Welcome to July! Brian Stelter here at 11:01pm ET on Thursday, June 30. Here's the latest on Elon Musk, WaPo, The Chainsmokers, John King, Meta, Kaylee Hartung, "Minions," the Big Ten, and more... Eight stories about state of the media |
-- Print advertising continues to fade despite a nagging sense that some aspects of print are irreplaceable. PricewaterhouseCoopers' latest report predicts this year will be a tipping point: "Newspaper circulation revenue, both print and digital, will overtake total ad revenue for the first time," Brier Dudley writes for The Seattle Times... -- The daily newspaper in the retirement community of The Villages, Florida is now one of the top papers in the US. Using data from William Turvill's Press Gazette story, Joshua Benton of NiemanLab took stock of the fact that The Villages Daily Sun is now among the top 25 in terms of daily print circulations... -- "Group Black, a company that aims to invest in and develop Black-owned media firms, is pursuing big potential acquisitions in the digital-media space," Alexandra Bruell, Keach Hagey and Suzanne Vranica report for the WSJ. BDG Media and Vice Media are both mentioned... -- The question on Friday's Business Day section of the NYT: "Is business as usual good enough for Netflix?" Nicole Sperling and John Koblin say some observers are concerned that "the company known for its entrepreneurial thinking is moving away from that strategy when leaning into it would serve it better..." -- Deadline's Peter Bart says "streamer and agency layoffs" are leaving Hollywood "feeling extra ruthless" right now... -- In Kara Swisher's final dispatch for the NYT, she reminds all of us that "the internet and its successors like the metaverse were always meant to be ours, originally designed as a public trust," but the land has been hijacked by tech whizzes who gained "all the money," control and power. She says "resisting the worst of the web is not futile..." -- Speaking of the web's worst, "Q is back," sort of, "and it's tearing the QAnon world apart,' Vice's David Gilbert reports. He explains how the conspiracy movement has evolved: "Most QAnon supporters get their information from one of the dozens of influencers who have leveraged the popularity of QAnon to grow their own followings..." -- It's the "billion-dollar book deal of the century," but it's being blocked by the Justice Department: William D. Cohan's latest for Puck explores what might happen with Penguin Random House's bid for Simon & Schuster. With one month til the antitrust trial, "the consensus seems to be there is no longer any chance for settlement..." |
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-- Happy anniversary to John King! He is celebrating an incredible 25 years at CNN... (Twitter) -- Dozens of WH correspondents and other well-known reporters "signed a letter on Thursday urging the White House to reestablish traditional 'access norms...'" (Mediaite) -- Justin Peters is out with a detailed look at "how the right-wing media went after Cassidy Hutchinson..." (Slate) -- Jake Tapper scrutinized the anti-Hutchinson campaign on Thursday. Will anyone disputing her testimony speak under oath? He said America is trying to "learn the truth about all the ways that Donald Trump and his team tried to usurp democracy, which is really, after all, what this is all truly about..." (CNN) -- Votebeat, which began as a three-month "pop-up" project, "is launching as a permanent newsroom" to "cover local election administration..." (NiemanLab) |
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| This week on the Reliable podcast: Jeff Sharlet Author and Dartmouth professor Jeff Sharlet has been reporting on the American right from a religious studies perspective for more than two decades. His next book, "The Undertow: Scenes From a Slow Civil War," was previewed in a widely shared Vanity Fair excerpt titled "January 6 was only the beginning." 🔌: On this week's "Reliable" podcast, we talked about his interviews with Americans who feel the "undertow;" the proliferation of guns across the country; the media's blind spots about religion; potential impacts of the January 6 hearings; and more. Tune in via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or Stitcher, and let me know what you think... |
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Markets post worst first half of the year in decades CNN's Nicole Goodkind has the story through June 30: "The S&P 500 printed its worst half-year since 1970, the Dow had its largest first-half drop since 1962 and the Nasdaq had its largest percentage drop ever." We all know the headwinds: "Russia's war in Ukraine, Covid-19 lockdowns in China, surging inflation and aggressive rate hikes by the Federal Reserve." What we don't know is when the winds will change direction. Goodkind notes, for what it's worth, that there is "very little correlation between the S&P 500's first and second half of the year performance, at least historically..." Tech stock carnage CNBC's Jordan Novet has a closer look at the second quarter of the year here. He notes that during the quarter when Tesla CEO Elon Musk began a bid to take over Twitter, Tesla "endured its largest quarterly decline since its 2010 initial public offering as the stock sank almost 38%." Musk has not tweeted in nine days – "his longest stretch without posting on Twitter in nearly five years," according to the WSJ. >> Other tech stock carnage: Amazon "dropped almost 35%" in Q2, "the most since the third quarter of 2001." Alphabet and Apple both ended the quarter "down almost 22%." More here... Meta warns of slower growth Katie Paul's scoop for Reuters: Meta "is bracing for a leaner second half of the year, as it copes with macroeconomic pressures and data privacy hits to its ads business, according to an internal memo seen by Reuters." The Verge published the entire memo from chief product officer Chris Cox. In it, Cox says "I have to underscore that we are in serious times here and the headwinds are fierce. We need to execute flawlessly in an environment of slower growth, where teams should not expect vast influxes of new engineers and budgets." Cox laid out six areas of investment priorities: Metaverse; Reels; community messaging; AI; privacy; and monetization. Read on... |
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President Biden will meet virtually with six Democratic governors... "Minions: The Rise of Gru" opens wide... Netflix's "Stranger Things" finishes off its super-sized fourth season... "The Terminal List," starring and produced by Chris Pratt, premieres on Amazon... |
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"What a term" "The last month covering the Supreme Court felt like a year," CNN's Ariane de Vogue wrote Thursday night. "It's going to take some time to digest the changes these cases have wrought." For more on that, read Tierney Sneed's overview of how "the conservative Supreme Court transformed the legal landscape around an assortment of hot-button issues," the culmination "of a generational effort to transform the high bench." Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, who was was sworn in at noon, could be forgiven for wondering what she is getting herself into," de Vogue added. "For now," she wrote, "we wait for Justice Jackson's 1st vote which will be on the next emergency application. What a term." |
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-- WaPo's Maxine Joselow tweeted, "Yes, the SCOTUS ruling in WV v EPA is a 'blow to Biden's climate agenda,' as many reporters (including me) have written. But this kind of framing misses that it's really a blow to efforts to cut emissions in line w/ climate science. Physics doesn't care about politics..." (Twitter) -- Emma Goldberg has a new story about the media companies that are expanding health coverage, reimbursing "employees who need to travel to access reproductive health care..." (NYT) -- Erik Wemple looked back at some Roe commentary from pundits and lawyers who downplayed the potential end to the landmark ruling on abortion rights, including one piece by his colleague Kathleen Parker... (WaPo) -- "States that ban abortion could want your data," Meghan Bobrowsky reports… (WSJ) -- The Chainsmokers' song "Paris" has become "TikTok's abortion rights anthem," MarĂa Luisa PaĂşl reports and, more importantly, explains... (WaPo) -- Kelly Lawler writes about "how Hollywood has portrayed abortions over the past 60 years, and what we might see in film and TV in a post-Roe world..." (USA Today) -- Thomson Reuters Foundation, Google's Jigsaw, and Twitter have teamed on the new tool, TRFilter, to help journalists "detect and flag harmful comments and threats, as well as block, mute or save comments at scale…" (Adweek) | |
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"Russian Duma passes law on retaliation against foreign media" Following threats that Russia may strip US news organizations of accreditations, a new bill "passed by the lower house of parliament on Thursday" creates "a legal basis for Moscow to retaliate against the media of any country that restricts the activity of Russian journalists," Reuters reports. The bill must be approved by the upper house and signed by Vladimir Putin... |
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FIRST IN RELIABLE
Hartung to depart ABC News for Amazon |
Kaylee Hartung is officially leaving ABC News, sources tell me. It's not clear precisely when her last day will be, but her current deal is set to expire within weeks. She is expected to join Amazon where she will be the primary "Thursday Night Football" sideline reporter, I'm told. The New York Post previously reported that Amazon was eyeing her for the role. Neither Hartung, ABC, nor Amazon provided comment... |
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FOR THE RECORD, PART THREE |
-- Brian O'Keefe, the senior executive editor at Fortune magazine, is joining Esquire as exec editor, reporting to Michael Sebastian... -- NYT has named Nestor Ramos as its new Metro editor... (NYT) -- Lindsay Foster Thomas has been named VP of WNYC Studios... (Inside Radio) -- Chloe Jones is joining CBS News Streaming "as senior executive producer overseeing morning-through-midday programming..." (TVNewser) -- WaPo has selected John Farrell as its first climate and weather breaking news video editor... (WaPo) |
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Who will succeed Fred Hiatt? Washington Post CEO Fred Ryan's seven-month search for a new editorial page editor "has been anxiety-inducing for the Post," Puck's Tara Palmeri reports. There is "added curiosity," she says, "about how this might reflect the personal politics" of Jeff Bezos. Palmeri says that "Ryan has been asking candidates for memos, and is nearing a final decision that will be announced soon, in consultation with Bezos." Peter Baker and Carlos Lozada have both taken themselves out of the running, she reports... |
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WaPo's new social media guidelines "Weeks after very public online beefing roiled the newsroom, Washington Post management on Thursday issued a new set of guidelines for using social media. The main takeaway: Think before you post," The Daily Beast's Corbin Bolies reports. The publication says "Post journalists should not feel compelled to engage or broadcast on social media platforms, except for those whose roles explicitly require it." Key points: Don't harm the Post's reputation, don't air personal grievances, don't fight with colleagues, don't be foolish with likes or retweets... |
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WIRED union threatens strike
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Staffers belonging to the WIRED union are threatening to go on strike during the two days of Prime Day, the News Guild of New York announced Thursday. The union said 97% of its workers are prepared to strike if Condé Nast "refuses to bargain in good faith and reach an agreement with the union before then." Prime Day is July 12 and 13. A spokesperson for Condé didn't respond to a request for comment... |
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FOR THE RECORD, PART FOUR |
-- NBCU exec Maggie McLean Suniewick is heading to Twitter in the newly recreated role of VP of partnerships... (THR) -- Ashley Kline-Shapiro has been promoted to VP of unscripted and slate publicity for ABC Entertainment and Walt Disney Television Alternative... (Variety) -- Karen Greenfield has been named as NatGeo's SVP of content, diversity and inclusion... (Deadline) -- Kelci Parker has been appointed to Hulu's new role of VP of animation... (Deadline) |
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UCLA and USC to join Big Ten BY BRIAN LOWRY: Thursday's news that USC and UCLA are joining the Big Ten conference — and abandoning the Pac-12 — is fundamentally a media story, and specifically the latter conference's failed strategy around its regional sports network. To understand why, see this piece last year by Jon Wilner in the Mercury News laying out the PAC-12's TV problem and why money trumps tradition... >> CNN's David Close has more on the "seismic shift" here... >> "Apple told the Big Ten that it wants to reengage in media talks after it heard about USC and UCLA joining the conference," SBJ's John Ourand reports... |
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| "The man who played Hollywood" BY AN PHUNG: Los Angeles Times reporters Amy Kaufman and Meg James spent four months on this story about Randall Emmett, a Hollywood producer famous for his low budget action films with big-name stars like Bruce Willis. The pair reports that Emmett is facing "lawsuits and mounting debts, as well as allegations of abuse against women, assistants and business partners." "This kind of alleged behavior is still going on in [Hollywood,] even post-Weinstein, Rudin, etc.," Kaufman tweeted. Kaufman also shared that the PR exec Emmett hired "to refute the allegations in our story," Sallie Hofmeister, was her former boss at the LAT. Small, and strange, world... |
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FOR THE RECORD, PART FIVE |
-- "TV networks continue to fare better than expected in the current 'upfront' market as they harness streaming video and sports ... in order to keep Madison Avenue's money flowing," Brian Steinberg reports... (Variety) -- "Dune: Part Two" has been pushed back to Thanksgiving 2023... (THR) -- A new "Godzilla vs. Kong" is set to be released on March 15, 2024... (Gizmodo)
-- William Shatner is set to unveil a documentary about himself at San Diego Comic-Con in mid July... (Variety)
-- Also at Comic-Con: Apple TV+ is making its first-ever appearance... (Deadline) |
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"Minions" are no match for Lowry BY BRIAN LOWRY: "Minions: The Rise of Gru" is a drab effort even by the modest standards of the "Despicable Me" franchise. The main problem, and structurally speaking it's a significant one, is that director Kyle Balda and writer Matthew Fogel throw a bunch of different gags against the wall hoping a few will stick, which they do, while seriously neglecting to maintain the plot. "Minions" certainly has to be evaluated in the context of what it's trying to achieve – like fueling fast-food giveaways and toy sales – but even compared to the earlier movies in the franchise, this one feels particularly limited in its scope and ambitions. Of course, this probably won't prevent younger kids from enjoying it enough to give a win to Universal... |
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LAST BUT CERTAINLY NOT LEAST... Pet of the day! Reader Bill Liebold emails: "Our 12 year-old rescue dog Mackinac hopes that 'Reliable Sources' will help spread the word that Fourth of July fireworks can be frightening for our pets..." |
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Thank you for reading! Feel free to email us anytime. We'll be back tomorrow... |
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