Media Beat: November 03, 2022

By David Farrell

HD Radio footprint expands In Canada with Pattison Media deal

HD Radio is expanding into Western Canada under a deal between technology provider Xperi and Pattison Media.

Pattison’s adoption of HD Radio will begin in Vancouver, BC with the hot AC/talk hybrid “102.7 Now” CKPK, which has made headlines in the U.S. for its combination of talk and music that promises “Not radio you’ve heard before. No-hype, real, honest, UN-radio.” CKPK’s HD2 channel will air “The Peak,” the alternative format carried on the main 102.7 channel until the “Now! Radio” launch in July. – Inside Radio

Competition Bureau seeks ‘full block’ of Rogers, Shaw deal

Sparks flew between lawyers at a case conference Tuesday, where a lawyer for the competition authority insisted it was still seeking the “full block” of the original deal that it first sought in May, and the cable giants’ representatives arguing that the tribunal should assess a revised transaction that would see Shaw’s Freedom Mobile wireless unit sold to Quebecor Inc. subsidiary Vidéotron for $2.85 billion. – Barbara Shecter, Financial Post

TekSavvy reveals CRTC chair Ian Scott’s multiple mystery meetings

Some of the undocumented, off-site meetings were connected to telecom execs and consultants. – Jonathan Lamont, Mobile Syrup

OAB opening session discussed the returning success of radio in Australia

Elon Musk’s disastrous week on Twitter

In his first hours as Twitter’s imperator, Musk has been like a man who woke up in the middle of the night in a new house, fumbling around in the dark and bumping into walls while grasping for a light switch. Musk—who is already writing letters to advertisers laden with executive-speak about brand safety—has also spent the weekend trying to fend off concerns that his acquisition of the platform has activated and energized trolls and neo-Nazis who are tweeting the N-word in celebration of his purchase. Although Musk wants famous users to think he’s not the problem, he’s also undermining this by posting content dredged from the far-right fever swamps. In the process, he’s finding out that it’s hard to have it both ways as a social-media CEO … – Damon Berez & Charlie Warzel, The Atlantic

Mark Zuckerberg’s metaverse is a joke not shared by investors

The other comedy in US tech land – aside from Elon Musk’s realisation that Twitter isn’t worth $44bn – is happening at Meta, the restyled Facebook. The joke in that case is on the shareholders. Having hailed Mark Zuckerberg as a visionary, and having given him effective control on that basis through a form of “golden share” voting structure, investors were shocked to discover it is impossible to sack the boss when he pursues visions they do not like.

Meta’s share price is down 73% this year to its lowest level since 2015 for reasons that go beyond the general big tech sell-off. The stock has fallen so far because Zuckerberg is squandering tens of billions of the company’s dollars on building his mysterious “metaverse” … – Nils Pratley, The Guardian UK

Amazon Music for Prime Members expands to 100M songs — but shifts from on-demand to shuffle-mode play

Amazon, looking to reel in more members to Prime, is dramatically boosting the number of songs available under the membership program — from 2 million previously to its full catalog of 100 million tracks. Amazon Music for Prime also is adding “hundreds of thousands” of podcast episodes ad-free, which has been the No. 1 request from customers who are podcast listeners, including Wondery’s entire slate of shows.

But there’s a catch.

With the expanded song library, Prime members listening on Amazon Music will mostly be limited to shuffle-play mode, based on artist, album or playlist, whereas previously the 2 million songs were available to stream on-demand … – Todd Spangler, Variety

TikTok and Instagram are the only social networks that are growing as news sources for Americans

Adults under 30 are the most likely group to say they regularly get news on TikTok. About a quarter of Americans in this age group (26%) say they regularly get news there, higher than in 2021 and 2020. This compares with 10% of those ages 30 to 49, 4% of those 50 to 64 and just 1% of those 65 and older. – Katerina Eva Matsa, Pew Research Center

U.S. households with Live Pay-TV service subscriptions decline to 66%

The number of U.S. TV households with access to live pay-TV, whether via cable, satellite, Telco or an internet vMVPD subscription, has dropped to 66%, down from 88% a decade ago, according to the findings of new research from Leichtman Research Group (LRG).

The findings also highlight ongoing worries about the future of the pay-TV industry in that one-third of the respondents (34%) reported that they had never had a pay TV service. – Phil Kurz, tvtech

The Bruce Willis deepfake is everyone’s problem

Jean-Luc Godard once claimed, regarding cinema, “When I die, it will be the end.” Godard passed away last month; film perseveres. Yet artificial intelligence has raised a kindred specter: that humans may go obsolete long before their artistic mediums do. Novels scribed by GPT-3; art conjured by DALL·E—machines could be making art long after people are gone. Actors are not exempt. As deepfakes evolve, fears are mounting that future films, TV shows, and commercials may not need them at all.

Not even Bruce Willis. – Will Bedingfield, Wired

The days of cheap music streaming may be numbered

Apple Music gets a price hike, and Spotify may be ready to debut its Platinum Plan – Ariel Shapiro, The Verge

Apple issues new app store rules for Crypto and NFT payments

… in order for apps to sell NFTs and related services, they’ll have to go through Apple’s in-app purchase systems and “may not include buttons, external links, or other calls to action that direct customers to purchasing mechanisms other than in-app purchase.” – Vlad Savov, Bloomberg

Edison Podcast metrics

SVOD viewership up in Q3, led by Netflix

The handwringing over the market saturation of subscription streaming video services appears to be overblown. New data finds that almost all of the major SVOD platforms saw viewership gains in the third quarter (ended Sept. 30), led by Netflix with about 70% market share, according to new data from research firm Attest.

YouTube TV made the biggest gains of all the TV streaming services upping weekly U.S. users by six percentage points to 23%. – Erik Gruenwedel, Media Play News

Twitter is losing its most active users, internal documents show

"Is Twitter dying?" billionaire Elon Musk mused in April, five days before offering to buy the social media platform.

The reality, according to internal Twitter research seen by Reuters, goes far beyond the handful of examples of celebrities ghosting their own accounts. Twitter is struggling to keep its most active users - who are vital to the business - engaged, underscoring a challenge faced by the Tesla chief executive as he approaches a deadline to close his $44 billion deal to buy the company. – Sheila Dang, Reuters

The great podcast robbery? Sony and Spotify accused of stealing shows

The media giants have allegedly released ‘new’ podcasts mirroring those made by the likes of Gizzi Erskine and Pandora Sykes. So why is it so hard to make a case against them? – Danielle De Wolfe, The Guardian UK

Presenters leaving, viewers switching off... why US talk shows are past their prime

With hosts such as James Corden and Trevor Noah departing, and revenue declining, a 70-year-old late-night TV format is in turmoil. – Edward Helmore, The Guardian UK