 Chris Aronson |
20th Century Fox film president of distribution Chris Aronson is one of the first executives to be let go in the wake of Disney’s takeover of a large chunk of Fox’s assets. Disney is also shuttering the Fox 2000 label, which specializes in mid-budget films that are primarily targeted at female moviegoers, according to a report in Variety. Employees are reportedly being informed department by department about their futures with the newly combined company, with some being told that they will keep their jobs over a transition period lasting either three or six months. The job cuts are one of the avenues toward the $2 billion in annual cost savings that Disney plans to make by 2021. In an email sent by Walt Disney Studios chairman and president Alan Bergman to Fox staff March 21, employees were warned that the integration of the two companies “would entail quite a bit of change,” adding that the company is “only at the beginning of the process.”
 Dan Peres |
Former Details editor-in-chief Dan Peres has been chosen by Bustle Digital Group to help resuscitate Gawker, the cheeky gossip site that was shuttered thanks to a lawsuit brought by pro wrestler Hulk Hogan and bankrolled by venture capitalist Peter Thiel. Bustle, which is mainly known for a group of digital properties that target millennial women, acquired the Gawker.com domain in July. At the time, CNN reported that Bustle CEO Bryan Goldberg paid about $1.5 million for the title after placing the winning bid at a bankruptcy auction. From what Peres told the New York Times, it seems that a watered-down version of the old Gawker is likely to be the result of the relaunch. “In the later years,” he told the Times, “they probably took things too far.” The relaunch is expected to take place later this year.
 |
The Reading Eagle Company, which has published the daily Reading Eagle newspaper since 1868, has filed for bankruptcy protection, according to MediaPost. The company says it intends to operate normally, publishing and broadcasting under bankruptcy rules while it conducts a search for a buyer. In addition to the Eagle, the company publishes the weekly South Schuylkill News, runs radio station WEEU 830 AM and owns Pretzel City Productions along with its commercial printing subsidiary REP. Reading Eagle president and CEO Peter D. Barbey was also the final owner of the Village Voice, which went out of business last fall.
Trump Media & Technology Group today reported a $58.2M net loss on $4.1M in 2023 revenues, a disclosure that drove its stock price down 22.6 percent to $47.96.
Barry Pollack, an attorney at Wall Street’s Harris St. Laurent & Wechsler, has registered Julian Assange as a client with the Justice Dept. “out of an abundance of caution.”
Paramount Global to slash 800 jobs in what chief executive Bob Bakish calls part of an effort to “return the company to earnings growth"... Rolling Stone editor-in-chief Noah Shachtman is exiting at the end of the month due to disagreements with chief executive Gus Wenner over the direction the magazine is taking... The New York Times broke the $1 billion barrier in annual revenue from digital subscriptions in 2023... Press Forward is investing more than $500 million to strengthen local newsrooms.
The majority of news articles are read within the first three days of publication, according to a recent report.
The Los Angeles Times gives pink slips to 115 people or 20 percent of its newsroom staff... TIME is also laying off about 30 employees, which is approximately 15 percent of its editorial staff... The Baltimore Banner, which was launched by Stewart Bainum in 2022 after he failed to buy the Baltimore Sun, added 500 subscribers per day in the three days following Sinclair Broadcast Group's deal to purchase the Sun.
Have a comment? Send it to 
No comments have been submitted for this story yet.