Know What's Happening in Media
Know What's Happening in Media
Indian TV market braces for sales dip amid rising production costs and rupee weakness
Soaring RAM prices, higher plastic and ocean‑freight costs tied to the West Asia crisis, and a weakening rupee have pushed retail TV prices up roughly 20%. An entry‑level 32‑inch set now costs about $133, up from $108 six months earlier, prompting many buyers to down‑trade. Counterpoint Research forecasts shipments to fall 5‑6%.
Also developing:
By the numbers: K‑Love seeks FCC approval for acquisition of WFCC
The Faithful: Women of the Bible is a Disney+ original that re‑centers biblical epics on female protagonists, beginning with Sarah and Hagar in Genesis. Minnie Driver humanizes Sarah while Natacha Karam delivers a vulnerable Hagar, framing their story as an early commentary on surrogacy. The series blends high‑budget visuals with feminist reinterpretation, offering both faith‑based appeal and contemporary relevance. Critical response notes uneven pacing but praises the intimate, low‑key exchanges that anchor the drama.
IMHO distorted crime perceptions are driven by how media dissolves distance. The human brain didn't evolve to consume graphic news stories about people we'd never meet. We process a TV or social media news story of a murder as if...
Luxury conglomerate Tapestry, owner of Coach and Kate Spade, has appointed Dentsu as its global agency of record for media planning and buying outside the United States. The agreement covers the APAC region—including Japan, China, Korea, Singapore, Malaysia, Australia, and...
Leogao announced the launch of a personal Substack newsletter, linking to nablatheta.substack.com. The post is a brief linkshare on LessWrong, signaling a shift toward independent publishing. It highlights the author’s intent to deliver longer-form content outside the platform’s standard post...
Creator commerce platform LTK has introduced Quick Collabs, a new feature that lets brands launch flat‑fee, one‑click campaigns that creators can opt into. The tool leverages LTK’s data on 44 million monthly shoppers, $6 billion in annual spend, 400,000 creators and 8,000...
Clean Creatives released the “Toxic Accounts” study, analyzing 1,859 ads, press releases and social‑media campaigns from 2020‑2024. It finds BP, Chevron, Shell and Exxon have abandoned climate‑friendly narratives, instead portraying fossil‑fuel use as essential for economic stability and national security....
Meta will begin charging advertisers a "location fee" starting July 1, 2026 to cover European digital services taxes. The fee varies by country—2 % in the U.K., 3 % in France, Italy and Spain, and 5 % in Austria and Turkey—adding directly to ad spend....
Instagram tested an AI‑driven “Shop the Look” feature that automatically tags products in creator posts, aiming to boost social commerce. The rollout, launched in February, sparked backlash as tags appeared without creators’ consent, linking followers to unvetted items and knockoffs....
Saturday night television saw sports and live events dominate the ratings, with the 2026 World Baseball Classic leading the 18‑49 demographic at a 0.81 rating and 2.80 million viewers. The NBA’s Nuggets‑Lakers tip‑off posted a 0.53 rating, marking a notable rise...
Shubham Bose reports that a typical New York Times article now requires 422 network requests and transfers 49 MB of data, taking over two minutes to fully load on average broadband connections. This size is comparable to downloading ten to twelve...
On March 16, 2026, Iran fired missiles and drones at several Persian Gulf states, including a strike that hit Kuwait City. President Donald Trump responded from Washington, urging regional partners to step up protection of commercial shipping in the Strait...
On Thursday, President Donald Trump nominated State Department Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy Sarah Rogers to become CEO of the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM). The move follows a federal judge’s ruling that invalidated the staff reductions and other...
On March 15‑17, 2026, President Donald Trump and his aides, including Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, publicly berated reporters aboard Air Force One and used social media to denounce news coverage of the Iran‑Saudi conflict. FCC Chairman Brendan Carr echoed the...
Scoop: MS NOW boss Rebecca Kutler is on the precipice of announcing some major dayside programming changes. Details on what is in store for the network in @get_status: https://www.status.news/p/ms-now-programming-changes-alicia-menendez-rebecca-kutler
influencers are launching stunt accounts to tease new products. those accounts are then typically converted into the brand account, with built in audience and intrigue for day one of the announcement.
Amazon Ads and Spotify have integrated Spotify’s premium audio and video inventory into Amazon’s demand‑side platform in Australia. The partnership lets Australian marketers buy across connected TV, display, audio and video through a single programmatic workflow, leveraging Amazon’s shopping and...
Ugh. Lots of rumbling about editor layoffs in publishing, and oh my god, if you keep letting go of the people who make the books happen, you won’t have the books. I want to scream.
Amazing how many people are triggered by my dumping on Oscar ratings yet this viewership chart says it all 1996 - 45 million 2006 - 36 million 2016 - 34 million 2026 - 18 million
A U.S. District Court judge ordered more than 1,000 full‑time Voice of America journalists and support staff to resume work by March 23, overturning the Trump administration’s effort to shut down the broadcaster. The ruling excludes contracted employees and reaffirms Congress’s...
Community notes is such a good feature. Only shows up when people who usually disagree with each other agree on a note. Imagine legacy media had the guts to implement a system like this. https://t.co/5oYLqZt1iS
In rebuke to @KariLake, US judge orders 1,000 Voice of America staffers back to work My story for NPR: https://t.co/NGgPfXNWOu
The Trade Desk’s OpenPath platform is facing pushback from major agency networks, with WPP and Dentsu withdrawing over concerns about cost transparency. While the service is free for advertisers and agencies, publishers are charged a 5 % fee tied to advertiser...
The episode explores the mysterious destruction of the Georgia Guidestones, a massive granite monument often dubbed "America's Stonehenge" that bore inscriptions in eight languages offering controversial directives for humanity. Host and callers discuss theories about the perpetrators, ranging from political...
Podtential, founded by veteran radio executive Wade Kingsley, has launched a growth platform for independent podcasters. The service centers on a proprietary diagnostic tool called PRO that evaluates 100 data points across ambition, concept, audience, content, marketing and commercial strategy....
The Australian Podcast Ranker, now powered by CRA and Triton Digital, shows Mamamia Out Loud retaining the February top spot with 982,235 listeners. New Demos+ tools expand audience metrics beyond age and gender to include spending habits, travel frequency and...
Culture Capital, an Australian podcast exploring leadership, accountability and workplace culture, has joined the iHeartRadio network. Co‑hosted by human‑rights lawyer Prabha Nandagopal and BlackCard CEO Mundanara Bayles, the series blends legal, executive and First Nations perspectives to expose the gap...
Oscars viewership fell to 17.9 million, a 9 percent decline from last year, ending a four‑year ratings rise. The drop coincided with similar declines at the Grammys and Golden Globes, marking the first simultaneous fall for all three major award shows. Conan...
ARD launched ARD Sounds on 9 March 2026, a free app that consolidates radio, podcasts, on‑demand audio and live sport from Germany’s public‑service broadcasters. The platform replaces the ARD Audiothek and has already been installed on 5.6 million devices worldwide. It offers extensive...
Reddit has partnered with ad‑tech firm Pacvue to let advertisers buy and track Reddit campaigns directly within Pacvue’s management platform. The integration adds Reddit to Pacvue’s suite, which already supports over 100 retail media networks and serves more than 70,000...
YouTube has rolled out its Jewels livestream gifting system to Korean users, following earlier launches in the United States and Canada. Jewels are an in‑app currency that lets viewers purchase digital stickers, which appear in chat and generate Rubies for...
Actus Digital is unveiling major upgrades to its Actus X platform at NAB Show 2026, including native ATSC 3.0 monitoring with A3SA encryption, a sub‑second browser‑based multiviewer, and AI‑driven automation for compliance and reporting. The new features let broadcasters decrypt and analyze...
At the 2026 NAB Show, AWS will unveil Elemental Inference, the first fully‑managed service that layers AI onto live‑video encoding to produce mobile‑first vertical streams. The solution automatically detects action in a live feed and reformats 16:9 content for smartphones...
The FCC concluded that Charlottesville’s low‑power FM station WXRK(LP) violated underwriting announcement rules but avoided a monetary fine by agreeing to a compliance plan. This decision resolves the fifth case stemming from a Virginia LPFM “coop” that shared facilities and...
The China Show's @Laowhy86 reveals how millions of Chinese citizens disguise dissent as puns, memes, and mythical creatures to dodge censors. Notes https://jordanharbinger.com/1299 Apple https://buff.ly/Yc7PvW7 Spotify https://buff.ly/9mf3sB3 Overcast https://buff.ly/tzFoDAn
Spotify has added an “Exclusive Mode” audiophile feature for Windows PCs. Spotify Premium users can now get bit-perfect playback on the Windows app, with Mac support coming later https://t.co/nJB9g10ZYU
Dow Jones aims for $1 billion EBITDA within five years, a 70% increase from 2025, according to CEO Almar Latour. To reach the target, the company is rolling out a $7,499 “super consumer” bundle and accelerating direct‑to‑consumer products, while expanding high‑margin...
Fear porn also dominates local TV news. Past studies have found a correlation: The more local TV news you watch, the more you believe crime is rising. Social media amplifies this, bu the problem is old and is all about...
Suddenly, “CBS Evening News” is back where executives at the news division behind the show hoped never to return --- the show captured under 4M viewers last week, a level that spurred alarm when the program was under John Dickerson...
The U.S. House Science, Space and Technology Committee will markup the NOAA Weather Radio Modernization Act, introduced by Rep. Brian Babin. The bill authorizes $100 million for FY 2026 and an additional $20 million annually through 2031 to upgrade the 1,030‑station VHF network....
ABC is in crisis mode after abuse allegations against lead Taylor Frankie Paul on The Bachelorette. Cinnabon abruptly terminated its promotional partnership with the show and Hulu’s The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives, prompting emergency meetings among network executives. Production...
Inbox: Andy Lack, former chairman of NBC News and MSNBC and cofounder of Deep South Today, has made a new $7 million gift to expand investigative reporting and digital video journalism, building on more than $5 million contribution over past decade.
Tencent Music Entertainment (TME) announced that its Super VIP (SVIP) tier surpassed 20 million subscribers at the end of 2025, up from 15 million in Q2 2025 and 10 million a year earlier. SVIP now accounts for roughly 15.7% of TME’s 127.4 million paying...
🍔 NEW: The legendary food critic @tomsietsema is joining Beehiiv and is cooking up something special for subscribers https://t.co/m6ACgUY6lj #axiosmediatrends
It's not just that people are bad at this. It's that news media have consistently highlighted crime stories because they're profitable. That affects people. The news incentives are broken and toxic to democracy.
MyFitnessPal has launched a data‑driven advertising business, expanding beyond its legacy mobile display unit to include video, interstitials, full‑screen takeovers, newsletter sponsorships and branded recipe integrations. The platform will leverage its opt‑in food‑logging data—averaging 16 items per user per day—to...
Audacy is deepening its sports‑focused advertising strategy with a new webinar, “The Business of Sports Fandom,” scheduled for March 23, which will explore fandom avidity as a measurable marketing currency. The event features unnamed sports hosts and media experts and is...
Broadcast Radio has partnered with Promo Only to embed the music‑service catalog directly into its Myriad Playout system. The integration, slated for Myriad version 6.9, lets stations with a Promo Only subscription browse, preview and download new releases without leaving the...
The 98th Oscars attracted 17.86 million viewers, roughly 2 million fewer than the 19.69 million who tuned in for the 97th ceremony. Its Adults 18‑49 rating slipped to 3.92 from 4.54, though the broadcast remained the top primetime entertainment telecast of the 2025‑2026 season....
Build A Rocket Boy and IOI Partners have terminated their publishing agreement for the upcoming game MindsEye. Effective immediately, Build A Rocket Boy will assume full publishing responsibilities for the title. The shift moves the studio from a traditional publisher‑developer...
Local broadcasters are wrestling with a widening digital divide as linear TV revenues fall and audiences migrate online. Despite investments in CTV platforms such as Premion and Madhive, many stations remain anchored to legacy linear economics and lack digital‑first content....
