Paramount is reported to be in advanced settlement talks with California officials to resolve the antitrust lawsuit blocking its $81 billion acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery, according to The Wall Street Journal citing people familiar with the matter. A deal is not guaranteed.
The talks are aimed at clearing the last major legal obstacle to a combination that would unite two of Hollywood’s oldest studios, the Paramount+ and HBO Max streaming services, and dozens of television networks.
Twelve Democratic-led states, headed by California Attorney General Rob Bonta, sued in July to block the transaction, arguing it would concentrate too much power in theatrical films and cable channels.
Paramount is under growing financial pressure to close. Its agreement with Warner includes a “ticking fee” of about $650 million a quarter, or roughly $7 million a day, that begins accruing next month if the deal has not closed.
President Donald Trump said Friday he is “banning” CNN, MS NOW and Politico from the White House “effective immediately,” citing what he called “fake news,” though there was no sign the administration had carried out the threat.
CNN reporters remained in their White House workspace into Friday evening, and a CNN crew continued traveling as the assigned television pool with Vice President JD Vance. Trump did not identify any specific stories that prompted the announcement or describe concrete steps to exclude the outlets.
Leading First Amendment organizations said any such ban would be unconstitutional. “A ban like this would be flatly unconstitutional,” said Bruce D. Brown, president of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press. “The First Amendment is clear that once the White House invites in some journalists, it can’t ban others because it doesn’t like their reporting. This is textbook viewpoint discrimination and will be quickly struck down by the courts if challenged.”
Aaron Terr of the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression said press credentials “aren’t a reward for loyalty to the government” and that “a free, even adversarial, press is a sign of our country’s strength.”
CNN said it “stands fully behind our White House team and their fair and accurate reporting” and called any ban “an illegal assault” on a constitutionally protected right. Politico said it would “continue to fairly report on this White House and future ones” and “vigorously defend our First Amendment rights.”
Ashley Flowers’ Audiochuck, the Indianapolis company behind the No. 2 U.S. podcast Crime Junkie, has lost about 30 of its roughly 100 employees over the past year — including a CEO, chief legal officer and chief growth officer — while internal surveys show staff satisfaction collapsing from +27 in April 2025 to –34 by the second quarter of 2026.
The flagship show is still growing. Average weekly unique listeners are up 71% year over year, YouTube views have jumped about 400%, and episode downloads are at an all-time high, the company told Bloomberg. Crime Junkie remains second nationally behind Joe Rogan.
That audience success sits beside a workplace described by current and former staff as exacting, overworked and unstable. One employee said they vomited from nerves before presenting ideas to Flowers. In June, Flowers canceled The Deck, Audiochuck’s second-most popular show, even though it regularly drew more than 300,000 downloads a week.
Ashley Flowers
She told staff the decision was about her work-life balance after her young daughter said how unhappy she was that her mother worked so much. “I’m sad and happy,” Flowers said in a recorded all-hands meeting. “And I know it’s the right decision.” The cancellation cut jobs and reduced programming available for a new distribution deal.
Audiochuck has cycled through three non-founder CEOs in three years. Matthew Starker, hired after a 2025 investment round, lasted about a year. In June 2026 the company named Evelyn Webster, then CEO of SoulCycle, as his successor.
In living rooms across America, the television still flickers with the same three familiar names: Fox News, CNN, and MSNBC (rebranded as MS NOW). Yet the people sitting in front of those screens tell a story of a medium that has grown old along with its most loyal audience. The typical cable-news viewer is now in their late sixties.
In living rooms across America, the television still flickers with the same three familiar names: Fox News, CNN, and MSNBC (rebranded in places as MS NOW). Yet the people sitting in front of those screens tell a story of a medium that has grown old along with its most loyal audience.
The typical cable-news viewer is now in their late sixties. Nielsen data repeatedly places the median age of an MSNBC viewer around 70, Fox News around 69, and CNN around 67 or 68. These are not the 25-to-54 “demo” advertisers once chased; they are Baby Boomers and older Gen Xers who still treat the evening news as appointment television. Cable news as a category has a median viewer age in the high 60s. Younger adults have largely left the linear feed for TikTok, YouTube, and X.
ABC on Thursday opposed the Federal Communications Commission’s bid to dismiss its First Amendment lawsuit, arguing that the agency’s early license-renewal review of eight Disney-owned stations is a “broadcaster death penalty” meant to punish the network’s speech.
In a filing meeting a Sept. 17 reply deadline, ABC said the FCC’s “plain purpose” in opening the process was to gain leverage “by hanging the threat of the broadcaster death penalty of license non-renewal or revocation over Plaintiffs’ every editorial decision.”
The network accused the commission of trying “to license viewpoints,” not investigate discrimination, and said the government’s motion “improperly conflate[s] the nature of Plaintiffs’ retaliation claims” while ABC and its affiliates suffer.“
Disney has created its first companywide chief technology officer role and filled it with Karandeep Anand, the outgoing CEO of Character.AI. Anand starts Oct. 2 as senior executive vice president and CTO, reporting directly to CEO Josh D’Amaro. A day earlier, Disney Entertainment elevated Adam Smith — a two-year Disney veteran after more than two decades at Google and YouTube — to chairman of Direct-to-Consumer.
Smith now oversees Disney+ and Hulu product, engineering, advertising technology, programming strategy, viewer experience, partnerships, and data and analytics. His former co-president, Joe Earley, moves to a new post as president of Disney Entertainment Television franchise and content strategy. Taken together, the two appointments are the clearest sign yet of how D’Amaro, who became CEO in March, wants Disney run: as a technology company that also makes entertainment, not a studio that also has apps.
Anand will own enterprise technology, infrastructure, data and AI platforms, product, and engineering across the company and will work with segment tech teams to modernize how Disney builds and ships software. A number of Character.AI engineers are expected to follow him. Smith’s promotion puts a product-and-platform operator, not a traditional programming executive, at the top of the streaming business D’Amaro has called Disney+ the digital centerpiece of a more connected fan relationship.
93.1 WIBC will launch a new weekday midday show Monday, Oct. 5, with Johnette Cruz and Brian Baker hosting the 9 a.m. to noon slot.
Program Director David Wood announced the pairing live on “The Hammer and Nigel Show.” The program does not yet have an official name. Cruz is already a familiar WIBC voice as a newscaster and digital reporter. Wood said her strength is deep-dive local storytelling.
“It’s super important that we still connect with the local people out here,” Cruz said.
Baker, a former WIBC host, is returning to Indiana from Georgia. His background includes financial radio and work as a television stunt driver. “We both want Indianapolis to be the hero of the story,” he said. Wood said the pairing won out after the station tested several combinations.
“What attracted me to this combination was their complementary skill set. Johnette is a great storyteller. She really digs into stories, and Brian is so multifaceted,” he said.
The 9 a.m.–noon daypart had been hosted by Rob Kendall and Casey Daniels before both left the station earlier this year. Kendall departed after contract talks stalled; Daniels exited later, leaving the slot open.
Pat McAfee is facing scrutiny after a viral clip from Thursday’s live ESPN show appeared to show him smoking or handling a lit item, prompting former ESPN host Jason Whitlock to warn that the moment normalizes drug use for young viewers.
McAfee later posted that it was sage, writing, “Little sage never hurt nobody.” Whitlock rejected that framing. Responding to analyst Sean Salisbury’s defense of McAfee on X, Whitlock said: “I disagree, Sean. I care. And I used to smoke weed. But when you look at the damage drugs have done to American society, I think it’s wrong to normalize this behavior for young people.”
Pat McAfee being caught on air smoking weed shows the lack of restraint that ESPN has on him… pic.twitter.com/wM4chSao6V
McAfee’s reach gives the criticism weight. His daily show draws about 575,000 viewers, he has nearly three million YouTube subscribers, and College GameDay reaches 2.7 million viewers with a large youth audience. Under a multi-year ESPN deal valued at more than $60 million annually, he keeps creative and editorial control while licensing the show to the network.
Meanwhile, McAfee denied smoking marijuana on Thursday’s episode of his ESPN/YouTube show after viewers accused him of lighting a joint on air, saying the smoldering item in his hand was sage.
Longtime Brevard County, FL conservative talk radio host Bill Mick announced his retirement during his Sept. 18 broadcast on WMMB, ending more than 25 years on iHeartRadio.
“To everything there is a season,” Mick said on his daily “Mick Nugget” after signing off for the last time. “25-plus years is a good run and this one’s been no exception.”
Mick said he plans to launch a daily live podcast with calls and texts as early as next week at billmick.com. He posted photos of a new home studio and said he intends to keep discussing news, politics, sports, social issues, and how they intersect.
Mick was a fixture on WMMB and a frequent FLORIDA TODAY contributor, known for a conversational style that built a loyal call-in audience. Former FLORIDA TODAY reporter Wayne Price, a periodic guest on Mick’s morning show, said Mick “certainly got people fired up” and was willing to criticize even supportive listeners — something Price said is uncommon in talk radio and cable news.
Capitol Broadcasting Company and Hurricanes Holdings have announced a multi-year extension of their partnership to broadcast Carolina Hurricanes games on radio and audio platforms across the Carolinas.
All preseason, regular-season and postseason games will air live on the team’s flagship station, 99.9 The Fan (WCMC-FM), with Mike Maniscalco and Tripp Tracy on the call. The station will also produce the pregame show “Storm Watch” and the postgame show “Aftermath.”
CBC will continue the after-every-game podcast “Canes Corner,” hosted by Adam Gold, and will carry exclusive interviews and daily Hurricanes content on “The Adam Gold Show,” “The Drive with Tim Donnelly” and “Next Up with Paul Ihander,” as well as on the station’s social media channels.
A Los Angeles woman under the influence of drugs was speeding the wrong way down a busy avenue, ran a red light and slammed into a city bus Tuesday, killing two passengers, prosecutors said Thursday as they charged her with murder. A television news helicopter covering the wreck then crashed, killing both people aboard and a man on the ground.
Bailee Lynn Rios, 36, faces two counts of second-degree murder in the deaths. Los Angeles County District Attorney Nathan Hochman said. Rios was being held on $4.1 million bail. Hochman said Rios was impaired when she drove her 2004 Ford Expedition the wrong way, struck another vehicle and then plowed into the bus.
The helicopter crash killed pilot George Marciniw, reporter Eliana Moreno and Edy Gutierrez Mejia, who was on the ground. At least four cars and two storage containers burned after the aircraft caught fire.
Mike Bowe, a longtime Philadelphia-area disc jockey whose calm, familiar voice defined decades of local radio at WMGK, WPEN, WHAT and other stations, died Monday, Sept. 14, at his home of complications from cancer. He was 76.
An Army veteran, devoted Phillies fan and proud son of Gloucester City, N.J., Bowe spent more than 40 years as a host and DJ in studios and at remote broadcasts, dance parties, fundraisers and other events.
He was best known for music shows at WMGK from 1977 through the early 2000s, a stint at KISS 100 in the 1990s, and work at WPEN and WHAT from 2000 to 2011. After 2011 he continued on other local stations and iRadioPhilly.com.
Colleagues and listeners credited him with making WMGK’s Saturday Night ’70s show a mid-1990s hit. “He was the very foundation of that success,” fellow DJ Chris McCoy said. McCoy added that Bowe “had something intangible. He made you feel like he knew you, and you knew him.”
Duncan Sheik, the Tony- and Grammy-winning singer-songwriter known for the enduring 1990s radio hit “Barely Breathing” and the score to Broadway’s “Spring Awakening,” died Thursday in Manhattan. He was 56.
His mother, Suzanne Sheik, told The New York Times the cause was organ failure, with some reports specifying heart failure that led to cardiac arrest. A statement posted Friday to Sheik’s Instagram said he “passed away last night surrounded by love” and called him “a singular talent, and deeply influential voice in music and theater.”
Sheik first became widely known with “Barely Breathing,” the breakout single from his 1996 self-titled debut. The song reached No. 16 on the Billboard Hot 100, stayed on the chart for 55 weeks, and earned a Grammy nomination for Best Male Pop Vocal Performance.
Newsradio WRVA (WRVA-AM / WTVR-HD2), an Audacy station in Richmond, partnered with Virginia Urology, the Richmond Flying Squirrels, and Fans for the Cure to host its second annual “Hitting Prostate Cancer Out Of The Park.” The event delivered over 70 free prostate screenings, directly addressing a critical community health gap for men facing financial barriers or a lack of insurance.
“I am deeply grateful to everyone behind the scenes who worked tirelessly to bring this initiative together,” said Rich Herrera, Morning News Host, Newsradio WRVA. “Being rooted in the communities we serve is at the heart of what we do. Local radio has the power to save lives, and through this event, we helped a listener discover a cancer he didn’t know he had.”
➦In 1921..Boston's WBZ radio, which now broadcasts at 1030 kHz AM and is the oldest surviving commercial radio station in New England, signed-on broadcasting from Springfield, MA.
The station has long been one of the highest-rated stations in the Boston area, and covers much of the eastern United States and Canada at night with its 50,000-watt clear-channel signal from its transmitter location in Hull, Massachusetts, which has been used by the station since 1940. The transmitter is a two tower directional array where each tower is 160 meters (520 ft) tall. The signal is intentionally directionalized from their coastal location for maximum power transmitted into the continental United States, giving WBZ outstanding multi-state coverage after sunset.
WBZ's initial license, for operation in Springfield, was issued by the Department of Commerce to the Westinghouse Electric & Manufacturing Company on September 15, 1921; it was the first license to specify broadcasts on 360 meters (833 kilohertz), and was subsequently deemed to be the first license for a commercial broadcast station. However, other stations, such as WWJ in Detroit, 1XE/WGI in Medford Hillside, and sister station KDKA in Pittsburgh, were already broadcasting under different license classifications.
Original Studio on Page Blvd.
The station's original transmitter and studios were located at the Westinghouse factory on Page Boulevard in East Springfield. However, WBZ's inaugural program, on September 19, 1921, was a remote broadcast from the Eastern States Exposition in West Springfield.
The original format was general entertainment and information, which included live music (often classical music and opera), sports, farm reports, special events, and public affairs programming. Despite WBZ being housed in Springfield, it somewhat difficult to attract top-flight artists to the station, leading Westinghouse to open a studio at the Hotel Brunswick in Boston on February 24, 1924. WBZ also expanded its news programming via a partnership with the newspaper Boston Herald and Traveler. It also carried a considerable amount of sports broadcasts, including Boston Bruins hockey, Boston Braves baseball, and Harvard Crimson football.
Because of its comparatively wide reach, the station often referred to itself as "WBZ, New England" as opposed to associating itself solely with Springfield or Boston.
However, even after several power boosts (the station broadcast at a power of 100 watts in 1921, but was using 2,000 watts in April 1925, the station still had some trouble reaching Boston, leading Westinghouse to sign on WBZA, a 250-watt station at 1240 kHz, on August 20, 1925. Efforts were soon made to operate WBZA as a synchronous repeater of WBZ, by then at 900 kHz; this process was difficult, as the two transmitters often interfered with each other even in Boston, and WBZA went back and forth between the two frequencies for nearly a year before finally going to full-time synchronous operation in June 1926.
WBZ also continued to boost the power of its primary East Springfield transmitter; it was granted permission to operate with 5,000 watts on March 31, 1926, and by 1927 it was operating with 15,000 watts. Meanwhile, a combination of WBZ's growth and continued difficulties with the WBZA signal led the station to move its Boston studio to the Statler Hotel (now the Boston Park Plaza Hotel & Towers) on June 1, 1927 and activate a new WBZA transmitter on June 9. The Federal Radio Commission (FRC) moved WBZ and WBZA to 990 kHz on November 11, 1928.
Amidst the technical changes, WBZ also began engaging in network activities. By 1925, it often shared programs with WJZ in New York City (which Westinghouse had also started in 1921, but sold to the Radio Corporation of America two years later), and a WBZ special commemorating the 150th anniversary of Paul Revere's "Midnight Ride" was also fed to WRC in Washington, D.C. and WGY in Schenectady, New York. This paved the way for the station to become a charter affiliate of the National Broadcasting Company (NBC) on November 15, 1926, carrying the WJZ-originated NBC Blue Network beginning on January 1, 1927.
Today, WBZ is owned by iHeartMedia and airs a News/Talk format.
➦In 1932...The radio soap Just Plain Bill started airing It aired for about 20-years. It was a 15-minute daytime radio drama program heard on CBS Radio and NBC Radio. Originally called Bill the Barber, it told the story of Bill Davidson (Arthur Hughes), a barber in the town of Hartville, and his daughter Nancy (Ruth Russell). Bill often became involved in helping his friends and neighbors when he wasn't cutting hair. Also in the cast: Dick Janaver (1911-1999).
➦In 1955...Radio-TV personality Bill Cullen started at WRCA 660 AM in NYC.
