Media Insider: Outside Media Cuts Three Magazines, Fox to Expand to Lifestyle Coverage, Jen Psaki Joins MSNBC
Welcome to Media Insider, PR Newswire’s roundup of media stories from the week.
Outside media company will cut three magazines and lay off dozens of employees
Poynter | Angela Fu
Outside Inc., which publishes more than 20 magazines dedicated to the outdoors and fitness, will lay off 66 full-time employees as it shifts away from print and focuses on digital. The company has roughly 580 employees. The news comes just months after editorial staff at Outside magazine withdrew their petition to the National Labor Relations Board for a union election. Outside Inc. will eliminate its magazines Beta, which focuses on mountain bikes; Peloton, which focuses on bike racing; and Oxygen, which focuses on workouts for women. The company will also reduce printing for most of its publications — except Outside magazine — to one or two issues a year. It is unclear whether the layoffs will affect any of the Outside magazine staff.
ICYMI: Campbell Brown will oversee a new global media partnerships team at Meta.
Fox moving into lifestyle content
Axios | Sara Fischer
Fox Corp. is in the early stages of expanding into lifestyle verticals across categories like outdoors, home and books, CEO Lachlan Murdoch told Axios in an interview. The hope is that new lifestyle verticals, in addition to streaming, sports betting and web3 projects, will “give us our growth going forward,” Murdoch said. The push into lifestyle content builds on the success of Fox News Media’s subscription streaming service, Fox Nation, which launched in 2018 as Fox News’ first big foray into softer content. Other verticals that could make sense for the brand as it expands include food and home, Murdoch said. The company has already begun to seed a few lifestyle products across its news unit, but the success of Fox Nation has motivated the company to double down.
Also from Axios: Votebeat launches as a permanent newsroom to cover voting at the local level.
Twitter rebrands its media website to focus on creators with a new ‘Create’ hub
TechCrunch | Aisha Malik
Twitter has rebranded its Twitter Media website to “Twitter Create.” The social media giant says the website is a new hub for creators to access resources, product information and tips for getting the most out of Twitter. With this new rebrand, the company says it wants to make it easier for creators to understand how they can use Twitter’s creator products and connect with other creators. Creators can access resources on the website by industry, including sports, gaming, news, podcasters, writers and more. Twitter says that by breaking down resources by categories, creators will be able to easily find content that is tailored to them. The website also includes guides for creators based on their goal on Twitter, such as earning money, engaging with their audience or further developing their brand.
Read next: Ogden newspapers will acquire Indiana’s KPC Media.
SiriusXM buys Conan O’Brien’s podcast and media company
Engadget | K. Holt
“Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend” and Team Coco’s other podcasts now belong to SiriusXM. O’Brien has sold his digital media company and podcast network to the satellite radio giant. As part of the deal, which The Wall Street Journal says is worth around $150 million, O’Brien has signed a five-year talent agreement to keep hosting his podcast. He’ll also create and produce a Team Coco comedy channel. In addition, SiriusXM will have the right to distribute some videos from O’Brien’s podcast, along with archival footage from his TBS late-night show. Team Coco’s staff of around 50 will continue to produce existing shows and work on other SiriusXM content.
Related: Podcasters and creative studios tout the benefits of custom, longer-form podcast ad formats.
Jen Psaki, former White House press secretary, to launch streaming MSNBC show in 2023
Variety | Brian Steinberg
Jen Psaki, the White House Press Secretary who resigned from the role a few weeks ago, is slated to join MSNBC in the fall, where she will host a new streaming program that is expected to launch in the first quarter of 2023. She will also appear on NBC and during MSNBC’s special programming related to the 2022 midterm elections and the 2024 presidential election. Psaki’s hire is emblematic of big changes taking place at MSNBC, which for the past few years had portrayed itself as a place where viewers might get breaking-news coverage across the day and even into the evening when warranted, while being served opinion programming from a progressive lens in primetime. Increasingly, however, the network is ceding more hours to opinion programming and has shrunk the number of programs devoted to straight news.
An important story you might have missed: Hawaii’s governor has signed legislation providing freedom of speech and press protections to student journalists.
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Maria Perez is director of web operations at Cision. In her spare time, she enjoys gaming, watching too much TV, and chasing squirrels with her dog Molly.
