• Join Puck

    Directly Supporting Authors

    A new economic model in which writers are also partners in the business.

    Personalized Subscriptions

    Customize your settings to receive the newsletters you want from the authors you follow.

    Stay in the Know

    Connect directly with Puck talent through email and exclusive events.

  • What is puck? Newsletters Authors Podcasts Events Gift Puck Careers

SPORTS
&
MEDIA

Can Zaz & Shari Go the Distance?

News and notes on the topics everyone is fulminating over as the holidays set in: Zazmount possibilities, Will Lewis’s forthcoming tenure at The Washington Post, and early grumblings from CNN on the Thompson era.
Dylan Byers • December 23, 2023
Dylan Byers • December 21, 2023
Zazmount Global & WaPo Gridlock
A combination of WBD and Paramount, even with a sale of various cable assets, would offer Zaz a true gem in many ways.
News and notes on the biggest stories roiling the industry: the Zaz-Shari deal possibilities and Will Lewis’s arrival at the union-torn, money-losing Washington Post.
Dylan Byers • December 16, 2023
The Best of the Times, The Worst of the Times
James Bennet, the undeniably brilliant former New York Times Opinion editor, was ousted from the paper in June 2020 after greenlighting Arkansas Senator Tom Cotton’s op-ed calling for military intervention to quell the civil unrest following the murder of George Floyd.
News and notes on James Bennet’s biblically long screed against the Gray Lady, A.G., illiberalism, and more.
Most media executives see an obvious ceiling to Tucker’s ambitions, with Beck, Megyn, and O’Reilly providing ample evidence of the limits to going it alone in the subscription-based creator economy.
Dylan Byers • December 13, 2023
The Tucker Rule
TCN, Tucker’s new $9-a-month streaming service, may portend the limits of the direct-to-consumer media economy—and suggest whether there is, indeed, life after cable stardom.
Chris Licht emerged at the event under the banner of his own company, Licht Media.
Dylan Byers • December 9, 2023
Licht of Arabia
News and notes emanating from Hudson Yards: clues about Chris Licht’s next venture, a CNN-ABC debate beef, and Charles Barkley’s round mound of rough ratings.
EBITDA positive or not, it’s estimated by some executives at the company that Condé Nast has lost significant sums during Lynch’s four and a half years at the helm, albeit for some decisions made before his time.
Lauren Sherman • December 7, 2023
Slouching Toward One World Trade
A prolonged and botched layoff cycle has called attention to the financial engineering and further brand dilution of Si Newhouse’s former empire. As usual, the chorus of discontent appears to be a mixture of agita and inevitability, along with typical finger-pointing.
David Zaslav
Dylan Byers • December 7, 2023
A Very Zaz X-mas
News and notes on the media amid the season of yuletide gossip: WBD theories, CNN hypotheticals, and more Zuckerology.
Mark Thompson
Dylan Byers • December 2, 2023
The Mark Thompson Plan
CNN’s new boss has been working on a 2024 business plan that will restructure the network around a multiplatform philosophy. The plan, which will go into effect next quarter, will move significantly more resources into CNN’s digital efforts.
Jeff Zucker speaks at the 2019 Mirror Awards at Cipriani 42nd Street on June 13, 2019 in New York City
Dylan Byers • November 30, 2023
Zucker in Deal Heat
The C.E.O. of RedBird IMI took a romp through London Town—holding court at the Berkeley, making bold declarations about editorial independence, meeting with associates, winning hearts and minds—to try to bring home the fund’s acquisition of The Telegraph.
Was Amazon’s Black Friday game a gimmick, or the future of sports?
Julia Alexander • November 29, 2023
Amazon’s NFL Retail Therapy Experiment
What Prime’s $100 million bet on a Black Friday game portends for the future of live sports on streaming.
Jeff Zucker, the former NBCUniversal C.E.O. and CNN president who is now C.E.O. of the Abu Dhabi-backed joint investment vehicle Redbird IMI.
Dylan Byers • November 24, 2023
Lord Zucker & The Great Telegraph Chase
Jeff Zucker, Gerry Cardinale, and Sheikh Mansour are spending $1.4 billion to take over The Telegraph, presumably introducing the business to the U.S. and making it the thinking person’s Daily Mail. Is it a brilliant move, or might it go the way of other recent legacy reboots?
Fairly or unfairly, David Zaslav has become a convenient caricature for the various pitfalls of legacy media businesses.
Dylan Byers • November 16, 2023
Zaz Lit 101 & Roger “The Grinch” Lynch
News and notes from around the media industry before everyone begins to disappear for the holidays.
Some Univision journliasts saw the Trump interview as glaring evidence of a broader effort by their new parent company—which has close ties to Trump and his son-in-law, Jared Kushner—to curry favor with the former president.
Dylan Byers • November 10, 2023
The Kushner Connection
A softball interview with Trump is unnerving staff inside Univision, and inside the White House, as the formerly left-leaning Spanish-language network—now under new leadership, and with surprising new Republican allies—undergoes a dramatic pivot to the right.
Sally Buzbee
Dylan Byers • November 9, 2023
When Will Met Sally
News and notes on Will Lewis’s maiden voyage at the Post and Kevin Mayer’s return to the podium.
Mark Thompson will lewis
Dylan Byers • November 3, 2023
The English Patients
News and notes on the regime change at CNN and the Murdoch baggage following The Washington Post’s presumptive next C.E.O.
Jeff Bezos solicited six-page memos from five semi-finalists and conducted one-on-one Zoom interviews with each of them.
Dylan Byers • November 1, 2023
Bezos’s Bummer, Condé Woes & Laurene’s New New Thing
News and notes from around the media business—a WaPo surprise, a legacy bloodletting, and Emerson Collective’s latest investment in the space.
The inevitability of a Paramount sale is something Shari’s fellow media executives have taken for granted since she seized the reins of CBS and Viacom from her father, Sumner.
Dylan Byers • October 27, 2023
Zaz-Shari, Bezos’ Note & ABC News Blues
News and notes from around the media industry.
In recent days, Bezos has met with the final two candidates for the Post publisher and C.E.O. position.
Dylan Byers • October 25, 2023
The Bezos Bake-off Enters Its Final Days
I’m told that Bezos is expected to make his WaPo C.E.O. selection in a matter of days. Barring any unforeseen crisis or change of heart, he will formally announce the new leader no later than next month.