J57 Internet Publishing and Broadcasting

Guardian Australia staff in the dark as global hack shutdown continues

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Original article by Sam Buckingham-Jones
The Australian Financial Review – Page: Online : 10-Jan-23

Online and print news company The Guardian was hit by a suspected ransomware attack across its global operations towards the end of 2022, and it is still working to recover from the attack. Its Australian news web site is still continuing to publish articles, but staff have been asked to working from home until January 23. Guardian Media Group CEO Anna Bateson has told staff that it has disabled Wi-Fi, network and printer access at all of its offices, in order to allow its technical staff to get its operations up and running again.

CORPORATES
GUARDIAN MEDIA GROUP PLC

Ads on Foxtel’s Binge make it 30pc more profitable

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Original article by Sam Buckingham-Jones
The Australian Financial Review – Page: Online : 23-Dec-22

Binge has opted for a different path to advertising-supported streaming than international rival Netflix, which launched a brand-new tier with ads in early November. Foxtel-owned Binge will instead introduce advertisements to one of its existing tiers in March. Foxtel Media CEO Mark Frain says modelling suggests that this strategy will make it a 30 per cent more profitable product. Foxtel Media is already selling advertising packages for Binge, and Frain notes that they are proving to be very popular with advertisers. He forecasts that Binge’s advertising revenue will be within the range of $50m to $100m within several years.

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BINGE, FOXTEL MANAGEMENT PTY LTD, FOXTEL MEDIA, NETFLIX INCORPORATED

Defamation reforms: Australian media may not be liable for Facebook comments in future

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Original article by Amanda Meade
The Guardian Australia – Page: Online : 14-Dec-22

A proposed overhaul of Australia’s uniform defamation laws will include the addition of an "innocent dissemination defence". This would protect individuals and organisations that administer Facebook pages from being sued for defamation over comments that were posted by third parties. The proposed reforms follow a 2021 court ruling which found that media companies could be liable for defamatory comments posted on their Facebook pages by people who read or view their content. The Standing Council of Attorneys-General has given in-principle support to the reforms.

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FACEBOOK, AUSTRALIA. STANDING COUNCIL OF ATTORNEYS-GENERAL

Facebook pulls out all stops to delay cryptocurrency scam case

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Original article by Nick Bonyhady
The Age – Page: Online : 20-Sep-22

Facebook owner Meta is the subject of separate legal action from mining billionaire Andrew Forrest and the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission over cryptocurrency scams. Forrest launched a private criminal case against Meta in February for allegedly failing to stop cryptocurrency investment scams that used his name and image, while the ACCC’s case against Meta allegeds it aided or abetted scammers by hosting their fake ads. Meta’s efforts to supress documents from the ACCC’s case against it have run into problems, but it has made a renewed attempt to delay proceedings in the Federal Court.

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META GROUP INCORPORATED,{SPAC}FACEBOOK AUSTRALIA PTY LTD,{SPAC}AUSTRALIAN COMPETITION AND CONSUMER COMMISSION,{SPAC}FEDERAL COURT OF AUSTRALIA

Facebook pulls out all stops to delay cryptocurrency scam case

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Original article by Nick Bonyhady
The Age – Page: Online : 20-Sep-22

Facebook owner Meta is the subject of separate legal action from mining billionaire Andrew Forrest and the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission over cryptocurrency scams. Forrest launched a private criminal case against Meta in February for allegedly failing to stop cryptocurrency investment scams that used his name and image, while the ACCC’s case against Meta allegeds it aided or abetted scammers by hosting their fake ads. Meta’s efforts to supress documents from the ACCC’s case against it have run into problems, but it has made a renewed attempt to delay proceedings in the Federal Court.

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META GROUP INCORPORATED,{SPAC}FACEBOOK AUSTRALIA PTY LTD,{SPAC}AUSTRALIAN COMPETITION AND CONSUMER COMMISSION,{SPAC}FEDERAL COURT OF AUSTRALIA

Netflix with ads tipped to lure 40 million viewers

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Original article by Suzanne Vranica, Sarah Krouse
The Australian – Page: 23 : 16-Sep-22

Streaming giant Netflix currently has about 220 million subscribers worldwide, and it anticipates that a lower-priced advertising-supported version will boost this significantly. Netflix’s preliminary projections suggest that the ad-supported version of its product is likely to boast around 40 million subscribers worldwide by the September 2023 quarter, including 13.3 million in the US. Streaming rivals such as HBO Max and Disney+ also intend to embrace the ad-supported model.

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NETFLIX INCORPORATED, HBO MAX, DISNEY+

Crikey: small independent news website challenges Lachlan Murdoch to sue it for defamation

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Original article by Ben Doherty
The Guardian Australia – Page: Online : 24-Aug-22

Private Media has taken out a full-page advertisement in The New York Times in which it challenges Lachlan Murdoch to sue for defamation. Private Media is the publisher of the Crikey news website, which has been embroiled in a legal dispute with Murdoch over an article written by political editor Bernard Keane that linked the Murdoch family to the 6 January 2021 attack on the US Capitol building. The article referred to the name "Murdoch" several times in both the title and text, but Crikey has contended that Lachlan Murdoch is not specifically named at any time, and that any defamation action "is bound to fail". Murdoch’s lawyers in turn have argued that the article and associated social media posts contain "scandalous allegations of criminal conduct and conspiracy" and "highly defamatory and false imputations" about him.

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PRIVATE MEDIA PARTNERS PTY LTD, CRIKEY.COM.AU

Australian streaming apps from TV brands chip away at Netflix dominance

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Original article by Josh Taylor
The Guardian Australia – Page: Online : 3-Aug-22

Data from Sensor Tower shows that the Disney+ app was downloaded almost two million times in Australia during the last 12 months. Disney+ retained its status as the top downloaded entertainment app in Australia, ahead of Amazon, TikTok and Netflix. The streaming apps of local companies Nine, the ABC, Seven and Stan were also among the 10 most-downloaded apps during the last year. Sensor Tower’s data is based on the number of new downloads from the Apple and Android stores. Netflix still dominates Australia’s streaming video sector; research by Roy Morgan in February found that Netflix has more than 12 million subscribers nationwide.

CORPORATES
SENSOR TOWER, DISNEY+, AMAZON PRIME VIDEO, TIKTOK, NETFLIX INCORPORATED, NINE ENTERTAINMENT COMPANY HOLDINGS LIMITED – ASX NEC, SEVEN WEST MEDIA LIMITED – ASX SWM, AUSTRALIAN BROADCASTING CORPORATION, STAN ENTERTAINMENT PTY LTD, ROY MORGAN LIMITED

Twitter deal could be terrific: Sims

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Original article by John Davidson, Tess Bennett, Yolanda Redrup
The Australian Financial Review – Page: 10 : 27-Apr-22

The Australian Competition & Consumer Commission’s former chairman Rod Sims has welcomed the acquisition of Twitter by US billionaire Elon Musk. He says the $64.1bn deal will be "terrific" for Australian businesses if Musk follows through with his plans for Twitter, which including making its algorithms open source and cracking down on disinformation on the social media platform. However, Reset Australia’s executive director Chris Cooper says the Twitter buyout demonstrates the need for proper regulation of technology companies.

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TWITTER INCORPORATED, AUSTRALIAN COMPETITION AND CONSUMER COMMISSION, RESET AUSTRALIA

ABC’s login plan to stem exodus fuels privacy fears

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Original article by Tom Burton
The Australian Financial Review – Page: 8 : 23-Feb-22

The ABC has defended its decision to require mandatory logins for users of its iview platform from 15 March. Amongst other things, the public broadcaster argues that personalised iview services will allow users to receive program recommendations and resume watching a show at any time and on any device. The ABC also claims that a more personalised iview experience could prevent the loss of younger audiences, which it says appear to favour the enhanced platform offerings of international video-on-demand services. However, privacy advocates have expressed concern about the ABC’s push for iview logins.

CORPORATES
AUSTRALIAN BROADCASTING CORPORATION, IVIEW