NBCU’s Linda Yaccarino in Talks for Twitter CEO

Twitter is worth only about one-third of what Elon Musk and 19 co-investors paid to acquire it last fall, according to a new disclosure by one of its investors.

Brian Steinberg Senior TV Editor CNN will shift the bulk of its operations behind its Spanish-language efforts to Mexico City, scaling back production of content for linear television in favor of work aimed at reaching a younger audience that favors mobile video. The move is likely to mean the elimination of jobs in Miami and Atlanta, but will also result in a ramp-up of jobs in Mexico and Los Angeles, where CNN will aim to add more than staffers, according to a person familiar with the plans, which were disclosed to employees Thursday afternoon. CNN CEO Chris Licht had nodded to the future of the Spanish-language network in November at a town-hall meeting. At issue is how to maintain outreach to Spanish-speaking viewers at a time when the economics of big media companies are under intense scrutiny. CNN and its corporate parent, Warner Bros. Discovery, have already cut operations, but the question of how to keep CNN en Espanol under such conditions has been under debate for some time. In the past, discussions had been underway to shut down the cable network, which has only limited distribution of around nine million in the United States.

Elon Musk basically confirmed today that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is set to announce his candidacy for the 2024 U.S. presidential election on Twitter tomorrow in an interview with the platform’s owner himself.

New Twitter CEO Linda Yaccarino is acknowledging the impending competition coming her way this summer as Instagram works on a text-based app.

Elon Musk‘s new feature for Twitter Blue subscribers — the ability to upload two-hour videos — has been used for film piracy.On Thursday (May 8), the owner of the social media platform announced that Twitter Blue subscribers would now be able to post 120-minute-long (8GB) videos.Shortly after the announcement, one verified user took advantage of the new feature and uploaded Shrek The Third in its entirety.The post currently sits at the top of the replies to Musk’s initial tweet. However, the video upload has since been disabled “in response to a report by the copyright owner.”Other users have since been taking advantage of the feature to share more copyright-infringed videos, such as movies, full sports matches and concert events.fuck it.

Brian Steinberg Senior TV Editor CBS is out; Netflix is in. Nothing encapsulates the tumult in television these days more than the fact that CBS, one of the pillars of network television, has decided not to attend the industry’s traditional upfront week — when media giants make glitzy programming presentations to prospective advertisers — while Netflix will make its debut. A year ago, when Netflix announced it would launch a subscriber tier supported by advertising, it was a seismic event in the history of the industry’s leading streamer. But so far, there’s been no quaking on Madison Avenue.

Brian Steinberg Senior TV Editor On his Fox News program, Tucker Carlson would often declare himself “the sworn enemy of lying, pomposity, smugness and group think.” So now he wants to launch a show on Twitter? The social-media platform has given millions of people the ability to express themselves and communicate in ways they never could before, but it has also become a haven for bullying, tribalism and disinformation. Carlson may become part of the venue’s latest effort to keep traffic flowing even as many advertisers keep more than an arm’s length away. Figuring out how to handle Carlson could be one of the first challenges for Linda Yaccarino, who has been named Twitter’s new CEO. The former NBCUniversal ad-sales chief knows what it takes to line up blue-chip sponsorships at scale. But doing that on behalf of Carlson may be a mission impossible. HisFox News show suffered from a dearth of mainstream national advertisers, despite the show’s high ratings. After recent revelations about the host’s use of racist and misogynist language, disclosed in documents tied to Dominion Voting Systems’ defamation litigation against Fox News, Twitter’s new bosswould have to hunt far and wide for any traditional sponsors willing to associate Carlson with their brands.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor Elon Musk, after dramatically slashing Twitter’s headcount following his takeover of the social platform, said the company will try to rehire some of them — acknowledging that the job cuts were too deep. Musk has slashed Twitter’s headcount by about 80%, from 7,800 to about 1,500, as he has attempted to cut costs and get the company in the black. “Some people who were let go probably shouldn’t have been,” Musk said during an interview with CNBC anchor David Faber following the 2023 Tesla annual shareholder meeting Tuesday at the car maker’s headquarters in Austin, Texas. “Desperate times call for desperate measures… Unfortunately, if you do it fast, there are some babies who will be thrown out,” Musk said. Twitter now will probably try to rehire some of the Twitter employees that were let go, he said.

Elon Musk welcomed Twitter’s new CEO into the fold as he held court at Tesla’s annual meeting in Austin today, sounding genuinely relieved to offload some of the burden of running the beleaguered social media company he reluctantly acquired last fall.

Michael Schneider Variety Editor at Large From the moment an animated “Ted” opened the NBCUniversal upfront, voiced by Seth MacFarlane prior to the writers strike, it was clear this was going to be an abbreviated event. For starters, until a week ago, this was still going to be Linda Yaccarino’s Radio City Music Hall show. But with Yaccarino off running Twitter (“Ted” making a crack about the crazies now at Twitter earned the biggest inadvertent laugh of the morning), it was up to Mark Marshall, NBCU interim chairman, global advertising & partnerships, to make the pitch to advertisers. “In all of our conversations leading up today, regardless of client or category, there has been one constant…this is going to be a very important year for your businesses,” Marshall said, counting 32 pharma launches, 60 auto releases (including 46 electric vehicles) and over 100 movie releases (“which puts us back to pre-pandemic levels”) this year. “We know this is a competitive year. And here at NBCUniversal, we are built for these moments.”

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer “I don’t know but I’ve been told, NBC has a heart that’s cold,” Writers Guild of America pickets shouted outside Radio City Music Hall Monday, making some noise about the writers strike in front of NBCUniversal’s upfront presentation to advertisers. Approximately 200 pickets, some members of SAG-AFTRA joining the WGA in solidarity, used other chants personalized for the occasion, including, “NBC, you’re no good, pay your writers like you should,” to try to get the attention of those in attendance at the event, which is used to launch NBC’s fall schedule and woo advertisers into spending their dollars on spots with NBCU brands. The WGA is on Day 14 of a strike after failing to ink a deal with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) before the clock ran out May 1.

Mark Lazarus, chairman of NBCUniversal Television and Streaming, wasn’t on the production call sheet until very recently for the company’s upfront at Radio City on Monday morning.

The NBCUniversal Upfront kicked off a week of events in New York amid a writers strike.

Brian Steinberg Senior TV Editor Plenty of money will be spent on TV ads during this year’s “upfront” — but probably not enough to fuel the economics of all the nation’s big media conglomerates. TV executives and media buyers usually can’t agree on much at this time of year, when U.S. TV networks try to sell the bulk of their advertising inventory in advance of their next cycle of programming. Buyers and CMOs insist TV advertising prices are too high, while TV sales honchos demand a premium for ads that are seen by more people all at once than commercials accompanying a random binge-watch or a YouTube influencer’s streamcast. In 2023, however, both types of hagglers are in agreement: Madison Avenue will greet the industry’s annual ad-sales session not with open wallets, but with tighter purse-strings.

Linda Yaccarino sent out her first tweets Saturday night since being named Twitter CEO, assuring the platform’s users that she is committed to the job and even sharing her aim of building “Twitter 2.0.”“I see I have some new followers,” Yaccarino tweeted to her more than 319, 000 followers along with a wave emoji. “I’m not as prolific as @elonmusk (yet!), but I’m just as committed to the future of this platform.

Todd Spangler NY Digital Editor In what may have been an highly unconventional job interview, NBCUniversal ad chief Linda Yaccarino hosted a discussion with Elon Musk about Twitter’s content policies and approach to working with marketers at an industry conference one month before Musk announced that he’d hired her as the social network’s CEO. The April 18 keynote conversation was billed as a talk about Musk’s “Twitter 2.0: From Conversations to Partnerships” at MMA Global’s Possible marketing event in Miami. Yaccarino told Musk that marketers want “protection for their ad campaigns,” with content moderation policies ensuring that “provocative speech” is properly labeled. She applauded Twitter’s announcement last month to promote “freedom of speech, not freedom of reach,” under which the company said it will limit the reach of tweets that violate policies concerning hateful conduct and violent speech.

Twitter has a new CEO.

Twitter has a new CEO.

Yaccarino, a graduate of Penn State University, served as the chair of global advertising and partnerships at NBCUniversal, acting as «the strategic and operational bridge across the entirety of NBCUniversal's global networks, properties, and business units,» according to her profile on LinkedIn. Her role involved monetizing the company's networks, digital and streaming platforms, distribution and commerce partnerships, and client relationships.