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8:05 AM ET, December 19, 2025

Mediagazer

 Top News: 
Sara Fischer / Axios:
Internal memo: TikTok has signed a deal to sell its US unit; Oracle, Silver Lake, MGX will collectively own 45% of the US entity, and ByteDance will retain ~20%  —  TikTok has signed a deal to sell its U.S. entity to a joint venture controlled by American investors, per an internal memo seen by Axios.
RELATED:
Alex Weprin / The Hollywood Reporter:
Memo: the TikTok US deal is set to close on Jan. 22; terms include retraining the recommendation algorithm on US user data and Oracle overseeing data protection  —  Abu Dhabi's state investment fund will also be a managing investor.  —  The TikTok sale is officially happening …
Ryan Glasspiegel / Front Office Sports:
Sources: Netflix will pay Barstool a yearly fee “in the eight figures” for its video podcasts; Fanatics has pitched WWE podcasts to Netflix which airs WWE Raw  —  Netflix is paying out meaningful sums of money in its ongoing push to entice creators to migrate the video forms …
RELATED:
Ashley Carman / Bloomberg:
YouTube's head of products for podcasts Steve McLendon says viewers streamed 700M+ hours of podcasts on TV in October, up from 400M hours in October 2024  —  That's up from 400 million hours a year ago as podcasts become the new late-night TV.  —  People are spending more time tuning …
Todd Spangler / Variety:
Sony Pictures Entertainment and Sony Music Entertainment (Japan) agree to buy WildBrain's 41% stake in Peanuts Holdings for ~$457M, raising Sony's stake to 80%  —  Sony is paying more than a few peanuts to get majority ownership of Charles M. Schulz's beloved Peanuts franchise featuring Snoopy, Charlie Brown and more.
Wall Street Journal:
Sources: Axel Springer has considered buying about a dozen media businesses in the US, including TED Conferences, TechCrunch, the 1440 newsletter, and more  —  Mathias Döpfner says ‘embrace AI or die’ as he looks to bolster his U.S. media holdings  —  Mathias Döpfner is hunting for “new gold” in media.
George Winslow / TV Tech:
The National Association of Broadcasters launches a campaign to support live sports on free broadcast channels as more big games move to streaming services  —  The campaign comes at a time when fans are increasingly complaining about the cost of accessing games behind paywalls and the complexity of accessing the games
Financial Times:
Trump Media agrees to merge with Google-backed fusion energy company TAE in a $6B deal and build the “world's first utility-scale fusion power plant” in 2026  —  Deal represents bet on nuclear energy powering artificial intelligence boom  —  The Trump family media group has agreed …
Ethan Millman / The Hollywood Reporter:
Universal Music Group partners with music creation platform Splice to build “advanced commercial AI tools” for musical artists  —  The new pact is the latest AI music development for the world's largest music company after settling a lawsuit with Udio in October.
Shane O'Neill / Washington Post:
Q&A with Christopher Anderson, who photographed Trump's inner circle for VF: “My job is to ... draw on my experience as a journalist and photograph what I see”  —  Every line, spot, blemish and blood vessel was captured by Christopher Anderson's lens.  What was he thinking?
Jessica M. Goldstein / New York Times:
A look at Track Star, a YouTube music quiz show that has become a stop on the celebrity promo trail and has started creating documentary-style music features  —  John Fogerty has written some of the most instantly recognizable songs in rock ‘n’ roll history.
Discussion: @jessicagolds
Emilio Casalicchio / Politico:
Downing Street makes changes to press access, cutting an afternoon briefing and promising more press conferences, which will be open to social media influencers  —  The move has already sparked an uproar from Westminster's journalists.  —  LONDON — No.10 Downing Street announced Thursday …
 
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 More News: 
M.G. Siegler / Spyglass:
YouTube streaming the Oscars in 2029 makes Netflix's WBD bid less likely to face antitrust issues, as it shows Netflix might need WBD to compete against YouTube
Will Sattelberg / 9to5Google:
Google returns as a partner service for Movies Anywhere, after leaving the service during a feud with Disney in October and November
Discussion: How-To Geek
Anna Betts / The Guardian:
David Brooks, who wrote a NYT column last month decrying popular fixation on the Epstein story, appears in newly released photos of a 2011 event with Epstein
Jake Kanter / Deadline:
YouTube terminates Screen Culture and KH Studio, two large channels that used AI to create fake movie trailers; the platform earlier suspended the channels' ads
 Earlier Picks: 
Lanre Bakare / The Guardian:
Members of UK performing arts union Equity vote overwhelmingly in favor of refusing to be scanned while on set to prevent their likeness being used by AI
Mark Stenberg / Adweek:
Dow Jones hires ex-Bloomberg Media CEO M. Scott Havens as its first chief growth officer, overseeing subscription growth and other consumer revenue streams
Discussion: Talking Biz News
Alex Weprin / The Hollywood Reporter:
CBS News and The Free Press announce Things That Matter, a series of town halls and debates, starting in early 2026, with Sam Altman, J.D. Vance, and others
Cynthia Littleton / Variety:
NBCU plans to add Arrival Ads, live ads that play when users turn on Peacock, and use AI to search live sports events for the optimal moment to place ads
 

 
From Techmeme:

Will Shanklin / Engadget:
Apple releases the first public betas of iOS 27, iPadOS 27, macOS 27 Golden Gate, watchOS 27, and tvOS 27, marking the public debut of the new Siri AI

Jason Nelson / Decrypt:
Anthropic research based on ~310K anonymized Claude conversations shows how Claude's expressed values and behaviors vary across models and languages

Zac Bowden / Windows Central:
Microsoft announces a Windows 11 search overhaul that prioritizes local results, removes promotional web content, and more, rolling out to Windows Insiders
 
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