Latest news with #Channels
Business Insider
a day ago
- Business
- Business Insider
Donald Trump is suing Rupert Murdoch. That doesn't mean the case will make it to court.
Donald Trump threatens to sue media companies all the time. Sometimes he actually does it. But the libel suit Trump filed against Rupert Murdoch, Murdoch's Wall Street Journal, and two Journal reporters last week — over a story the Journal published about a note Trump allegedly sent to Jeffrey Epstein — is extraordinary. Not only is it seemingly the first time a sitting president has sued a media organization, it puts Trump in direct conflict with Murdoch — perhaps Trump's most important backer over the years, via his Fox News operation. But just because Trump has sued Murdoch doesn't mean we'll see a verdict in the case. Multiple media and tech companies have settled similar cases with Trump since he was elected last fall. On the face of it, Trump should have a hard time prevailing: US libel laws place the burden on a plaintiff to prove that someone has said something untrue about them, and that burden gets much steeper when that person is a public figure. Murdoch's Journal also has a long tradition of not bending when powerful people threaten it. Still, we are in a different environment than we were before last November's election, and all kinds of institutions have tried to accommodate Trump. Just as important: Murdoch has backed out of fights in the past. I ran that theory by NPR's David Folkenflik — a longtime Murdoch watcher — this week on the newest episode of my Channels podcast. (Though we spent most of our time chatting about Trump's move to pull $1 billion in funding from NPR and PBS.) Here's an edited excerpt of our conversation. Peter Kafka: What do you think happens with this suit? Do you think it actually goes to trial? Do you think they settle? David Folkenflik: Look. Trump — actually, his ostensible future presidential library — has received a lot of money in recent months from settlements. ABC, CBS — which had a truly flimsy case presented against it, essentially legally nonexistent — plus Meta, plus Twitter/X. But a lot of Trump's previous lawsuits have been dismissed. It wouldn't totally surprise me if it were dismissed here, if Trump would be ultimately OK with that. Because he's gotten the huge headline out of trying to discredit The Wall Street Journal's excellent reporting teams. It puts Rupert on notice. As well as other elements of the conservative ecosystem — that they don't get a pass, just because they're notionally seen as on his side. Nobody has done more than Rupert Murdoch to help Trump over the past decade. Murdoch is his own power source. These are two titans. Two titans who don't necessarily like each other. But they're transactional and they both see the value in getting something from the other one. And Rupert Murdoch does settle lawsuits — like the $787.5 million check he wrote to Dominion Voting Systems, right before that defamation case was supposed to go to trial. Just before he was supposed to testify. So if the current price for settling a Donald Trump lawsuit is a $16 million donation to his library, that's a nothingburger for Murdoch, right? This is something I've been thinking about and talking about with some of Murdoch's people. We've spoken in recent days. I can't predict the future. But Murdoch seems to me like the kind of guy who fights things like this — until he doesn't. Until it's more useful for him not to. Like if he has to go on the stand or go into depositions at the age of 94 and prepare for those things — he's probably like, "Forget it. Sixteen million? I could care less." That said, he likes a good story. He didn't kill the Theranos story, which was an exposé by one of his reporters about a blood diagnosis company built on lies, in which he was the largest private investor. And that's to his great credit that he didn't do that. So I would guess that the excellent legal team of the Journal and Dow Jones fights this right until the point at which it's going to be inconvenient. Both sides have a pressure point. Trump doesn't want to go to discovery, and have to talk at great length in front of lawyers for Murdoch about his actual relationship with Epstein. That's a pressure point. On the other hand, if Murdoch has anything that he may think in the future is going to be in front of federal officials or regulators — like CBS and Paramount, which has its sale about to go through; like the Walt Disney Company, which perennially does — then Murdoch may say $16 million is cheap. Let's not forget that these alliances work in both directions. Fox News has run interference for Trump pretty much since 2015. Murdoch won benefits for that, right? The Justice Department under Trump tried to block AT&T's acquisition of Time Warner because Murdoch had kind of wanted to take over Time Warner. And when Murdoch wanted to sell to Disney, Trump said 'Go right ahead.' He called it a " great thing." Trump's only question the morning when he learned about the Disney acquisition of most of Fox's Hollywood assets was calling Murdoch and asking, "Are you gonna hold on to Fox News?" Murdoch says yes. Trump says congratulations. Although there's a part of me that believes Murdoch's gonna fight it, these guys are totally transactional. If it didn't happen to have the word "lawsuit" around it, somebody might pay something or send an email to somebody else to resolve this. These are two billionaires colliding here. But their alliance is probably more useful to them than their fighting. Unless Trump thinks that he needs this to feed the increasingly radicalized parts of his base that somehow has to be distracted from the idea that Trump knew Jeffrey Epstein. Which he obviously did.
Phone Arena
a day ago
- Phone Arena
WhatsApp on Windows is about to change – and not everyone will like it
Right now, there's a native WhatsApp app for laptops and PCs running Windows. It has quite a lot of features and looks pretty good. But apparently, the app may become worse because of a decision by Meta for its future development. Meta has hinted that the native WhatsApp app for Windows will no longer be available, and it will switch to a web wrapper. That is basically a web app that is packaged to look like a Windows app. The latest beta of WhatsApp includes some of the major changes that are probably going to come soon to the stable version of the app. For one, the app will look different from what it did before, and unfortunately (at least for now), it may be working more slowly. It is possible that it also consumes more RAM, and on top of it all, the notifications won't be as good as they are on a native Windows app. Image Credit - Meta Luckily, it's not just bad news. The web-based app will also reportedly bring one new feature, Channels. With that version of the app, Channels will be accessible on your Windows PC or laptop. Also, more functionality for Status and Communications is also likely to come with the web-based app. WhatsApp's native Windows app launched back in 2022. Meanwhile, the web version is likely going to be easier to maintain for Meta, so that's probably one of the reasons why the tech giant has decided to replace it. This would mean one less platform to maintain for bugs. Meanwhile, it's also likely that the higher RAM usage and somewhat slow performance could be ironed out by the company before the stable release of the web-based app. We'll have to wait and see to know for sure. Meta has not specified when the change will occur just yet.
Yahoo
14-07-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Get Ready: WhatsApp Is Getting Ads, Paid Channel Subscriptions
PCMag editors select and review products independently. If you buy through affiliate links, we may earn commissions, which help support our testing. Unlike other Meta apps, the company has traditionally kept WhatsApp ad-free. That's set to change, though ads will be limited to specific areas of the app, away from your messages. Meta will soon include ads within the Status feature. This section is similar to Instagram Stories, where you can share clips or photos from your day-to-day life with your contacts. In the coming months, ads will appear between people you follow. Meta hasn't shared how often ads will appear, but if it's anything like Instagram, it'll likely be after every fourth or fifth story you view. Meta won't use your personal data to target these ads. That means it can't use the topics in your messages, or the people you message, to figure out what ads to show you. Instead, Meta will use data such as your location, language, your interactions with Channels, or the ads you've been interested in before. The company is also introducing a new way for businesses, celebrities, and influencers to monetize their own WhatsApp Channels. A Channel on WhatsApp acts like a big group chat, where you can update everyone following you at the same time. Many businesses use them to update users on specific changes or promotions. Soon, owners of these channels will be able to charge for exclusive access to certain content. It sounds like this will work similarly to a Patreon subscription, where businesses can have a free tier for most users, and those who want exclusive access to additional services can pay for a subscription on top. Around 1.5 billion people visit Channels and Status each day. There's currently no sign of WhatsApp bringing ads to other parts of its app, but that may eventually happen if the company continues to see success in its ad expansion.
Jordan News
12-07-2025
- Jordan News
Microsoft Launches Threaded Conversations Feature in Teams - Jordan News
Microsoft Launches Threaded Conversations Feature in Teams Microsoft has officially added threaded conversations to its Teams communication platform this week, following through on a long-promised and highly requested feature, originally scheduled for mid-2025. The company has now released a public preview of threaded conversations, allowing Teams users to enable the feature. اضافة اعلان Threaded messaging in Microsoft Teams is being rolled out initially within Channels, and it works a bit differently compared to how Slack handles threads. Noga Ronen, Principal Product Marketing Manager for Microsoft Teams, explains: 'You can follow the most important threads, and when a key update or decision is made, you can bring it back to the main conversation, keeping everyone informed without needing to review every single reply.' Users will now be able to create either posts or conversation threads within a channel, but unlike Slack's simplified threading system, Teams requires channel owners to choose between posts or threads, depending on how the channel is structured. Additionally, Microsoft has introduced a 'Followed Conversations' view in Teams. This lets users easily track conversations they care about—and just as easily unfollow noisy threads. Ronen adds: 'By default, you'll follow only the conversations you've started, replied to, been mentioned in, or explicitly chosen to follow.' Alongside the threaded conversation preview, Microsoft Teams now supports multiple emoji reactions per message. Ronen also notes that users can now more easily search for GIFs using the /gif command, enhancing the fun and interactivity within chats. Youm7
Business Insider
30-06-2025
- Business
- Business Insider
Emily Sundberg got laid off at Meta. Now her Feed Me is a thriving one-person media business.
There are lots of Emily Sundbergs in New York City — striving young people who show up intent on making a name for themselves in media, finance, or fashion. But there's only one actual Emily Sundberg, who has turned that ethos into a one-person media company: Her Feed Me newsletter has become an increasingly popular read for people who want to know what people with money and ambition are spending their money on — and who also want to know about the businesses that cater to those people. Sundberg started her Substack when she had a full-time job in business marketing at Meta — which she described as "basically being, 'You're a small business in Miami. You should use Instagram ads.'" Then she lost her gig during a 2022 layoff round, and eventually turned Feed Me into her full-time thing. Now she's doing well enough that she says she can easily shrug off offers from investors. Earlier this year, The New York Times pegged her subscription revenue at least $400,000 a year, and it's likely well above that now; she also says ads — which she sells herself — contribute about a third of her revenue. I talked to Sundberg in a recent edition of my Channels podcast about her origin story, her ambitions to launch new stuff, and the balance between being the face of her company and keeping parts of her life private. The following is an edited excerpt of our conversation: Peter Kafka: When you started FeedMe, you were also consulting and working on other projects. Were you thinking that the newsletter would just be one of those projects, or were you always hoping to turn it into a full-time business? Emily Sundberg: The data I was receiving from Substack was so positive. The growth was crazier than anything I'd ever worked on before. And I was also green-lighting all of my ideas — and other places that I was working for weren't green-lighting my ideas. It was a lesson in trusting myself, and my gut and intuition, and making something in a white space that didn't exist. So I was like: "OK, I'm onto something. I'm trusting myself. I'm gonna lean into this." How did you think about making yourself the face/brand/main character of your work? At the beginning of my newsletter, I did have a selfie on it every day. I'm not sure if selfies were popular on LinkedIn at the time, so I do think that I got an initial bump in traffic. Because people were like, "She's talking about the credit restructuring of Rent the Runway, and she's a young woman, and there's anime hearts around this selfie of her. What is going on?" I think that helped at the beginning. And then, a year ago, I did a proper branding of the letter. The selfies went away. I had too many weird interactions in the city. That can be a double-edged sword, right? You've attained some sort of status/celebrity notoriety. On the other hand, you have creeps coming up in the street. I'm really happy that I stopped doing the photos. But it's funny — as I'm doing the ad sales now, I'm noticing business brands are like "Are we treating you like a New York Magazine, or are we treating you like an influencer? Are we doing a photo shoot with you? Or just a big banner ad at the top of your newsletter?" And I've noticed that I'm not as comfortable smiling for a photo shoot. I don't want to do that. I don't want to show people my house or my closet or my life like that. Why not? A very wise person in this industry, who's quite public, once told me: "Once you turn certain levers on, you can't turn them back off." That doesn't mean you never turn them on — but you should be strategic about when you do. And I don't need to right now. Everything's working. I don't need to give more of my personal life. But I've never met you before, and I know a bit about you, because there are profiles and stories about you. I know where you got married. It seems like you've kind of dialed in exactly how much of yourself you want to show and not show. Are you doing those calculations all the time? Like: This can go up on Instagram, but this one is too personal. Or: I don't want you to know where I live. I mean, everybody knows I live in [Brooklyn's] South Slope because I say that a lot, and I have a favorite bar. But this is an interesting story: I did write about my wedding on my newsletter, which is probably the most personal thing I ever wrote on there. And it was the highest conversion from free to paid readers I'd ever seen. Ever. The wedding was almost paid for after that. It was crazy. This is a one-person operation. There's a lot of advantage to that: Every dollar you make, you get to keep. The flip side is: How do you scale that? Do you want to scale that? The scaling thing is top of mind. Also, I don't know if a newsroom is supposed to be one person. Sometimes I wish I had somebody to bounce these ideas off of more during the day, or even a legal team or an editor. I feel like the newsletter's in a good place. I would like to play around with audio. I've made a movie before, I've made a podcast before. I had a podcast about poker over COVID with my ex and his friend. It's pretty easy to make. Don't tell anyone! I understand how to do it. I understand how to edit video, I understand how to edit audio. So I think I'd like to play around with making a podcast this year. I'm interested in not being the face of that. I would like to produce a podcast with a host [that isn't] me. You don't want to be the face of that because of time, or because you don't want everything that comes out of Feed Me to be Emily Sundberg? The latter. I also don't think that's the best idea that I could put together: Me saying, "OK, you just read my newsletter and now we're gonna talk about it." Because the counter would be: You are the product. People want to hear from you, they want to see you, you are the thing. They don't want ancillary Emily stuff. They want Emily. Which I think is totally fair, but I actually think that I'm a better producer than a host. We'll see. Do you think that a year from now, this is still a one-person company? Or at some point, are you going to have to start hiring people full time? Substack does a lot, I will say. Things that I would normally be hiring for. Their team is super-helpful to me and the other top newsletters on that platform. Maybe a chief of staff/on-the-ground assistant kind of person could be helpful. But I like to keep my overhead low. It feels very doable right now. I'm sure people are always trying to invest in you, and telling you their capital and resources can help you grow. Not interested. There's a recurring conversation about Substacks and all these one-person companies, and whether it would make sense to bundle them. Are you interested in being part of a Substack bundle? Why? I don't need it. But I would be interested if there are writers on Substack and they were interested in being part of the Feed Me universe. I've talked about this with a few writers on Substack, so we'll see how that shakes out.
