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Time named “The Guardians”—four individual journalists and the staff of the Capital Gazette in Annapolis, MD—as its 2018 Person of the Year. The four journalists are Jamal Khashoggi, the Washington Post columnist who was murdered in the Saudi Arabian consulate in Istanbul in October; Maria Ressa, chief executive of the Rappler news website in the Philippines and a fierce critic of Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte; and Wa Long and Kyaw Soe Oo, who have been held in jail for almost a year for their work to expose the mass killing of Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar. Five staff members of the Capital Gazette were killed when a gunman opened fire in their newsroom in June. The recipients were recognized for helping to expose what magazine called “the manipulation and the abuse of truth” occurring in countries around the world. “As we looked at the choices, it became clear that the manipulation and the abuse of truth is really the common thread in so many of this year’s major stories, from Russia to Riyadh to Silicon,” Time editor Edward Felsenthal said while announcing the award winner on Tuesday morning’s “Today” show.
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A Reuters report says that Sports Illustrated magazine will likely be acquired by Ulysses Lee “Junior” Bridgeman, who played for the Milwaukee Bucks and Los Angeles Clippers. After his basketball career ended, Bridgeman acquired various Chili’s and Wendy’s restaurants, which he sold for $400 million in 2016. Meredith announced its plans to sell Sports Illustrated, along with Time and Fortune, shortly after it acquired Time Inc. in January. Time was sold to Salesforce.com founder Marc Benioff for $190 million, and Thai businessman Chatchaval Jiaravanon paid $150 million for Fortune. While the deal is still being worked out, the Reuters report cites sources that indicate the selling price of SI will be around $150 million.
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Fox News has been the most tweeted about news outlet in the U.S. for 2018, according to Twitter News. Coming in at No. 2 is CNN, followed by The Hill, MSNBC and the New York Times. In addition to listing the news outlets, Twitter News also named the most popular reporter/host at each. Sean Hannity is at top of Fox’s roster in that regard, and Jake Tapper is the most tweeted-about reporter/host at CNN. Joe Concha takes the top spot at The Hill, and Kyle Griffin and Maggie Haberman are most popular at MSNBC and the Times. In Twitter’s list of the Most Influential Men on Twitter 2018, president Trump did not do quite as well as his favorite news source. In that ranking, the president took second place, falling behind English singer/songwriter Liam Payne, formerly of the boy band One Direction. And close behind the president is his predecessor, Barack Obama, who came in at No. 4.
Versant Media Group, the NBCUniversal cable TV spin-off, today reported its first financial results as 2025 revenues dipped 5.3 percent to $6.7B and standalone EBITDA dropped 9.1 percent to $2.2B.
Trump Media & Technology Group is discussing a spin-off of the Truth Social platform following the expected closing of its $6B merger deal with TAE Technologies... Condé Nast sells off Them, the digital LGBTQ-focused platform it launched in 2017, to Equalpride, publisher of Out, The Advocate, Out Traveler, Health PLUS Wellness and Pride.com... CBS News has parted ways with longevity influencer Peter Attia, one of the 19 contributors that editor-in-chief Bari Weiss brought on as part of her plan to present a wider variety of voices on the platform. 
Symbolic.ai forms a partnership with News Corp to begin using the company’s AI-native publisher platform in the newsrooms of News Corp publications to augment research, writing and publishing... Mediaite launches a newsletter that promises to give readers a summary of—media newsletters... The Fund for American Studies launches the Journalism Excellence Fellowship, a program that will provide promising young journalists the opportunity to work alongside top writers, reporters, and media professionals.
The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, which has roots going back to 1786, is going out of business, the paper’s owners, Block Communications, announced on Jan. 7... GQ editor Will Welch is stepping down to take on a new Paris-based role with the musician Pharrell, who is also men’s creative director at Louis Vuitton... Semafor says it has raised $30 million on a $330 million valuation, following its first profitable year. 
The Walt Disney Company and OpenAI reach an agreement that will make a set of more than 200 animated, masked and creature characters from Disney, Marvel, Pixar and Star Wars available for use by Sora, OpenAI’s short-form generative AI video platform... CBS News editor-in-chief Bari Weiss has moved Tony Dokoupil, a co-host at “CBS Mornings” since 2019, into the anchor’s chair for the “CBS Evening News,” following the departure of John Dickerson and Maurice DuBois... USA Today editor-in-chief Caren Bohan has left the paper.
