| | | | | Why are Rio ratings weak? | | The big Q for TV execs this week: What is causing relatively low television viewership of this year's Summer Olympics?
The storylines are outstanding -- as Michael Phelps and Simone Manuel demonstrated tonight. But nightly viewership is down from the 2012 games in London, particularly in the key 18- to 49-year-old demographic.
"The way we're watching television has changed," Amplifi VP Billie Gold told Frank Pallotta. It's not that Olympic live-streaming is eating into the Nielsen numbers -- streaming on NBCOlympics.com represents just a tiny fraction of overall viewership. But overall streaming is affecting the TV ratings -- because people can just watch clips online. Or skip the games and watch something on Netflix instead. (Or watch campaign coverage.) Read Frank's full story here... | | | Crunching the digital #'s | | Frank did the math, and it's fascinating. While NBC is setting internal records for its Rio live-streams, this mode of viewing is not cannibalizing traditional TV in a meaningful way. On Thursday morning NBC said that its live streaming of the games had "topped 1 billion minutes" after five days of competition. A press release called it "unprecedented for an Olympics," which is true.
But NBC had 1 billion minutes worth of Olympic viewership during just a half an hour of TV coverage on Tuesday night. Here's how the math works: Nielsen publicizes average viewership per minute for channels like NBC. Tuesday night's prime time coverage on NBC averaged 33.4 million viewers -- the best Rio result yet for the network -- over a three hour and 44 minute broadcast. Extrapolating from the data, there were roughly 7.5 billion minutes viewed through NBC's TV coverage on Tuesday night. More...
-- Frank will have more about the #'s on CNN International, Friday at 6am...
| | | The Daily Beast removes article | | Tonight The Daily Beast retracted a widely-condemned article by Nico Hines titled "The Other Olympic Sport in Rio: Swiping."
"Reliable" producer Lee Alexander emails: In the article, Himes wrote about all the action taking place at the Summer games... the kind of events that viewers at home don't get see. Slate's Mark Joseph Stern said it was a "uniquely disgusting and irresponsible entry into the tired genre" of Grindr stunts. "Hines entices his (often closeted) subjects under false pretenses; effectively outs several closeted athletes who live in repressive countries; then writes about the whole thing in a tone of mocking yet lurid condescension."
At first the site simply revised the story by removing identifying info about the gay athletes. But that was not sufficient. Around 9pm the site removed the article altogether -- a step that it called "unprecedented but necessary" for the news organization.
"As a newsroom, we succeed together and we fail together, and this was a failure on The Daily Beast as a whole, not a single individual," the new "Note From the Editors" states. "The article was not intended to do harm or degrade members of the LGBT community, but intent doesn't matter, impact does. Our hope is that removing an article that is in conflict with both our values and what we aspire to as journalists will demonstrate how seriously we take our error. We screwed up. We will do better."
There's more to come on this story... We'll have a full story at CNNMoney.com/Media/ overnight... | | | -- Staci Kramer tweets: "The Daily Beast needs to do more than apologize. It has to figure out why any staffer -- reporter or editor -- thought this was ok and fix it..." | | | Huffington-less Huffington Post | | Arianna Huffington is leaving The Huffington Post. She says her new health and wellness startup, Thrive Global, demands her full-time attention. "I really thought I could do both, but as we started building it up, I realized that it really needed my full attention," she told the WSJ's Lukas Alpert in her only interview today.
Huffington will depart in the next few weeks. Thrive Global will launch in November. The timing is noteworthy since HuffPost's parent, AOL, is about to go through some significant changes. With AOL's parent Verizon buying Yahoo, the looming integration is expected to affect HuffPost. Her exit "was inevitable" once the Yahoo deal happened, a former top editor told me, calling it "years in the making. Here's my story...
-- HuffPost's Michael Calderone: "Arianna focusing primarily on health/well-being not a surprise, but abrupt departure news -- during election -- was..."
-- Margaret Sullivan is right: "In today's digital media world, HuffPo feels almost ancient, although it is less than a dozen years old..."
-- Emily Bell's column: "Like her or loathe her, Arianna Huffington woke the news industry up" | | Dylan Byers emails his latest deep dive into digital media: CBSN, the free digital news network from CBS News, has become a major selling point for the network in the last two years. But across the industry, there is great skepticism. Execs doubt that the has any meaningful revenue projection, and are confounded by the network's decision to pour money and resources into what they describe as an archaic business strategy with little chance of turning a profit.
"I totally get that this is their pet project and they're very excited about it. But they've done precisely what you shouldn't do," one broadcast news executive told me. "They've created a sub-standard cable network, stuck the most old-school television product into the digital space, unchanged, and just hoped for the best."
CBS News prez David Rhodes takes issue with this view. Future audiences are going to expect streaming content online, on mobile and on over-the-top services, he says, and CBS is positioning itself to be the leader in that space. Read Dylan's full report here... | | | NYT on "harassment crisis" at Fox | | Inside the Fox News newsroom, "employees are still on edge about what new stories might surface and which executives could be ensnared," Grynbaum/Steel/Ember wrote in Thursday's paper. "If the Murdoch family wanted to leap ahead of this scandal, it is now at risk of falling behind."
Key graf: "Some people at Fox News are asking if meaningful change can occur inside a workplace still stocked with loyalists to Mr. Ailes. 'People are waiting to see,' one staff member said...." | | | Trump comments on Ailes again | | | Donald Trump says Ailes is NOT advising his campaign. The statement came in a new interview with Newsmax today. "I speak to Roger on occasion now," he said. Trump praised Ailes for doing "an amazing job building Fox, an amazing job," but had no comment on the Gretchen Carlson lawsuit... | | | Ailes, Denton, Huffington, VandeHei... | | | Dylan puts this year's ends-of-eras into perspective: | | | Hugh Grant on phone hacking | | This week there have been a lot of references to the News Corp. phone hacking scandal, with some suggestions that the Ailes story bears similarities to what happened in Britain. So this Chloe Melas interview with Hugh Grant, one of the hacking victims, is definitely worth checking out. Grant "has spent the past five years lobbying for stricter press laws in Britain," Chloe reports. "He's gotten heavily involved with Hacked Off, an organization trying to end unethical practices at British publications."
"Some newspapers in Britain have become closer to these kind of mafia families. They wield an incredible power. They choose our governments, they choose our prime ministers and they live above the law," Grant told her. Read the rest here... | | -- This weekend the entire NYT Mag is devoted to a single story, "the product of some 18 months of reporting," about the fracturing of the Arab world... (NYT)
-- Nomiki Konst's Saturday morning radio show "The Filter" is expanding: It'll now air weeknights from 9pm til midnight on SiriusXM's Progress channel...
-- Fusion's Laura Feinstein writes about "that time I interviewed to be Ivanka Trump's assistant..." (Fusion) | | | Claire Atkinson just posted this story: "Look who's talking. Again. Viacom Chief Executive Philippe Dauman and the media conglomerate's owners — Sumner and Shari Redstone — have restarted negotiations aimed at ending a months-long feud." She says "several key Viacom board members have moved closer to supporting a move to name a new CEO..." | | | Colbert's election night plans on Showtime | | | Sandra Gonzalez emails from TCA Press Tour: Showtime is closing in on a deal to book Stephen Colbert for a live comedy special on election night. Network boss David Nevins called it a "half announcement." Deal isn't done yet, but he said all parties are game. Plus, Colbert isn't working on that night for CBS, so he's free. Nevins said the special will be Colbert "unfettered" and that Colbert promised him he'd "say a couple of curse words..." | | What Pharoah and Killam are doing post-"SNL" | | More from Sandra: Showtime has cast "SNL" alums Jay Pharoah and Taran Killam in a pair of pilots. The two were just let go from "SNL" earlier this week. Nevins said they had been in discussions with the actors for the last month and were "prepared to work around their SNL schedules," knowing they were going into their final years.
"Our scheduling got easier when they were released by the show," he said. Pharoah is starring in a pilot for a half-hour comedy executive produced by Jamie Foxx and "Californication" showrunner Tom Kapinos called "White Famous." Killam, meanwhile, will star in a comedy from "Friday Night Lights" creator Jason Katims... | | | "Post-fact-check culture" | | | On "Legal View" Thursday afternoon, when another guest commented that we're in a "post-fact-check culture," I had to jump in. That may very well be true, I said. But it's up to the viewers of the show and the readers of this newsletter to decide. Are we collectively going to accept a "post-fact-check culture?" | | | Programming note: Bill Carter and I will be on "New Day" Friday at 7:40am... | | | Trump is winning... his campaign to become a conservative media celebrity | | | "Donald Trump is running a top-notch campaign to be a conservative media celebrity. Unfortunately for him, and especially for the Republican Party, this isn't the same thing as running a good, or even minimally competent, campaign for president," Rich Lowry writes for Politico. Lowry notes that "there have been reports that Trump is considering starting his own TV network after the election..." | | | Trump's latest fund-raising letter | | | Michael Calderone notes that Trump is explicitly raising money off of liberal media "lies" in this latest fund-raising letter: | | | The campaign is also promoting this "Mainstream Media Accountability Survey." Is it just a way to gain more email subscribers, or will the campaign put these survey findings to use? | | | "Why Are The Media Obsessed With Trump's Controversies And Not Clinton's?" | | A clear-headed assessment by NPR's Ron Elving:
Trump "is nearly always making more news — at least by our traditional journalistic definition. He says and does things that are different, that stand out, that surprise and even alter the landscape... Witnessing his debates or speeches is far more compelling than hearing about the possible implications of old emails from another decade... Talking about the potential for corruption in some of Clinton's practices is serious business, but it is dull compared to watching one's daily dose of the Donald." Read more... | | | Why Thomas Gibson has been suspended from "Criminal Minds" | | "Criminal Minds" vet Thomas Gibson "has been suspended for two episodes," THR reports. What happened? He says "there were creative differences on the set and a disagreement. I regret that it occurred. We all want to work together as a team to make the best show possible. We always have and we always will."
His character is being written out of two episodes... And "the matter is under investigation by human resources..." THR says Gibson had a dispute with a writer while directing an episode... "Tempers on both sides flared with Gibson said to have instinctively reacted to aggression and kicked the writer." Read more... | | | "The Get Down" premieres Friday | | Baz Luhrmann's Netflix musical drama "The Get Down" starts streaming on Friday. It's "a bit of a mess," but "its infectious energy, young talent and period setting provide plenty of upside," Brian Lowry writes. Read his full review here...
-- Interesting: "In a bit of a departure, Netflix will split the 12 episodes into two six-episode binges, a byproduct of the program's somewhat tortured production schedule..."
--Lowry says "The Get Down" could connect "with a subset of Netflix subscribers not readily served by many of its other original programs by wedding its predominantly African-American and Latino cast with music and nostalgia. Under the shadowy rules of the premium-TV game, that's one of the ways a streaming star is born..." | | -- Disney just released a new trailer for "Rogue One: A Star Wars Story." Frank Pallotta has the details and the video here... (CNN)
-- "Hamilton" has made history hot. So is it any surprise that the fall TV season has more than a few historical shows debuting? Call it the "Hamilton" effect, Lisa France says... (CNN)
-- Also via Lisa: Landing on the September cover of Vogue may not seem to back up Kendall Jenner's assertion that she doesn't crave the limelight. But the reality star/model says she is 'superdifferent' from her sisters... (CNN) | | Rihanna to accept VMA Vanguard award | | | Chloe Melas reports: Rihanna will receive MTV's highest honor at the VMAs, the Michael Jackson Video Vanguard Award. MTV announced the news today... The show is on August 28 at MSG... | | "Ocean's Eight" will have all-female lead cast | | | Speaking of Rihanna, Frank Pallotta emails: Another grand caper is underway, but this time with an all-female crew of thieves. Rihanna, Mindy Kaling, Helena Bonham Carter and rapper Awkwafina are close to deals to join Sandra Bullock, Anne Hathaway and Cate Blanchett for the Warner Bros. heist film "Ocean's Eight." The cast features some of the most famous actresses in Hollywood -- and some of the most award winning. Bullock, Blanchett, and Hathaway have all won Oscars. Read more... | | | What do you like about today's newsletter -- and what do you think we should improve? Email your feedback to reliablesources@cnn.com. We'll be back tomorrow... | | | Get Reliable Sources, a comprehensive summary of the most important media news, delivered to your inbox every afternoon. | | | | | |
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