob Liefeld, creator of Deadpool, in a seven-figure deal — EXCLUSIVE: Netflix has bet big on the Extreme Universe of graphic novel characters hatched by Rob Liefeld, whose disruptive Deadpool creation was the blockbuster movie surprise of 2016.
Maria Temming / Science News:
Study of 4.5M+ tweets from 2006 to 2017 confirms inaccurate news spreads faster and further than true stories, and humans, not bots, are primarily to blame — An analysis of 4.5 million tweets shows falsehoods are 70 percent more likely to get shared — There's been a lot of talk …
Discussion:
@mantzarlis, Nieman Lab, Los Angeles Times, @tribelaw, Vanity Fair, Forbes, @edmundheaphy, @zeynep, The Daily Caller, Washington Post, Press Gazette, MIT Technology Review, Gizmodo, MediaNama, Business Insider, Slate, The Hill, The Guardian, Science, [H]ardOCP News/Article Feed, The Week, New York Magazine, Mother Jones, @caulfieldtim, Mashable, NBC News, The Atlantic, CommonHealth, @sciencenews, New York Times, @sulliview, The Register, Vox, Engadget, The Verge and TechCrunch, more at Techmeme »
Max Willens / Digiday:
Though Reddit makes up <1% of referral traffic, publishers use it to interact with their audiences; site plans to continue growing relationships with publishers — After nearly a decade of indifference, Reddit is cozying up to publishers. — Over the past year, a media partnerships team …
Discussion:
@genepark and @jonathan_h
Shan Wang / Nieman Lab:
The Better India, a news org focused on positive news gets 80% of its revenue from sponsored content, has 1.9M Facebook followers, 100K newsletter subscribers — “It was a huge revelation: If these kinds of stories, read by just a few thousand back then, could drive this kind of response …
Oliver Darcy / CNNMoney:
Fox News settles suit with Diana Falzone, who said she was demoted after writing about her medical disorder; lawyer says she has left the company — Diana Falzone, a reporter who covered entertainment and issues related to sexual harassment, has settled a lawsuit with Fox News and left the company …
Christine Schmidt / Nieman Lab:
How WGBH uses volunteers and gamification to transcribe and tag metadata on thousands of hours of public radio and television to secure a reliable archive — It might not be the sexiest journalism innovation, but WGBH is hoping to keep public radio and public television's massive archives alive …