Shares of Electronic Arts jumped 15% on Friday after a report that the company is finalizing a deal to go private at a $50 billion valuation. The company is known for publishing major game titles tied to the NBA, NFL and pro soccer as well as first-person shooter games like Battlefield. A consortium of investors including Silver Lake, Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, and Jared Kushner’s investment firm Affinity Partners would be stakeholders in the newly private entity. The deal would be the largest ...

Nexstar Media Group will restore Jimmy Kimmel Live! to its 24 ABC affiliates beginning tonight, ending a preemption of the show over a comment by the host about the death of conservative activist Charlie Kirk. The decision, announced Friday afternoon, followed a similar decision by Sinclair on Friday. Between the two station groups, about one-quarter of ABC’s total footprint was left without access to Kimmel. His show had also been sidelined by ABC for five days amid the firestorm stemming from the tossed- ...

Jimmy Kimmel Live! is returning to Sinclair ABC affiliates Friday night, the station group announced in a lengthy statement. The major station owner said it is restoring the show after it made proposals for various measures, including the installation of a “network-wide independent ombudsman” at ABC. These proposals were suggested as “collaborative efforts” with Disney and ABC, and as yet the network has not agreed to implement them. Nexstar Media Group, which has also been preempting the show for more tha ...

Pam Kaufman is exiting her role as Paramount President and CEO of International Markets, Global Consumer Products and Experiences. She becomes the latest senior C-suite exec to leave Paramount following its sale to Skydance Media in August, according to insiders. Following the deal, Paramount Chair and CEO David Ellison installed a new top team, with former NBCUniversal international chief Kevin MacLellan named President, International and Global Content Distribution. The new-look Paramount structured the ...

Paramount Skydance said Thursday that it has hired Makan Delrahim, who served as head of the U.S. Department of Justice’s antitrust unit during Donald Trump’s first term as president, to be the new company’s Chief Legal Officer. In the role, Delrahim will oversee all legal, regulatory, compliance and public policy matters and oversee Paramount’s Government Relations team. He begins October 6. Stephanie Kyoko McKinnon, Paramount’s current General Counsel and Acting Chief Legal Officer, will continue as Gene ...

President Donald Trump signed an executive order Thursday declaring that a plan for TikTok‘s Chinese owner ByteDance to divest the U.S. operations of the wildly popular video app meets the requirements of a 2024 law. In recent weeks, there have been reports that a consortium including Oracle chairman Larry Ellison and Dell Technologies CEO Michael Dell would be part of a group to take control of TikTok’s U.S. operations via a joint venture. Fox Corp. also is in talks to become a backer. White House Press S ...

Amazon has agreed to pay $2.5 billion to settle claims that it enrolled millions in Prime membership subscriptions without their consent and also made it hard for customers to cancel, the Federal Trade Commission announced on Thursday. The settlement includes a $1 billion civil penalty, and a $1.5 billion fund to give refunds back to consumers. Amazon Prime subscribers get access to Prime Video, the tech giant’s subscription streaming service. The FTC said that the $1 billion civil penalty is the largest e ...

And now some news from the Department of Awkward Timing: With the Jimmy Kimmel controversy swirling, word has emerged that Disney is raising the price of Disney+, Hulu and ESPN+ next month. Subscribers started being notified Tuesday that as of October 21, a subscription to Disney+ will go up two dollars a month, to $11.99. Various bundles, with and without ads, are rising for combinations of Disney+, Hulu and ESPN+. The hikes are the fourth in four years by Disney, which is far from the only company raisin ...

Nexstar said that it will continue to preempt Jimmy Kimmel Live!, meaning that the late-night host’s return on Tuesday night won’t have carriage in nearly a quarter of ABC‘s affiliate reach. In a statement, Nexstar said, “We made a decision last week to preempt Jimmy Kimmel Live! following what ABC referred to as Mr. Kimmel’s ‘ill-timed and insensitive’ comments at a critical time in our national discourse. We stand by that decision pending assurance that all parties are committed to fostering an environme ...

A federal judge tossed out Donald Trump‘s $15 billion lawsuit against The New York Times, declaring that the 85-page complaint was “improper and impermissible.” The federal judge, Steven Merryday, will allow Trump’s lawyers to file a new complaint within 28 days that does not exceed 48 pages. Citing court rules, Merryday wrote, “This complaint stands unmistakably and inexcusably athwart the requirements of Rule 8. This action will begin, will continue, and will end in accord with the rulesof procedure and ...