Know What's Happening in Media
Know What's Happening in Media
Indian TV market braces for sales dip as production costs surge
Rising RAM prices, higher plastic and ocean‑freight costs linked to the West Asia crisis, and a weakening rupee have pushed entry‑level 32‑inch TV prices up about 20% to $133, up from $108 six months ago. Counterpoint Research expects shipments to fall 5‑6% as consumers down‑trade to smaller screens.
Also developing:
By the numbers: K-Love seeks FCC approval to acquire radio station WFCC
Waterloo Sparkling Water has appointed Dentsu Creative as its social agency of record, coinciding with the rollout of new flavors Banana Berry Bliss, Melon Medley and a year‑round Lemon Italian Ice. The partnership is timed to the opening of the 2026 Milano‑Cortina Winter Olympics and is designed to drive national awareness, conversion and loyalty. Waterloo, now at roughly 10% U.S. household penetration, seeks to deepen community engagement and differentiate in a crowded sparkling‑water category. Dentsu will embed with Waterloo’s team, emphasizing quality interactions over volume.
Video game journalism entered 2026 under severe pressure, with widespread layoffs, shrinking freelance budgets, and shifting audience habits eroding traditional business models. At GamesBeat’s Hollywood & Games event, Alexander Lee interviewed Christopher Dring and Kaare Eriksen, who highlighted the sector’s...
Apple’s recent rollout of native video in Apple Podcasts marks a pivotal shift, turning video into a core podcast format and introducing Apple’s first large‑scale video ad revenue share. This move accelerates the “liquid content era,” where shows fluidly switch...
Lemonada Media is hiring a part‑time, temporary Video Growth Lead to boost its YouTube and short‑form video presence. The role, reporting to the SVP of Content & Production, will create, edit, and optimize video assets for shows like *Don’t Listen...
Dentsu Entertainment announced a strategic partnership with Iconic Arts to develop original, brand‑centric intellectual property, emphasizing anime and serialized formats. The collaboration will initially serve Dentsu’s Japan‑US synergy initiatives, helping Japanese and global brands launch cross‑market franchises. Leveraging Iconic Arts’...
More AI-coded fun things 📕 Yesterday I asked it to build an ePub and PDF generator for my book https://t.co/VEoyhFdCOd I still update and write on it, but every time I had to print the book (it's HTML) as a PDF, and...
The president's comments about Netflix/Susan Rice shouldn't have bearing over the approval of any WBD deal — a decision to sue to block would be made by the DOJ which would face an indp judge in court — BUT his...
The author of Publishing Confidential announces that the newsletter will become 80% paid, offering a $6/month subscription with group discounts and free options for those in need. The piece then examines the evolving landscape of book publicity, noting the decline...
Donna Summer is hot again thanks to Olympic ⛸️ Alysa Liu’s Olympic Gold Skate Sends Donna Summer Streams Soaring: https://t.co/awwuTGQRmj via @sportico @germanotes w/ data from @luminate_data
Left: what happened to newspaper stocks. Right: what NYT did about it. The product that survived looks nothing like the one that was dying. The software/AI playbook may already exist https://t.co/OL43xsRz6Q
Hubhopper has integrated Headliner’s AI‑powered video‑clipping toolkit, letting podcasters turn full‑length video episodes into up to ten short clips with a single click. The workflow lets creators upload, generate, and schedule clips to YouTube and, soon, Apple Podcasts directly from...
The Fall and Rise of Reggie Dinkins premiered on NBC on February 23, starring Tracy Morgan as a fallen football star seeking a comeback. Created by 30 Rock veterans Robert Carlock and Sam Means, with Tina Fey as executive producer, the...
After fifteen years of strained police‑press relations following the Leveson Inquiry, the College of Policing has issued updated communications standards for England and Wales. The new rulebook encourages officers at all levels to engage with journalists, permits off‑the‑record briefings, and...
Manchester United led the UK Instagram surge in January 2026, adding 497,000 followers to reach 66.1 million total. Harry Styles, Owen Cooper, Olivia Dean and other entertainers followed, each gaining between 191,000 and 419,000 new followers. The growth was driven by a...
Substack has hired veteran digital‑media executive Mark Swierszcz as its first Head of Partnerships for Canada, signaling a focused push into its third‑largest market. Swierszcz brings a decade of experience from MTV, MuchMusic, YouTube and Google Canada to grow creator,...
Canadian streamer Crave’s original series “Heated Rivalry” has become a breakout hit, pulling in roughly 11.5 million U.S. viewers on HBO Max and ranking as the platform’s top‑acquired series. The show’s success has driven a 26 percent subscriber surge for Crave, adding over...
Caitríona Balfe revealed that Outlander’s final season will be driven by “revenge, reunions, revelations,” hinting at the possible return of the long‑presumed‑dead daughter Faith. She noted Jamie will shoulder a new, solitary burden while Claire begins to discover hidden abilities. The...
EMPIRE announced a new publishing agreement with Grammy‑winning artist Shaboozey, extending the partnership that began with his 2021 label signing. The deal follows the massive success of “A Bar Song (Tipsy),” which logged 19 weeks at No. 1 on the Billboard...
The season‑10 reunion of Married at First Sight UK will air on March 1, featuring a lineup of past couples. Abigail Callahan disclosed on a YouTube interview that she experienced an emotional "wobble" during filming, prompting her to ask the crew...
Luis Estrada, a veteran public‑media professional with more than 11 years at KPBS, will become general manager of KVMR Community Radio in Nevada City on March 2. He also founded the bilingual production firm ES Creative Gang, giving him a strong...
Millennial Entertainment, a Beverly Hills‑based 360° talent firm founded in 2017, positions itself as a long‑term career architect for creators, athletes and performers. Co‑founders Jack Reed and Max Litke emphasize a full‑service model that extends beyond brand deals into podcast...
A 1 kW Class C AM station broadcasting vintage 1960s rock from Oregon’s capital is set to change hands, pending Federal Communications Commission approval. The outlet, operating with a single tower, has cultivated a dedicated niche audience that values analog authenticity. Ownership...
Ozen.fm, a global podcast and digital‑audio platform, announced its market entry in Brazil and hired Priscila Falcone as Commercial Director. Falcone will head commercial operations, leveraging her decade‑long experience in programmatic media and audio advertising. The launch aligns with rapid...
Guggenheim Brothers Media has launched a $75 million fund, anchored by Abu Dhabi’s Ethmar International, to fill the middle‑market funding gap in the creator economy. The Los Angeles‑based firm will invest $1‑5 million in 20‑25 early‑ to growth‑stage media and entertainment companies...
Telos Alliance announced a software update (v3.32.47) for its Linear Acoustic AERO series to incorporate the latest Nielsen watermark encoding library and fix a timestamp reset issue that would affect data reporting after Jan 1, 2027. The update covers current AERO models—including...
Kate O’Neill’s new book *What Matters Next* argues that AI itself isn’t the disruptor for radio—human behavior is, and AI merely speeds up its effects. The author warns stations against using AI to double down on sameness, insisting that originality...
A new Duetti Music Economics Report examined over 6 million tracks from 2025 and found that only about 1.1% of songs achieve a viral spike, defined as a five‑fold stream increase in a month. Sustaining that momentum is even rarer, with...
Audacy is extending its flagship WGR Sports Radio brand into the Rochester market by simulcasting most of the Buffalo‑based programming on WROC‑AM and its FM translator W239BF. The station will keep its WROC call letters but adopt the WGR Rochester...
Talk media’s weekend roundup highlighted five headline‑grabbing stories: the Supreme Court rejected former President Trump’s tariff policy, a security guard was killed at Mar‑a‑Lago, tensions between the United States and Iran intensified, a Mexican cartel strike disrupted operations, and the...
Tidal has expanded its Spotlight program to Canada, the UK and several European markets, adding eleven countries in total. The initiative ties directly to Tidal Upload, allowing any publicly posted track to enter an editorial review queue without a separate...
Podcast advertising spend plunged 21% in January, falling to $59.8 million for the top 15 advertisers from a December peak of $75.9 million. The decline follows a holiday‑driven surge and signals a market correction. Despite the overall drop, brands such as T‑Mobile...
OpenX partnered with data firm Givsly to launch a sell‑side curation platform that lets political advertisers target voters by shared values rather than party affiliation. The solution works across premium CTV and digital publishers, including Newsweek, Plex, Xumo and Scripps....
Puerto Rican reggaetón‑R&B star Lenny Tavárez has signed with Apple Music’s artist services and distribution arm Platoon, a move aimed at accelerating his global profile. Tavárez brings a catalog of over 11 billion streams, 16 million social followers, and multiple Billboard chart...
In this episode, host Sebastian Hassinger chats with Evan Kubas, a lawyer‑turned‑quantum media entrepreneur, about the origins of Quantum Insider and its parent company Resonance. Kubas recounts how he and co‑founder Alex Challens built a leading quantum news platform from...
Coming up on @SquawkCNBC talking neverending battle for $WBD btwn $NFLX and $PSKY with @andrewrsorkin @BeckyQuick @JoeSquawk
Think you might be getting a bit ahead of yourself here... If AI makes human labor obsolete, who decides who gets to eat? https://t.co/3kx7WjAcRC
Amazon has opened a public waitlist for its satellite‑based home internet service, Amazon Leo, targeting a residential launch in 2026. The Leo platform will offer three tiers—Standard, Pro and Portable—delivering speeds from 100 Mbps up to 1 Gbps using low‑Earth‑orbit satellites. An initial...
A caller identifying as "John Barron" appeared on C‑SPAN, sounding unmistakably like former President Donald Trump, but the network later confirmed it was not the president. The brief, 32‑second call sparked speculation about a Trump impersonator or AI‑generated voice, highlighting...
German broadcaster RTL Deutschland and Warner Bros. Discovery have merged RTL+ and HBO Max into a single, cancellable subscription for Austrian consumers. The bundle offers two tiers—a ad‑supported option at €11.99 and an ad‑free version at €17.99—both discounted from the standalone prices. An introductory...
Deepdub has teamed up with Love TV Channels to bring AI‑driven dubbing to free ad‑supported streaming (FAST) services across Europe. The partnership will localise Cineflix Rights factual titles into Castilian Spanish, Italian and French, targeting Love TV’s 25 million monthly viewers....
PAVE Studios announced the launch of "The Final Hours," a Crime House original audio series debuting Monday, February 23. Hosted by seasoned true‑crime advocates Sarah Turney and Kourtney Nichole, the weekly podcast examines the last hours before a disappearance, spotlighting...
CBS kicks off Monday with the series premiere of "CIA," a spin‑off that pairs a rule‑breaking CIA case officer with a by‑the‑book FBI agent, extending the network’s successful FBI franchise. The same night, the procedural drama "FBI" weaves a personal...
CBS’s fall lineup captured eight of the ten most‑watched broadcast series and nine of the top‑20 titles across broadcast and streaming, according to Nielsen’s live + 35‑day multiplatform data through January 4, 2026. The drama Tracker led the pack with 16.7 million viewers, while new...
eBay announced a $1.2 billion acquisition of Depop, the mobile‑first fashion resale platform, to deepen its reach with Gen Z shoppers. Depop reported roughly $1 billion in gross merchandise volume last year, growing 60% year‑over‑year, and now serves 7 million buyers and 3 million sellers....
Med Media Services has secured distribution for its Mediterranean‑themed FAST channel MED.TV on Rakuten TV, extending the service across 43 European markets. The partnership gives MED.TV access to a potential audience of more than 150 million households, complementing its existing footprint of...
AI's rapid adoption is eroding creative professionals' confidence, as algorithms increasingly generate visual and textual content. However, the article argues that uniquely human traits—vulnerability, intuition, and emotional nuance—remain irreplaceable drivers of breakthrough ideas. It suggests that creatives should leverage AI...
Civic Media is revamping its News/Talk format across Wisconsin under the Civic Media Network brand, launching new local programs on stations in Wausau, Madison, Milwaukee, and Oshkosh‑Appleton. The refreshed schedule features a flagship morning show, Daybreak with Brian and Jamie,...
Veteran meteorologist Pat Cavlin announced his departure from KHOU 11 Houston after four years, posting a heartfelt farewell on social media. Cavlin, who joined the TEGNA‑owned station in March 2022, will likely relocate to New York for his next role. His career...
Warner Bros. Discovery reported its strongest Olympic streaming performance to date during the Milano‑Cortina 2026 Winter Games, with total hours viewed on HBO Max and discovery+ jumping 103% versus Beijing 2022. European markets delivered triple‑digit growth, and combined platform audiences...
Production Park secured planning approval to expand its campus to nearly 30 acres, adding two new studios and over 70,000 square feet of commercial space. The development will also house a training and performance centre and enlarge the teaching facilities...
