Business of Media
Amazon’s Twitch to cut 500 employees, about 35% of staff
Amazon.com Inc.’s live streaming site Twitch is cutting 35% of its staff, or about 500 workers, Twitch chief executive officer Dan Clancy said in a blog post Wednesday morning. The layoffs are the latest in a series of job reductions there, reports Bloomberg’s Cecilia D’Anastasio.
The cuts, which Bloomberg News earlier reported on Tuesday, come amid concerns over losses at Twitch and after several top executives left the company in the span of a few months.
See also: Twitch co-founder Emmett Shear announces he is stepping down as CEO after 16 years
Alan Jones’ right-wing TV station asks ex-Seven News boss to be CEO
Alan Jones’ online broadcaster has asked former Seven news director Jason Morrison to be its new chief executive, even as questions remain about whether the former 2GB Radio star will return to the airwaves after allegations of inappropriate behaviour over many decades, reports The Australian Financial Review’s Sam Buckingham-Jones.
See also: Luke Grant moves to 2GB Weekend Mornings, replacing Michael McLaren
Amazon’s Video Ad Push Expected to Generate an Extra $5 Billion in Revenue
Amazon.com Inc.’s push into video advertising will boost annual revenue by as much as $5 billion, according to a Bank of America analysis, mostly generated by new television-style commercials on Prime Video, reports Bloomberg’s Spencer Soper.
See also: Amazon US offers low ad prices to get brands on board for Prime Video Ads launch
Ads on Amazon’s streaming service will start appearing in North America on Jan. 29 and internationally on Feb 5. To receive ad-free content, North American subscribers will have to pay an additional $3 per month.
Skydance Backers Explore All-Cash Deal to Gain Control of Paramount
Shari Redstone, whose family controls Paramount Global, has entertained several offers over the years to buy its famed movie studio. Skydance Media CEO David Ellison is eyeing something more ambitious, reports The Wall Street Journal’s Jessica Toonkel and Miriam Gottfied.
See also: Impact in Australia if Warner Bros Discovery and Paramount pursued a merger
Schwartz Media sells The Politics to former Junkee boss
Schwartz Media has sold off The Monthly’s popular daily politics column, The Politics, to former Betoota Advocate publisher and Daily Aus investor Piers Grove for an unknown sum. It is understood the sale went through in early November 2023, reports Crikey’s Daanyl Saeed.
Calvin Klein ad with singer FKA twigs banned for making her ‘stereotypical sexual object’
A Calvin Klein advertisement featuring the British singer has been banned by the UK’s Advertising Standards Authority, on the grounds that it presented her as “a stereotypical sexual object”, reports The Guardian’s Ben Beaumont-Thomas.
The poster featured the singer with a shirt draped across her body, revealing part of one breast and the side of her buttocks, along with the caption “Calvins or nothing”.
Entertainment
Baby Yoda heads to big screen in new ‘Star Wars’ movie
Baby Yoda’s next adventure will take the young alien, seen only on a hit Star Wars streaming series, to movie theatres, reports Reuters.
The first feature film inspired by The Mandalorian series will start production this year, Walt Disney’s Lucasfilm said on Tuesday. The title character, a helmeted bounty hunter, and his companion, known as Baby Yoda or Grogu, debuted on the Disney+ streaming service in 2019.
Social Media
Musk’s X cuts creating ‘perfect storm’ for online hate, eSafety commissioner warns
Social media platform X, formerly Twitter, has more than halved the number of moderators it employs since being acquired by billionaire Elon Musk in 2022, a new transparency report from Australia’s online safety watchdog has revealed, reports The Sydney Morning Herald’s Calum Jaspan.
Threads vs Bluesky: Meta’s Twitter rival appears to be winning with publishers
Six months after it launched, many publishers continue to actively post on Threads despite the Meta-owned platform’s ambivalence to news, reports Press Gazette’s Bron Maher.
Fellow X/Twitter rival Bluesky, which was launched in February by a group including Twitter founder Jack Dorsey, has not been nearly as widely adopted by the news industry.