So this is just Trump extorting another propaganda network as a bribe like CBS, right?
And the contraction of ‘independent’ media continues. I expect CNN to get a MAGA apparatchik, like Bari Weiss at CBS, and the former will become another arm of ‘Fox News Lite.’ CNN has been going downhill for quite a while now, I expect this to be like falling off a cliff.
NPR and PBS have already been gutted.
Warner Bros will finance the sequel to ‘Melania.’ And HBO will run them both 24 hours a day. (Kidding, I think?)
I was specifically curious about John Oliver’s show so I looked it up. Apparently his contract runs out at the end of the year and he’s already said he’s not going to renew it? I have to wonder if that was a pre-existing decision or if he saw the writing on the wall a few months ago.
Damn it this pisses me off.
Warner Bros Discovery signed the deal with Paramount. It’s not great but there was no good outcome of this.
“It’s not great” is underselling this to the point of being wrong. It’s catastrophic. A 16 billion dollar company outbidded a 350 billion dollar company purely through corruption and political favors that will cost the America people far more than any dollar amount.
Edit: And the Saudi money / influence involved here too is going to end up being another way we’re all fucked.
Had Netflix won the bidding, it wouldn’t even have acquired CNN and other cable channels. They would have formed another company. And Netflix was willing to give Warner Bros movies only a limited theatrical release. IOW, neither bidder was ideal.
And yes, Paramount Skydance isn’t a big company but Larry Ellison is worth more than $200 billion so the money is there.
Yes and no.
Netflix shutting down movie theaters would have been bad for their employees.
CNN getting emasculated by Paramount is a big step in the process where a regime I dislike consolidates power over my country’s mass media.
The second one concerns me more.
And everyone who loves to watch movies. Netflix causing the death of movie theaters would be a terrible outcome.
But yes, both choices are awful.
Yeah the former is another bs corporate merger that will reduce choice and creativity.
The latter (which we got) is a significant step on the road to dictatorship 
Hmm, some movies will have a more limited theatrical release, versus fascists gain control of most of the mass media… yes… very tough