Top News:
Juliet Chung / Wall Street Journal:
Moonbug, a London-based startup that recently acquired YouTube channel Little Baby Bum, raises $145M to buy and develop more programming for kids — Entertainment company wants to acquire popular shows, invest in production — Children's entertainment company Moonbug Entertainment …
Discussion:
TechCrunch, Deadline and @felixcapital
Vox Media:
Vox Media launches Vox Video Lab on YouTube, a two-tiered video subscription program starting at $4.99 with access to extended interviews, Q&As, and more — New Membership Program Launched with Support from Google News Initiative — Today we're happy to introduce the latest project …
Discussion:
Business Insider
Sahil Patel / Digiday:
Forbes Media CEO says overall revenue and profit are up 18% and 42% YoY, respectively, and that it plans to invest in or acquire one of two companies per year — Forbes said it just had its most profitable year since it became Forbes Media in 2006. And now, the company …
Thanks:@steverubel
Nick Statt / The Verge:
Fortnite creator faces lawsuits alleging copyright infringement for profiting off dance “emotes”, raising questions about monetizing public forms of expression — Epic Games' Fortnite is the biggest game on the planet right now, but one of its biggest sources of revenue …
Discussion:
Wall Street Journal, @bryfitz, @mattpavelle, @mathewi and The Ringer, more at Techmeme »
Tara John / CNN:
UK's Advertising Standards Authority announces companies will be banned from including gender stereotypes that could cause offense in ads beginning June 2019 — London (CNN)Depictions of girls as less academic than boys or men being belittled for “unmanly” behavior will be soon be a thing of the past in British commercials.
Discussion:
The Guardian, The Independent and The Week
Agence France-Press:
Der Spiegel plans a special 23-page section on how award-winning reporter Claas Relotius got away with inventing sources and stories — German magazine calls Claas Relotius scam ‘worst thing that can happen’ to editorial team — The German news weekly Der Spiegel is to publish …
Discussion:
Spiegel Online, @natashafatah, Washington Post, DW.COM, @shane_bauer, @petersmanns, The Wrap, The Guardian and TVNewser
RELATED:
Medium:
Two residents of Fergus Falls, MN, detail what Claas Relotius of Der Spiegel fabricated or got wrong when he visited to write about US rural support of Trump
Two residents of Fergus Falls, MN, detail what Claas Relotius of Der Spiegel fabricated or got wrong when he visited to write about US rural support of Trump
Discussion:
New York Times, Spiegel Online, @jeffjohnroberts, @tomdreisbach, Politico, @lachlan, @chashomans, @stillgray, @spiegel_english, @nkjemisin, @shane_bauer, @craigsilverman, @c_stroop, @bentaub91, Hmm Daily, New York Post, @mathewi, @juliareinstein, @bernstein, @juliareinstein, @yair_rosenberg, @macloo, The Rural Blog and NPR
The Guardian:
Russia's media regulator says it will review whether the BBC is in compliance with Russian law in a retaliatory move after Ofcom in the UK censured Russia's RT — Retaliatory move comes after UK watchdog found network RT broke impartiality rules — Russia's media regulator has said it will carry …
Discussion:
BBC, Telegraph, @ksenijapavlovic, BBC, The Guardian and Ofcom
Jon Russell / TechCrunch:
iflix, a Netflix-like streaming service targeting emerging markets, is selling its Africa business to concentrate on Indonesia, Malaysia, and the Philippines — Iflix, the emerging market Netflix competitor that's backed by Sky, is leaving Africa to double down on its business in Asia.
Rani Molla / Recode:
More than half of top 50 shows on Netflix, by one measure, are owned by others like Disney, NBCU, and WarnerMedia, which are planning rival streaming services — Fortunately for the streaming giant, its own shows are popular too. — Many of Netflix's most popular shows are owned by companies that plan to compete with Netflix.
Discussion:
@ranimolla
Will Oremus / Slate:
Facebook has forfeited our trust to the point that we see nefarious motives in any misstep, as some overblown reactions to Spotify and Netflix integrations show — Facebook may or may not have lost its handle on our data. But it has definitely lost its handle on the public narrative—and the benefit of the doubt.
Discussion:
@syardi, @willoremus, @hshaban, @lam_barrett, @zittrain, @zittrain, @zittrain, The Wrap, Vox, Techdirt and Motherboard, more at Techmeme »
Lucinda Southern / Digiday:
Schibsted says its video platform Stream, now used in 40 newsrooms and 30 newspapers in Norway, had 2.6B views across its videos in 2018 — Nordic media giant Schibsted has a heritage of developing core products in one newsroom and spinning them out to dozens of its own titles and beyond.
Lucinda Southern / Digiday:
Three French broadcasters, France Télévisions, M6, and TF1, have created Sygma, a common standard for buyers to access VOD inventory in hopes of reducing fraud — In France three broadcasters, France Télévisions, M6 and TF1, have created a common standard …