Mediagazer: TikTok sues the US government over the law forcing a sale or ban, saying it violates users' First Amendment rights and divestiture is “simply not possible” (New York Times)

7:35 PM ET, May 7, 2024

Top News:

CNBC:

Disney reports Q2 revenue up 1% YoY to $22.08B, vs. $22.11B est., with Disney+ and Hulu hitting a combined quarterly profit for the first time — The “Partners” statue of Walt Disney and Mickey Mouse, at Cinderella Castle at the Magic Kingdom, at Walt Disney World, in Lake Buena Vista, Florida, photographed Saturday, June 3, 2023.

Jennifer Maas / Variety:

Disney CEO Bob Iger says Marvel is going to reduce output and focus on quality by releasing “about two TV series a year” and a “maximum of three” films per year — Disney CEO Bob Iger says the company is shrinking the MCU with a new mission to drop the number …

Discussion: Empire, Screen Rant, The Hollywood Reporter, New York Post, The Wrap, The Playlist, Business Insider, @tvgrimreaper, Jackie Szymanski on LinkedIn, TVLine, SlashFilm, ComingSoon.net, The Guardian, @ballmatthew, Gizmodo, MatthewBall.co, Deadline and The A.V. Club

Robbie Whelan / Wall Street Journal:

Disney's streaming unit reports a loss of $18M in Q2, down from a $659M loss YoY, and says it is on track to achieve streaming profitability in Q4 2024 — Entertainment giant adds streaming customers as it swings to a loss as a result of charge from India media venture

Discussion: @tvgrimreaper, Axios, Media Play News, Dylan Jones on LinkedIn and The Hollywood Reporter

Loree Seitz / The Wrap:
Bob Iger says Disney+ will add a new ESPN tile by the end of 2024, with “select live games and studio programming” for US subscribers

Discussion: The Hollywood Reporter, IndieWire, Deadline, Digital Trends, AdExchanger, Streaming Better, The Streamable, Cord Cutters News, Sportico, UPROXX, Awful Announcing, Variety and The Verge

Thomas Buckley / Bloomberg:
Disney reports Disney+ 153.6M subscribers, vs. 155.66M est., and raises its guidance for FY 2024 earnings growth from 20% to 25%, vs. 25.5% est.; DIS drops 8%+

Discussion: The Streamable, Lucas Shaw on LinkedIn and Advanced Television

Todd Spangler / Variety:
Disney reports Q2 subscribers to Disney+ Core, which excludes Disney+ Hotstar in India and other Southeast Asian countries, up 6% QoQ to 117.6M, above forecasts

Discussion: TVNewsCheck, The Streamable, Zach O'Neal on LinkedIn and Engadget

Joshua Benton / Nieman Lab:

A historical look at Pulitzer winners shows the decline of local and regional newspapers and the growth in online news outlets, especially at the local level — For the first time ever, more online news sites produced Pulitzer finalists than newspapers did.

Discussion: The Pulitzer Prizes, @kottke@mastodon.social, @michaelluo, @jbenton, artofneed, @niemanlab@mastodon.social, The New York Times Company, Axios, Poynter and Washington Post

Benjamin Mullin / New York Times:

A look at Chicago's Invisible Institute, a nonprofit newsroom with about a dozen journalists incorporated in 2015 that won two 2024 Pulitzers — The Invisible Institute, a nonprofit newsroom with roughly a dozen journalists, was recognized for local and audio reporting.

Discussion: Poynter, @chrisahowell@threads.net, NewsLab, Poynter and Chicago Tribune

Joseph Ax / Reuters:
Lookout Santa Cruz, a digital-only local news outlet, won the breaking news reporting Pulitzer for its 2023 California floods coverage; Reuters won two prizes

Max Tani / Semafor:

Memo: Business Insider Global Editor-in-Chief Nich Carlson is stepping down and will become an editor-at-large focused on longer-term projects — The Scoop — Business Insider's global editor-in-chief is stepping down as the company begins a search for his replacement.

Discussion: Reuters, @nataliekorach@threads.net, @sportsrapport, New York Post, Axios, @billackman, @sarafischer, @thestalwart, Talking Biz News, @mjnblack, @julie188, @nichcarlson, The Wrap and The Daily Beast

Deepa Seetharaman / Wall Street Journal:

OpenAI releases a tool to detect DALL-E 3-created images, claiming 98% accuracy for unaltered images, and joins Microsoft and Adobe's content credentials group — Startup's new tool detects 98% of pictures generated by its DALL-E 3 system, but success drops if the images are altered

Discussion: Reuters, Microsoft On the Issues, Quartz, Engadget, New York Times and ZDNet, more at Techmeme »

Sara Fischer / Axios:
Dotdash Meredith inks a deal with OpenAI to license its content to train AI models and work together on products, including Dotdash's ad-targeting tool D/Cipher

Discussion: Engadget, Bloomberg, The Information, @sarafischer, Dotdash Meredith, Sara Fischer on LinkedIn, @sarafischer, The Wrap, Reuters and The Verge

Alex Weprin / The Hollywood Reporter:

Amazon announces three new interactive ad formats for Prime Video: shoppable carousel ads, interactive pause ads, and interactive brand trivia ads — Three new formats will let users easily include products featured in ads to their Amazon carts, with no need for QR codes.

Discussion: The Streamable, Deadline, Variety, Next TV, Ad Age, Adweek, Amazon Ads, AdExchanger and MediaPost

Austin Fuller / Current:

NPR CEO Katherine Maher will not attend a US House committee hearing on May 8 looking at alleged NPR bias due to a schedule conflict, but offers to appear later — NPR CEO Katherine Maher will not attend a U.S. House committee hearing Wednesday aimed at looking into alleged ideological bias at the organization.

Discussion: Fox News, @davidfolkenflik and @davidfolkenflik

New York Times:

TikTok sues the US government over the law forcing a sale or ban, saying it violates users' First Amendment rights and divestiture is “simply not possible” — The social media company and its Chinese parent, ByteDance, sued to challenge the new law, saying it violated users' First Amendment rights.

Nellie Andreeva / Deadline:

Ricky Strauss, who has been head of marketing at Apple TV+ for 16 months, is leaving; he earlier was president of content and marketing at Disney+ at its launch — Ricky Strauss is leaving Apple TV+ after a 16-month stint as Head of Marketing. — In his role, he was involved …

Discussion: Variety, The Wrap, Puck, @rarebre3d and 9to5Mac

Pew Research Center:

Survey: 48% of US adults prefer websites or social media for local news; 15% paid for local news in the last year; 63% believe local outlets do well financially — As news consumption habits become more digital, U.S. adults continue to see value in local outlets — Table of Contents Table of Contents

Discussion: Nieman Lab, @dustysneakers_@threads.net, @iohn.bsky.social, Poynter and @jackshafer

Kate Knibbs / Wired:

A look at Musi, a free music streaming app popular among high schoolers that uses YouTube to source music, opening Musi up to legal action from record labels — Musi's free music streaming app is a hit with thrifty teens. The app claims to tap content on YouTube, but some in the music industry question the legitimacy of that model.

Discussion: @knibbs, @extremeknibbs@threads.net and 9to5Mac

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