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Eupora police seize THC vapes, kratom in business raids
Eupora police served search warrants on two businesses Friday after reports that the businesses were selling illegal THC vapes, kratom and other controlled substances.
Eupora police seize THC vapes, kratom in business raids
Eupora police served search warrants on two businesses Friday after reports that the businesses were selling illegal THC vapes, kratom and other controlled substances.
Premier League transfer windfall a lifeline for ailing French clubs
Record spending by English Premier League clubs in the summer transfer window has served as a lifeline across the Channel in France, where cash-strapped teams are more reliant on selling their best players for big money than ever before.English clubs signed Ligue 1 players for a reported total of 800 million euros in the summer window -- meaning that of an overall Premier League spend of 4.1 billion euros, about one fifth went to France.
Science of Speed off to fast start
PITTSBURGH — One month in and Pittsburgh is proving it’s ready to put the pedal to the metal. Since opening Aug. 1, Science of Speed, Powered by Lenovo, at Kamin Science Center has welcomed nearly 10,000 visitors, with 90 percent of racing experiences selling out through the first month of operations. The 21,000-square-foot immersive experience […]
Seminar offers insight into planning business transitions
The best time to think about selling your business might be months (or even years) before you identify a buyer. Carrie Peterson offers tips into a smooth, profitable transition.
How will Stan Kroenke impact the Angels? We asked reporters who have covered his other teams
Los Angeles Angels fans rejoiced on Tuesday after news broke that longtime owner Arte Moreno was selling the team for $4 billion to Stan Kroenke, whose Kroenke Sports and Entertainment owns a collection of franchises across multiple leagues. Under the group’s umbrella, Kroenke owns the NFL’s Los Angeles Rams, NBA’s Denver Nuggets, NHL’s Colorado Avalanche and Arsenal in the English Premier League. He also owns MLS’ Colorado Rapids and the National Lacrosse League’s Colorado Mammoth. Each of those teams has won at least one league title during Kroenke’s ownership tenure. So what...
Amazon is selling a 2-in-1 laptop and tablet on sale for $100
One shopper called it "a feature-packed productivity package."
August Monthly Review: ChatGPT In Epic
Death, taxes, another frontier lab healthcare launch inspiring truly insane LinkedIn takes. As much as I want to stay away, I repeatedly am the crewman unplugging his ears whenever we pass these sirens. So it’s not the first and probably not the last time we dial up the typewriter rather than tie ourselves to the mast. The full blow-by-blow timeline: Health API Guy is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Subscribe The End of the Standalone PHR (Jan 8): ChatGPT Health arrives for consumers, at the time powered by b.well. I was bullish on the approach in that the best way for the PHR to finally solve distribution was to meet consumers were they already are (i.e. When Horizontal Meets Healthcare (Jan 9): OpenAI for Healthcare puts out the shingle for enterprises, with SharePoint ingestion standing in for the EHR integration the product actually needed. Another One: Anthropic’s Healthcare Debut (Jan 16): Claude's version, on HealthEx rails instead of b.well, with Agent Skills for FHIR development as the one true vertical-specific investment. ChatGPT for Clinicians: The Trap Sprung (Apr 24): OpenAI filled in the missing GTM middle with a free product for verified clinicians, effectively peeling the enterprise wrapper off ChatGPT for Healthcare and taking the PLG fight directly to OpenEvidence. OpenAI’s Second Attempt at Health (Jul 31): a relaunch of their patient specific app, now branded Health in ChatGPT, where the privacy partition came out, the connectors thinned, and b.well disappeared in favor of first-party FHIR work against a smaller network Beyond a Shingle So what was announced now? Today, we’re introducing a new electronic health record integration that brings authorized patient context from Epic into ChatGPT for Healthcare, along with the Healthcare Public Data plugin for direct, structured access to official healthcare datasets like PubMed, DailyMed, and CMS Coverage. Together, these capabilities bring ChatGPT closer to the systems and sources healthcare teams trust, while supporting the controls and compliance healthcare work requires. The core portfolio is unchanged from prior announcements we delineated and discussed (aside from the relaunch of patient-facing). Since trade publications still seem to be confusing them by using the wrong names: Enterprise sales motion: ChatGPT for Healthcare Protecting their core product / PLG: ChatGPT for Clinicians Consumer/patient-facing product: Health in ChatGPT So really, this is a feature release (specifically for ChatGPT for Healthcare when it comes to EHR integration). What’s cool about it, though, is that we are moving beyond just putting out a shingle. Everything in the January enterprise launch was horizontalizable: Horizontal tech companies thus generally start verticalization with their “putting out a shingle phase”. Telling the world you’re open for business as a horizontal tech company reliably attracts early inbound interest from buyers who are already trying to force-fit horizontal tools into domain-specific workflows and are eager for any signal that the vendor intends to support their use case more directly. Nothing was really vertical specific, which is exactly what you'd expect from the ultimate hypergrowth horizontal company dipping their toes into specific industries. But eventually you have to stop changing the sign on the door and start changing the product. Can you guess where the horizontal product was going to run out of road? This is the core dilemma writ large: verticalization requires differentiation, while scale economics of consumer and horizontal push toward unification. I’ve buried the lede so deep here it will be painful to some readers, but what should be shocking to no one is that my perspective is that EHR integration is the only path that meaningfully resolves this tension for ChatGPT for Healthcare. Integration with Microsoft Sharepoint is fine, but it is categorically insufficient for any product that hopes to influence clinical decision-making. SMART Money Well here we are, eight months later! Real vertical investment has begun, which surprised a few people. One friend in the industry messaged me: “Absolutely no way Epic gave ChatGPT API access.” Looking forensically at the announcements, the integration is notably read-only across appointment notes, laboratory results, medications, and specialist documentation. So while I’m not a betting man, I'd wager the house this is a SMART on FHIR launch: That sounds a lot like USCDI! The recommended path for the workflow they outline would be SMART on FHIR Their Health AI lead’s post is evocative of both standalone and EHR launch SMART, which another termed “ChartGPT” and “EHR Plugin” The implementation burden for SMART on FHIR is the lowest of the available integrative paths This is the team who literally did patient-facing SMART on FHIR with Epic last month Most importantly, if you’re a horizontal company, you generally still haven’t taken the full plunge and thus (overly) value reusability. SMART on FHIR is the logical compromise: healthcare-specific enough to matter, but standardized enough to reuse. Nobody Asked Judy Another friend asked “I thought they had to go to each health system, or did they go direct to Epic and now health systems opt in?” Given the trust paradigms in healthcare, this functionally cannot be Epic hoovering up all the data for OpenAI and shoving ChatGPT in their customers’ faces (or they would revolt). However, I do believe the aforementioned terrible coverage by TechCrunch and other outlets is probably responsible for that question, given the 325 million reference. When using FHIR as a business associate to an Epic customer, there is no EHR gatekeeping to speak of, as that isn’t how fhir.epic.com works: You register an app You pick your APIs You test against the sandbox APIs You list as “Ready for Production” Hospitals pick your app You test and go live with them Bluntly, nobody had to say yes or no in Verona (nor were they given the chance). Vendor Services (their next developer tier up that I doubt OpenAI is using quite yet in this initial release) certainly has contractual paperwork that some resent, but even there, the twin pressures of mounting antitrust and information blocking make outright gatekeeping increasingly fraught. My friend’s sentiment is, to me, representative of a broader industry neurosis, perhaps a sort of scar tissue of prior eras: people assume the gate is still there and never actually try the door. There are certainly other ways Epic (and any EHR) can put its thumb on the scale, but they are not so dumb as to stand in front of a federally mandated API and play bouncer at this exact moment in time. So I think they can and probably should go deeper, as this release is at best parity and at worst behind vertical-specific competition. OpenEvidence did a basic SMART launch with Sutter Health in February, allowing for more convenient evidence search by providers. They then add patient-context (the equivalent SMART on FHIR flow to what we see here) when Cedars-Sinai went enterprise-wide in May. UpToDate has four distinct applications across deeper workflows like patient engagement listed in Epic Showroom and announced a partnership with Epic to power Art at UGM Abridge and other ambient scribes have invested deeply into the deepest bidirectional clinical copilot workflow with integrations well beyond SMART on FHIR. In that light, the “Who is OpenAI primarily targeting here?” is clear. This release brings them into striking distance of OpenEvidence, but not the others quite yet. They are the only one of the three you can reach without building something truly Epic-specific. When will they go further? Competition is a great motivator to overcome the horizontal demons and start building things that can’t be reused: not across industries, not across EHRs, maybe not past the customer you built them for. That’s the price of actually verticalizing. The question is if and when OpenAI will be willing to pay it. Month in Review Here is the monthly review. As a reminder, this is a regular round-up of the month’s posts and other content to surface things you may have missed across regulation, litigation, interoperability, and beyond. AI assistance is used in these bullet summaries so I can focus on articles. Articles Published: None this month Video Content: The Information Exchange: Standards-based Thruple Edition (Aug 14): Back to school for us too, with Brad reporting in from the CMS Health Tech Ecosystem’s one year anniversary in DC. We get into the January CMS-0057 deadline, the fall rulemaking reading list, and why enrollment still keeps most apps off FHIR. The Information Exchange: Epic Dúnadan Edition (Aug 25): A UGM roundup with Ryan Brickner joining for the first time to check our takes against what the building actually thinks. Rangers, Ergo sitting on top of EHI, and a down-market lineup that needs some cuts. Regulatory: Stacked Deck, Bad Hand (Aug 05): ONC’s website refresh took the entire HIT Policy Committee record with it, so I rebuilt the archive and went looking for the regulatory capture story everyone assumes is buried in there. Stacking the deck and winning the hand turn out to be very different things. The Sixth Generation of Patient Access (Aug 19): A quick catalog of the five generations of patient access we’ve layered on since HIPAA, and the two candidates now competing to be the sixth. One is planned. The other is the market routing around the plan entirely. Court cases: Three Cases Walk Into a Docket (Aug 06): Two surprise settlements cleared the board in a single week, and then Judge Maddox dropped ninety-four pages on Vyne v. Henry Schein. The sleeper is a DMCA holding that makes direct-to-database a considerably riskier business model. Epic v. Health Gorilla: Into the MDL (Aug 10): Nine class actions are headed to Miami, and the Panel signaled it wants to bring the case that spawned them along too. That would leave Epic arguing the requests were obviously fraudulent in one courtroom and unknowable in the other. Amazon v. Perplexity: Agents Are Legalized! (Aug 11): The Ninth Circuit vacated the injunction against Comet, holding that the user is the one accessing the servers rather than the company that built the agent. A real win for agentic access, and a much narrower one than the headline suggests. Veeva v. Epic: Come At Me, Bro (Aug 26): Epic’s response brief wants the dismissal affirmed and, unusually, wants the opinion published as precedent. Buried in it is Epic’s own description of what its non-competes actually prohibit, which current and former employees should read closely. EHRs: The Contract Epic Would Never Sign Today (Aug 04): A 1999 SEC exhibit catches Epic licensing nearly its entire product line, Tapestry included, to the company that became TriZetto. The marketing services menu attached to it is the part that will make you blink. Forecast from Verona (Aug 07): The Epic Almanac makes one argument six different ways: the AI is only as good as the networks behind it. Emmie headlines, Art’s context stack is the most ambitious part, and Penny finally gets an autonomous coding date on the calendar. Works With Epic MyChart (Aug 17): Epic’s first new Showroom category since the death of Workshop certifies hardware instead of software, badge on the box and all. Made for iPhone, but for blood pressure cuffs, and rough news for anyone selling the RPM stack sitting in between. UGM Hot Takes 2026 (Aug 20): Everyone else covered the AI announcements, so I went after Savvy deleting the payment gateway, Rangers as Boost with the timer removed, and a down-market lineup with too many entries. Plus the Health Grid tidbits I cannot help myself on. MyChart Central Grows Up (Aug 24): Device data and Emmie turn Epic’s identity hub into a full consumer platform, which is both a logical answer to ChatGPT and a bit of a mistake. It also happens to be the best scraping target Epic has ever shipped. Industry Analysis: The Wrong Yardstick (Aug 12): Vertical software keeps getting judged against Superhuman and Notion, which is the wrong bar entirely. Your user is comparing your product to a whiteboard and forty phone calls before lunch. Primitives vs. Abstractions (Aug 27): Developers want building blocks, systems of record prefer to hand out business logic, and both sides have a real case. There’s no test from the outside that separates the engineering reason from the competitive one, which is why this keeps ending up in court. Cross-industry Comparisons: The Two Kinds of Platform Power (Aug 18): Attention power and record power are different problems that keep getting handed the same regulatory toolkit. Congress’s latest swing at Big Tech shows both what’s possible and where it falls apart. The Dogs of (Platform) War (Aug 21): A CourtListener alert turned up a property management fight with healthcare’s exact shape and none of the Cures Act. Shell prospects, ghost accounts, a notetaker bot that came back to haunt someone, and a lawyer arguing both sides of the same theory in two states. Fractals All the Way Down (Aug 31): Yardi dominates property management right up until you zoom into one segment, where AppFolio owns it outright and Yardi doesn’t appear at all. Where you draw the line around a B2B software market is about to decide an awful lot of cases. Other News: If Judy Had the Courage (Aug 13): A short eulogy for the era when software was allowed to look insane: WinAMP, bold colors, and everything the grey chatbot era has taken from us. External Media: Portland Monthly Health Tech Meetup: Erin O’Brien channeled my own feelings - maybe it’s just because it’s August and beautiful, but the monthly edition of the PDX Health community meetup was a ripper. Make sure to reach out if interested to join for the next one. STAT’s Coverage of Epic This Month: Brittany Trang of STAT did a fantastic job of breaking the FTC investigation that’s been lurking, as well as UGM related coverage, so I had to give her her wish of a meme. Fall Conferences: I’m pumped to be kicking off my fall conference season in NYC at Nabla Accelerate next month, which Chrissy provided the link to apply for. Here’s the rest of my schedule in case you want to meet up: Commonwell (Redwood Shores, CA): Oct 13-14 Open@Epic (Madison, WI): Oct 21-22 eHealthExchange (Austin, TX): Oct 27 Sequoia Project (Austin, TX): Oct 28-29 HLTH (Vegas): Nov 15-18 RSNA (Chicago): Nov 29-Dec 3 Posts I Liked: HTI-6 Should Unbundle API Certification: Josh Mandel makes the case that HTI-6 should split (g)(10) into separate authorization and data certifications, so a PACS or a genomics platform can certify only the role it actually performs. Imaging is the urgent example, but the structure solves a much bigger problem. On implementing ePrior Auth with Epic: Scott Rossignol’s field notes from a live ePrior Auth build on Epic, including the two app registrations nobody warns you about and the CPT mapping problem waiting at the end. CMS-0057 implementations are going to be such a beast. Healthcare point solutions are starting to look a lot like streaming services: Spencer Dorn runs the cable-to-streaming arc against health IT and lands squarely on the bundling half of the cycle. Bundling can be good! It can also be bad! Life is nuanced. Health API Guy is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Subscribe
Royal Bank of Canada Sells 54,663 Shares of Starz Entertainment Corp. $STRZ
Royal Bank of Canada lessened its stake in shares of Starz Entertainment Corp. (NASDAQ:STRZ - Free Report) by 89.3% during the first quarter, according to its most recent filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission. The firm owned 6,528 shares of the company's stock after selling 54,663 sh
Louisiana cites three for illegal seafood business
Agents with the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries (LDWF) cited three individuals for several violations related to selling illegal raw seafood
Keurig Dr Pepper sells stake in Chobani ahead of split; Corgan enters new market with M&A
Keurig Dr Pepper is selling its stake in Chobani and using the proceeds to reduce debt ahead of a planned split. Private equity firm Align Capital Partners completed an exit, while architecture firm Corgan revealed its latest acquisition to enter another fast-growing market. Read on to learn about these deals and more as September gets off to a quick start.
Not accepting health insurance a selling point for some KC doctors
As health insurance costs climb, more patients turn to direct primary care for basic care. Patients get quick access for a monthly fee.
‘Most’ of Star Wars Zero Company studio Bit Reactor was furloughed ahead of launch
Last week was meant to be a moment of triumph for Bit Reactor, the Maryland-based game studio founded in 2021 with ambitions to create a great new tactical combat game. On Thursday, August 27, Bit Reactor’s debut title, Star Wars Zero Company, released to stellar reviews. And, from the Gamescom show in Cologne, Germany, studio co-founder Greg Foertsch was giving interviews discussing what the studio’s next game may be. But for many developers on the game, launch has been bittersweet. Fans love it. Critics prefer it to most recent Star Wars games. Zero Company, which is out for PS5, Xbox Series consoles and PC, is the top-selling game on Steam. Much of the team that made it, however, is currently going without pay. They were furloughed, just weeks ahead of the game’s launch. A rep for Bit Reactor confirmed to Game File today that the studio had furloughed many of its workers prior to the game’s release. They said it was a difficult decision and one that had been made before it was clear how launch would go. The rep emphasized that the call to do this was Bit Reactor’s alone (meaning not from publisher EA nor Star Wars license holder Disney). While the rep declined to comment on the scale of the furloughs, a previously unreported lawsuit brought by studio co-founder Alison Kelly in 2024 noted in a filing from August 12 of this year that Bit Reactor “has furloughed most of its employees and terminated contractors…” One source told Game File the furloughs impacted 80% of the team; another referred to there only being a skeleton crew left on Bit Reactor’s active payroll, ready to address any of Zero Company’s post-launch bugs. The issue is that Bit Reactor, a studio formed in 2021, had run out of most of its money just ahead of the launch of its first game. Over the weekend, Zachariah Scott, a senior technical artist who worked at Bit Reactor from early 2023 until an acrimonious exit this past May, said on LinkedIn that the studio was “concealing the fact that the team was Furloughed weeks ago.” Reached by phone today, Scott told Game File that he spoke to nearly a dozen Bit Reactor workers over the weekend. “Everybody has essentially the same story, which is, ‘Yeah, I got furloughed three weeks ago.” The Bit Reactor rep told Game File that the studio hoped to bring furloughed workers back, suggesting that a successful launch of the game could be impactful. Scott told Game File that workers he spoke to were less confident that even if there were returns, that all who were furloughed would get their old jobs again. A heated dispute Bit Reactor’s mid-2026 was almost even more tumultuous. The lawsuit by co-founder Alison Kelly that first revealed the furloughs was initially slated to go to trial in June. The suit is a she-said/he-said about whether Kelly, until 2024 the chief operating officer of Bit Reactor, was a co-owner of the studio or whether it was solely owned by Greg Foertsch. In July 2024, Kelly sued, saying she was pushed out by Foertsch. She first sued in federal court and later refiled in Maryland’s Baltimore County, alleging breach of contract and that Foertsch had unjustly enriched himself. Kelly cited damages of over $20 million, on the basis of Bit Reactor allegedly being worth more than double that. Foertsch’s side has said Kelly was never a co-owner and has countered with claims about her job performance (which she has denied). The June trial was postponed until early 2027, as both sides have been deposing witnesses and filing more claims and denials along the way. Amid all of that, filings in the lawsuit reviewed by Game File paint a picture about Bit Reactor’s origins, early aspirations around tactics games, the team’s breakthrough in drawing the attention of Electronic Arts with the help of a pitch tied to one of EA’s non-Star Wars franchises, and early fractures among its co-founders. The real story about the company behind Zero Company
Ernst Names Small Business of the Week, The Bread Board
Read the release on Sen. Ernst's website HERE. Throughout this Congress, Chair Ernst plans to recognize a small business in every one of Iowa’s 99 counties. RED OAK, Iowa – U.S. Senator Joni Ernst (R-Iowa), Chair of the Senate Small Business Committee, today announced her Small Business of the Week: The Bread Board of Marion County. Throughout the 119th Congress, Chair Ernst plans to recognize a small business in each of Iowa's 99 counties. “The Bread Board has risen to the occasion, growing from Heidi’s passion for baking into a thriving Pella bakery that brings people together,” said Chair Ernst. “From serving fresh sourdough and homemade meals to supporting local businesses, schools, and community events, Heidi and her team have proven they have the perfect recipe for success.” Heidi Rozenboom grew up baking fresh bread alongside her grandmother, always using the same bread board that would eventually inspire her business’ name. Years later, Heidi started selling fresh bread to local coffee shops and cafes. As demand grew, she opened her storefront in downtown Pella in 2021 and named her bakery the Bread Board. Today, the Bread Board serves fresh sourdough bread, pastries, homemade meals, and other baked goods. Stay tuned as Chair Ernst continues to recognize outstanding Iowa small businesses with her Small Business of the Week award. ###
Take-Two Stock Drops Amid GTA 6 Leaks - Take-Two Interactive (NASDAQ:TTWO)
Take-Two Interactive Software Inc (NASDAQ:TTWO) shares are falling Monday, potentially facing selling pressure tied to a string of leaks surrounding "Grand Theft Auto VI" ahead of the game's Nov. 19 release.
Want to buy a camel? Now there’s an app for that
Startup Hign Al Khaleej says it’s the first digital marketplace for buying, selling and auctioning camels.
Live Nation Entertainment, Inc. $LYV Stock Holdings Decreased by Wellington Management Group LLP
Wellington Management Group LLP trimmed its position in Live Nation Entertainment, Inc. (NYSE:LYV - Free Report) by 31.6% in the second quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the SEC. The institutional investor owned 1,891,959 shares of the company's stock after selling 873,002 shar
Italian American Powerhouse AGBO Unveils New Hit Thriller ‘The Whisper Man’ on Netflix
AGBO's latest feature film, The Whisper Man, premiered Friday on Netflix and surged to the platform's no. 1 spot, marking another major release for the independent studio founded by Italian American filmmakers Joe and Anthony Russo. Based on Alex North's bestselling 2019 novel, the psychological crime thriller brings together an acclaimed cast led by Robert…
Hemp business owner reacts to arrest
JANESVILLE, Wis. (WKOW) -- Hemp 1848 owner Jerry McCoy said he believes his arrest on suspicion of selling illegal THC products was racially motivated.
Wellesley kids turn stray golf balls into a thriving business
Young Wellesley entrepreneurs selling recycled golf balls across from Nehoiden Golf Club entrances
Expansive Pecan Grove home offers plenty of entertainment space for growing family
TUPELO – Laurie Webb of TM Realtors believes Pecan Grove, an expansive house and property in Tupelo, offers at least two major selling points: It’s a home large for a
Amazon is selling a $315 luxury Seiko watch for $209
It has 100 meters of water resistance.
Minnesota company is tackling nitrogen pollution with ag science in volatile fertilizer market
Pivot Bio, a company selling farmers a self-sustaining, non-synthetic, bacterial source of nitrogen, aims to lower the nitrogen levels that are the source of significant water pollution in farm states.
ICYMI: SanDisk Is Now Selling A 1TB MicroSD Express Card For Switch 2
Make some space
How The Founder Of MaryRuth’s Vitamin Supplements Built A Billion-Dollar Business
The inside story of the crazy, creative financing behind one of America’s best-selling wellness brands.
Bitcoin treasury companies shed $80bn in value as business model unwinds
Crypto hoarders have been selling tokens and reverting to former activities
Buss brothers joining new Padres ownership group
The Buss brothers new firm will be part of the Padres ownership group after selling the Lakers.
Galaxy S26 Ultra is the world’s most popular Android phone, and that’s a first
Android phones are never the top-selling smartphones globally, but the ones that get closest are almost always budget models. In...
Trump's Canada tariffs take aim at America's favorite cars
President Donald Trump threatened 50% tariffs on Canadian vehicles and auto parts. Three of America's four best-selling vehicles are assembled there.
Gavin Newsom is selling his Sacramento mansion
The sale is Newsom's "next step" ahead of his job transition next year.
Plex is selling your personal data, here's how to opt out of that
Feel like ads on Plex know too much about you? Here's how you can opt out of Plex selling your data to third parties.
The company selling a $3,000 mattress cover that billionaires love wants to become a healthcare company that treats sleep apnea
Eight Sleep wants to turn its consumer sleep data into a healthcare business, but first it has to clear regulatory and clinical hurdles.
Daniel Snyder 'Invisible' Three Years After Selling Commanders
The infamous NFL owner hasn't been heard from.
Antwone Fisher to Present Author Talk at Chaucer's
Antoine Fisher Chaucer's Books will host New York Times bestselling author Antwone Fisher (“Finding Fish”) for a talk and signing of "Reflections Beneath
Building the beat: How New Orleans can grow the business behind the music
People dance to the music of the TBC Brass Band Photo by Michael DeMocker / The Times-Picayune This week New Orleans hosts the annual Cutting Edge CE Conference, which brings together members of the music industry, musicians, lawyers and others to learn about and discuss the latest changes in the business of making, producing and selling music. googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('ad-1492300'); }); The conference comes as AI and streaming are causing upheavals in the industry. Meanwhile, we’ve seen at least a partial collapse of the global festival industrial complex which has long been a key financial lifeline for many artists.All of that can feel a bit removed from life in New Orleans. After all, we are a city filled with music. On any given day or night, there are dozens of shows across the city, ranging from jazz and blues to hip-hop, bounce and house. Whereas in other cities kids dream of being the star of their local sports team, in New Orleans more often than not they dream of leading their own band.And music is a huge part of our economy. Before New Orleans was known as a foodie destination, it was already drawing millions of visitors from around the globe to experience our jazz, soul and funk scenes firsthand.But the reality is, if you want to make it big, you’re probably going to end up leaving the city. We’ve seen major performers like Lil Wayne, Master P and Jon Batiste (though he’s back on the Northshore) decamp to Los Angeles, Miami and New York. Likewise, up-and-coming musicians like Greer Grimsely, $leazy EZ and Lucky Daye have also left town in search of more profitable pastures.Meanwhile, our local universities train some of the best producers and engineers in the business — only to see them head to one of the big music industry cities after graduation.It’s not a new phenomenon, though the reasons have changed over the years. Like a lot of early jazz musicians, Louis Armstrong famously left New Orleans, first for Chicago before ultimately settling in New York City. But while those early migrations had more to do with racism, in today’s day and age, musicians end up leaving because New Orleans doesn’t have the industry infrastructure necessary to sustain the kind of growth and, well, success, a lot of folks dream of.It’s a hard, but very real, truth. Artists have to go to Nashville for publishing, Los Angeles for production, Atlanta to join a label or New York for representation. That, in turn, is a drain not only on the city’s talent pool but on money that could be staying here at home.Not being an industry town inevitably makes it that much harder for musicians who don’t leave to get the recognition and success they deserve. It also undoubtedly plays a part in keeping the wages working musicians in New Orleans make at their gigs here lower than in places like Austin or Nashville.That’s not to say we don’t have any of the infrastructure needed to make New Orleans a music industry town. We’ve got live music venues, studios, record labels, management companies, copyright attorneys ... all the various building blocks are there. We just haven’t ever built upon that solid foundation. googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('ad-1492297'); }); The question is how do we do that in a way that supports our existing industry and artists, respects our cultural traditions and ensures the wealth generated is equitably distributed so it isn’t just C-suite executives who end up reaping the benefits. And the time to start figuring out the answers is now: next year the legislature will focus on taxes and spending, making it vital that New Orleans leaders have a plan to try and secure funding to help grow our industry.So we asked a group of New Orleanians to give us their thoughts, ranging from industry attorneys and venue operators to working musicians and cultural advocates. Their answers point toward turning New Orleans into a music industry city without leaving musicians behind or abandoning what makes us the greatest music city on earth.If a dusty city like Austin can transform itself into a major hub not just for music but the industry behind it, surely the birthplace of jazz — and pretty much all modern music by extension — can figure it out as well. +3 Mailbox Money: The Recording Academy’s Reid Wick on supporting, and growing, New Orleans’ music industry Reid Wick has been a part of the New Orleans music landscape from virtually every angle. He'… California Dreaming: Pell discusses his time in L.A. and how New Orleans can help young musicians In 2015, New Orleans-born rapper Pell decided to make the move to Los Angeles. He was fresh … +2 Up from the street: To build a stronger music industry, support community first. At MaCCNO, most of our team aren’t just advocates, we’re also working musicians. Here are a … +2 Live and direct: Public investment in independent venues is key to a robust music economy. I’ve spent most of my adult life looking at the New Orleans music business from every side o… +2 Helping Hand: New Orleans doesn’t need more talent. It needs more infrastructure. People love to call New Orleans a music town. And they’re right. +2 \We out here: New Orleans doesn't need to be Austin. It's already a music industry city. +2 Futureshock: New Olreans has the music talent. Now it needs the innovation. New Orleans has long been known as a place for music creation and innovation. 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The Business You Built May Be Holding You Back. For Some Founders, Selling Is the Braver Move
After two decades of running a fast-growing agency, I realized staying put was less risky than starting over.
Sean Duffy's National Vacation Is Peak MAGA Cringe
A reality TV couple taking a cross-country trip with their kids would be great TV if it didn't feature the Transportation Secretary selling out his office.
Woot Is Practically Giving Away Sonic x Shadow Generations to New Customers Today—and Selling Sonic Racing CrossWorlds for Next to Nothing As Well
Amazon-owned retailer Woot is practically giving away top Sonic titles today—including Sonic x Shadow Generations for just $1—to new customers.
One New Thing: Supporting Business Professionals in Higher Ed
Jacques Steinberg is a New York Times bestselling author, former New York Times education correspondent and recurring co-host of the “Admissions Beat” podcast. Here is his latest rave on an EdTech resource. The National Association of College and University Business Officers seeks to support and ...
Bieber Shuts Down Rays Again: Rays 1, Toronto 5
Shane Bieber last faced the Rays on July 23rd in what was potentially an audition to acquire the veteran pitcher. In that game, he scattered three hits and a single run as Toronto won the contest 3-1. The Jays did some buying and selling at the deadline, and Bieber remained with the club to the […]
Yuval Noah Harari on the economic and political perils of AI
Humanity must not entrust its lot to clever machines, the bestselling historian warns
Lindale business owner jailed for selling counterfeit luxury goods
A Lindale business owner is behind bars after he was charged with selling counterfeit merchandise of six different high-end fashion brands, according to court records.
Best Buy Is Selling $100 Gift Cards for Just $60 in Local Stores for One Day Only — Here’s Everything You Need to Know
Best Buy is offering $100 gift cards for just $60 during a 24-hour in-store sale this weekend. Here's everything you need to know.
Selling data centers to voters: Frank Luntz on the politics of AI data centers
Frank Luntz, FIL Inc. pollster and political strategist, joins 'Squawk Box' to discuss AI data centers in the midterms, how companies and politicians are selling data center buildouts to voters, state of political polling, and more.
Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 Pro In Desoldered Form Is Already On Sale For $42 Before Official Launch, New Image Shows Possible Heatsink Solution Like Samsung’s HPB
A desoldered Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 6 Pro is reportedly selling for $42 ahead of its official launch, accompanied by leaked images revealing an HPB heatsink solution
Train to headline Harrisonburg concert in October
Platinum-selling and Grammy-winning rock group Train is coming to Harrisonburg, headlining a concert at the Atlantic Union Bank Center on Oct. 2 with opening act Moon Taxi. The concert at
Janesville business owner arrested for allegedly selling illegal THC products
A Janesville business owner was arrested after a months-long investigation found the business was allegedly selling illegal THC products, according to the Janesville Police Department.
Clay Travis officially launches new venture Sport & State
Clay Travis has officially launched his new outlet after departing OutKick earlier this summer. On Wednesday, Travis filed his first column on Sport & State, the new sports, culture, and politics venture he will lead after 15 years building, growing, and eventually selling OutKick. Sport & State will feature an all-day lineup of live shows beginning…
Charlamagne tha God on Podcast, Being a Girl Dad, Mental Health
Radio royalty and New York Times bestselling author Charlamagne tha God joins TODAY’s Jenna Bush Hager and Sheinelle Jones to discuss his No.1 video podcast on Netflix, “The Breakfast Club” and share a story of working with Craig Melvin early in their careers. He also talks about the importance of reading, receiving a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, being a dad to four girls and his advocacy for mental health. Then, they play a game of “Charlamagne Sounds Off,” where he gives his hot takes to pop culture news.
iPhone 17 Pro Cases Fit iPhone 18 Pro - Or At Least Otterbox Thinks So
Bloomberg's Mark Gurman noted on X (Twitter) today that Otterbox is already selling iPhone 18 Pro cases at Best Buy. While the timing is early for a new iPhone that isn't expected to launch until mid-September, what's more interesting is that Otterbox's packaging indicates the iPhone 18 Pro will fit iPhone 17 Pro cases and vice versa.
Fairview to sell 200,000-square-foot Midway campus, relocate 250 employees
Fairview Health Services is selling its 200,000-square-foot administrative campus in St. Paul's Midway neighborhood, relocating 250 employees by year-end.
10 things to know before starting a resale business — and what actually sells in 2026
Learn how to start a resale business in 2026, from platform fees and sourcing to the sneakers, denim, and handbags actually selling right now
Don't boycott Grand Theft Auto 6, say workers fired by Rockstar - buy a T-shirt to help fund the legal battle instead
The IWGB are selling t-shirts, with the revenues going directly to union legal costs.
Exclusive: You Can Finally Buy a Fairphone—a Sustainable, Repairable Smartphone—in the US
More than a decade after launching in Europe, the Netherlands company is now selling its repairable phones in the US, starting with the Fairphone (Gen 6+).
Chelsea co-owners Todd Boehly and Mark Walter open to selling stakes to majority owners Clearlake Capital
Latest transfer news and headlines as Galatasaray are prepared to double Bruno Fernandes Manchester United wages; Man City are hoping to sign Lille midfielder Ayyoub Bouaddi in the next few days; Man City face having to pay Chelsea more than £120m to land midfielder Enzo Fernandez
Will Anthropic and OpenAI Stop Selling Their Best AI to Businesses?
Anthropic and OpenAI’s move to develop AI applications and features tailored to specific industries continues to worry their customers, some of which must now compete head-on with their main AI suppliers. Design app Canva is the latest to find itself in this predicament, as we reported earlier ...
Alibaba to Sell Videogame Business for at Least $1.5 Billion
Alibaba Group is selling its videogame arm in a deal worth at least $1.5 billion, as the Chinese company shifts its focus to artificial intelligence.
What Three Encompass Health Insiders Selling Signals After a Rate Increase
This sale reduced an insider's direct equity holdings by 11%.
Amazon is selling a $39 multi-tool for $24 that’s easy to carry
"It includes an impressive variety of functions."
MRN BUSINESS SPOTLIGHT: Tim Lohmeyer Home Inspections and Improvements
On the MRN Business Spotlight brought to you by Bank of Springfield, Tim Lohmeyer with Tim Lohmeyer Home Inspections and Improvements joins Brittany Boll to talk about his business and the experience and trust he brings to one of the biggest financial decisions most of us will ever make: buying or selling a home. One...
His family fled socialism. He’s trying to spread it.
A young Cuban American is selling democratic socialism door-to-door across Miami. But he cannot bring himself to discuss it across his family’s kitchen table.
Amazon is selling a 2-in-1 laptop and tablet for just $75
"Excellent tablet for everyday use."
Erie County receives small number of responses to biometric law disclosure
The law prohibits businesses from collecting, using or selling people's data.
3 Mistakes Business Owners Make Before Selling Their Business
Two years sounded like plenty of time. It was not even close. And the moment she realized that, it was almost too late to fix it.
Trump is selling early access to his posts on Truth Social
President Donald Trump gets sued by media organizations for selling early access to his Truth Social posts.
BREAKING: Netflix to shut down two more game studios
Netflix is sticking with video games but once again reducing the number of studios it owns making games. The streaming giant is closing Los Angeles-based Night School studio, which it acquired in 2021 and plans to close Helsinki-based Moonloot, which was founded in 2022. Just six weeks ago, Night School had released Unhinged, a novel 30-minute first-person horror game, streamable on TVs to Netflix users. The game was hailed by Netflix co-CEO Greg Peters in a call with investors. Six weeks later, Night School is closing. Prior to its Netflix tenure, Night School had developed the award-winning supernatural thriller Oxenfree. A second Oxenfree game followed after the purchase, as well as a mobile game designed to tie in to an episode of the Netflix show Black Mirror. Netflix attributed the studio closures to a prioritization around kids gaming, party games, story-driven fare and games with mainstream hooks, such as a recently released FIFA game. “We see an opportunity to be more focused in our execution, so we are making organizational changes to the business to match those priorities,” a Netflix spokesperson told Game File. Netflix is also cutting jobs from its internal games team. A rep declined to say how many jobs were being lost by these cutbacks. “We are incredibly grateful to the talented colleagues we’re saying goodbye to today. We thank them for all their contributions to Netflix, and wish them the best,” the rep said. Netflix started releasing video games, initially on mobile as a free bonus to subscribers, in 2021. By 2023, Mike Verdu, then the head of Netflix’s game operations, was telling me that the company was committed to growing carefully, as it offered more games and built up internal game studios. At the time, it hadn’t made any gaming job cuts. Since then, Netflix has altered its approach. In 2024, it shut down Team Blue, a start-up studio led by ex-Call of Duty and Halo developers that was exploring making a high-end first-person game for the service. Last October, Netflix shut down another studio, Boss Fight, shortly after Peters praised the team’s Squid Game game to investors. (One of Boss Fight’s main developers now works on the Netflix FIFA game for outside studio Delphi.) And in December, Netflix sold cozy game studio Spry Fox back to its founders. Amid all of this, Netflix has shifted from emphasizing mobile games to offering games through TVs and PCs, via streamed connections, with phones used as controllers. That’s how Night School’s Unhinged worked, along with games such as Boggle and Party Crashers that have collectively helped the Netflix game controller app chart well on mobile app stores. The studio cuts leave Netflix with a central gaming team that works with external developers, and a dedicated first party studio in, Helsinki-based Next Games, which produced many of the company’s couch-centric party games. The move away from having a roster of internal game studios aligns with Netflix’s own approach to shows and movies, which are largely produced externally. The company owns few TV/film production studios of its own. The gaming industry overall is seeing large holders of multiple studios cut back, with Sony, Ubisoft, Embracer, Microsoft and other giants closing or selling off studios. Cuts in California-based studios, where costs often run relatively high, have been particularly acute. Netflix has faced skepticism about its gaming plans for years. The moves today are likely to fuel them, and the company has few upcoming projects to counter the narrative. Among the few hinted, acclaimed independent studio Don’t Nod said last year it was working on a game tied to a major Netflix franchise.
Kids to learn business skills running their own booths at Arlington County Fair
Booths run by some of Arlington's youngest entrepreneurs will be setting up at the Arlington County Fair this weekend, selling crafts, food and more. Kids Markets will be hosting two kid-run markets on Saturday and Sunday at the fair, setting up booths in the upper field with goods such as jewelry, arts and crafts, crocheted
Nvidia playing many roles in AI gold rush: tech guru
In this AI gold rush, Nvidia is selling picks, investing in mines, and bankrolling prospectors, business professor Rob Lalka says.
Ardagh considers selling off metal packaging business after restructuring
Ardagh Holdings, which has a 76% stake in Ardagh Metal Packaging, disclosed Thursday it may take steps to facilitate a sale to a third-party buyer. AMP’s revenues totaled $5.5 billion last year.
Cerebras Hardware Business Declines in Sign of ‘Lumpy’ Demand
Cerebras Systems Inc. slid in late trading after reporting a decline in hardware revenue, a sign the newly public company is making slow progress selling computers with a novel chip design.
Viral Las Vegas baker starts petition to ‘protect cottage food businesses’
The viral Mama Llama Bakery has been selling “center-bite cinnamon rolls” from her Las Vegas home, but will soon cease operations after she received a code violation.
Shopify Inc. (SHOP) Soars as Jim Cramer Applauds AI-Driven Business Formation
Software platforms faced selling pressure due to concerns that generative AI tools would replace traditional software architectures. However, Shopify Inc. (NASDAQ:SHOP) broke away from sector headwinds after second-quarter financial results showed AI tools driving business formation rather than displacing its e-commerce infrastructure. Because Shopify serves small and medium-sized businesses requiring turnkey checkout, payment processing, and […]
Teen buys abandoned storage units and sells 'treasures' he finds inside—his side hustle brings in $135,000 a year
Michael Haskell started buying abandoned storage units and selling their contents while still in high school through his business Mike's Unique Treasures.
Small Business Spotlight: Specialty dental practice takes root on Market St.
WHAT MADE YOU WANT TO OPEN BLUE HERON ROOT CANAL SPECIALISTS? OWNER SARAH ERMOSHKIN: “I’ve always been an entrepreneur at heart. When I was 23 years old, I owned a cafe in Seattle, where I even fought to oppose oppressive sales taxes on espresso drinks. After selling that business, I got married and started a family. Once my children were in school, I attended dental school through the Navy Health Professions Scholarship Program (HPSP), which covered my tuition and provided a stipend. From the beginning, my goal was to eventually own my own practice after completing my military service. The work I do is incredibly rewarding and being able to create an environment that puts patients first while helping employees grow professionally makes every day as a business owner meaningful.” WHAT DOES YOUR BUSINESS PROVIDE? ERMOSHKIN: “Endodontists are often called ‘pain doctors’ because our primary mission is to relieve pain and save natural teeth. We specialize in root canal therapy, retreatment of nonhealing root canals, treatment of root resorption, apicoectomies – microsurgical root-end procedures – and vital pulp therapy for children. Our goal is to preserve teeth that might otherwise need to be extracted and replaced with implants. Saving a patient’s natural tooth is almost always the best long-term solution for their oral health.” HOW DOES YOUR MILITARY TRAINING HELP YOUR BUSINESS? ERMOSHKIN: “My military service taught me how to lead, collaborate and make decisions under pressure. I worked closely with senior leadership while treating a large patient population and collaborating with specialists across multiple disciplines. During the COVID-19 pandemic, (I) served a dual role as Navy dentist and as the public affairs officer for Naval Health Clinic Annapolis, where I helped develop medical and dental communications for the midshipmen and support staff, while coordinating with the broader Navy Capital Region. We worked closely with other military treatment facilities to share best practices and deliver consistent public health messaging. Those leadership experiences continue to shape how I lead my team and serve our patients today.” WHAT CHALLENGES ARE YOU FACING RIGHT NOW IN YOUR BUSINESS? ERMOSHKIN: “One of our biggest challenges is overcoming the misinformation surrounding root canal treatment. Root canals are safe, effective and often the best way to relieve pain while preserving a natural tooth. Unfortunately, many people choose extraction because they believe it’s less expensive or because they’ve seen misleading information online. What they may not realize is that losing a tooth can lead to shifting teeth, changes in the way they bite and chew and significantly higher costs to restore their smile later.”
The secret AI-startup project I’ve been working on the last six months
In this edition of STAT's AI Prognosis: The messy reality of hastily developing and selling AI tools to clinics, and other health AI news.
Protalix BioTherapeutics Reports Second Quarter 2026 Financial and Business Results
Company to host conference call and webcast today at 8:00 a.m. EDT Revenues from selling goods increased to $19.8 million in the second quarter of 2026, up...
'Game of Thrones' fans gush over 'Mad King' at Royal Shakespeare Theatre
"Game of Thrones: The Mad King," the first stage adaptation of writer George R. R. Martin's bestselling fantasy saga, opened Saturday at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre with Martin — and rapturous fans — in attendance.
HeyDay Entertainment to close Norman location after selling to Oklahoma Turnpike Authority
HeyDay Entertainment announced on Monday that it will be closing its Norman location on August 28 after reaching an agreement to sell its property to the Oklahoma Turnpike Authority for planned hig…
Are Madison's vintage shops Gen Z's new small-business boom?
These entrepreneurs in their 20s are selling old-school threads in physical stores, proving that online isn't the only way.
Self-flying air taxis and drones: Boeing sells key aviation technology businesses to Archer
Boeing is selling Wisk, SkyGrid and Insitu to Archer in a major deal combining autonomous aircraft, drones, airspace technology and AI.
Donors come through for Sophie, Morristown's beloved 'Hot Dog Lady'
Soft-spoken Sophie Hsieh been selling hod dogs on the Morristown Green for four decades. When her cart was damaged, her fans stepped up.
Telefónica is integrating AI into all its business voice communications
The operator’s unique selling point lies in offering smart voice services directly over standard telephone networks.
Amundi Has $760,000 Stake in PENN Entertainment, Inc. $PENN
Amundi trimmed its stake in PENN Entertainment, Inc. (NASDAQ:PENN - Free Report) by 93.5% in the first quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The institutional investor owned 50,567 shares of the company's stock after selling 731,502 sha
4 Of The Best Selling HDMI Splitters On Amazon Worth Buying
HDMI splitters are great if you want to broadcast the same image across multiple displays. Here are the best options on Amazon from Orei, Llano, and more.
Selling the Dream of SpaceX Was the Easy Part. Now Elon Musk Has to Hang On.
SpaceX’s $300 billion swing in market value this past week put Musk back in grind mode, having to execute on highflying promises made in the lead-up to the biggest IPO ever.
21 youth business licenses issued to UAF lemonade camp participants
Twenty-one Fairbanks children ages 9 to 12 wrapped up a week-long entrepreneurship program Thursday, selling lemonade at UAF’s Georgeson Botanical Garden as the capstone of the UAF College of Business and Security Management’s Young Entrepreneurs Lemonade Lab.
I built Canada’s largest crypto company. But the business climate here made selling to Robinhood inevitable
The CEO of WonderFi says that he sold because Canada's burdensome regulatory climate makes international expansion out of reach.
The Business of Selling People Their Family’s Lost Photos
This online niche sometimes feels like a scam. Is it?
City warns retailers to stop selling illegal e-bikes
The mayor put companies on notice Wednesday, sending cease-and-desist letters to over 40 online retailers.
Halo remake isn't doing so hot on PS5 compared to Black Ops ports
Two old Call of Duty games are outselling the new Halo remake at more than 30:1.
14 Years After Its Release, Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 Is One of 2026's Best Selling Games, According to Analysts
The recent PS4 and PS5 ports of Call of Duty: Black Ops 1 and 2 are already some of the best-selling games of the year, according to analysts.
Apple’s selling refurbished MacBook Neos with a $100 discount
Save a bit of cash on a new laptop for the school year.
Not Google Nest, Not Netgear: This Is Amazon's Best-Selling Mesh Wi-Fi System
TP-Link's Deco X55 AX3000 Wi-Fi 6 Mesh System is the best selling mesh system on Amazon, with over 6,000 purchases happening in July 2026 alone.
Fans Upset Over Some New Vinyl Records Missing Content And Final Mixes
Artists like Olivia Rodrigo and Raye are catching flak from collectors and fans for selling incomplete records
DuckDuckGo Is Selling Anti Pervert Glasses That Contain Zero AI, Cameras, or Even Electronics Whatsoever
"0/10... Useless for perverts."
DuckDuckGo Is Selling Anti Pervert Glasses That Contain Zero AI, Cameras, or Even Electronics Whatsoever
"0/10... Useless for perverts."
DuckDuckGo Is Selling Anti Pervert Glasses That Contain Zero AI, Cameras, or Even Electronics Whatsoever
Google alternative DuckDuckGo has come up with a pair of plastic, non-pervert glasses in response to Meta's controversial smart glasses.
MrBeast Sales Slow, Angel Stock Falls, MUBI and Neon Look for Hits, and Will an NBA Franchise Set a Sales Record?
(Welcome to the Entertainment Strategy Guy, a newsletter on the entertainment industry and business strategy. I write a weekly Streaming Ratings Report and a bi-weekly strategy column, along with occasional deep dives into other topics, like today’s article. Please subscribe.) You probably remember egg prices spiking a few years ago. This led to a lot of debate between the pro-market/pro-competition/antitrust/Neo-Brandesian crowd and the center/center-right/center-left/abundance/libertarian crowd over the cause, whether it was the avian flu outbreak or whether industry consolidation led to price fixing, using avian flu as a convenient cover. Basel Musharbash wrote a whole investigation at BIG looking at it. Well, two years later, we have our answer: it was price fixing. The Justice Department found proof, via emails, of price fixing. Indeed, just the threat of an investigation brought prices down two years ago: I bring this up because at least half a dozen of my favorite political writers and pundits, who were skeptical about price fixing at the time, haven’t written any mea culpas on this issue. It’s really dispiriting and makes it much, much harder to trust their work on other issues. If you take a hard stand on an issue, then you get it wrong, you need to explain how and why you got it wrong. Or update your priors. This is how epistemological bubbles are formed! All of which is to say, it’s time for another installment of “What I Got Right, What I Got Wrong”. Last issue, I mostly focused on the “wrong” side of the equation, so today’s is a bit more balanced, but with one big mea culpa (though I still stand by my original concerns). Let’s dive right in! Subscribe CORRECTION: UFC Didn’t Release Subscriber Data (But Seems to Have Bragged About It Internally) In my analysis of the viewership of UFC Freedom 250, I wrote... “Paramount has also released datecdotes bragging about their subscriber numbers. Earlier this year, they claimed that the first UFC fight on Paramount+ brought in 1 million subscribers.” Well, that datecdote did not come from a PR rep, but from great reporting from James Faris at Business Insider. The actual quote was this: “Paramount’s flagship streaming service generated about a million new subscribers on the day of its first-ever UFC event, Paramount product chief Dane Glasgow told employees in a town hall on Tuesday morning, three staffers who attended the meeting told Business Insider.“ This wasn’t the biggest goof in the world; even Faris emphasized to me that this is more a “clarification” than a correction. Still, it sounds like, internally, the folks at Paramount were very happy about this result—and I’m guessing they were happy with this news getting out—even though the gains didn’t last through the quarter, dropping to 700K adds. RIGHT: MrBeast’s Struggles Continue... I’m very skeptical about MrBeast’s burgeoning media “empire” and, in particular, its $5 billion valuation, as I wrote earlier this year and last year. Sure enough, according to Business Insider, regarding its “booming” consumer products division_:_ “US sales volume grew 13% year-over-year in 2025, following a 33% leap the previous year, according to a presentation deck dated May 2026....A February 2025 investor deck viewed by Business Insider showed Feastables’ net revenue more than doubled in 2024 from 2023, to $215 million, and was forecast to grow 74% in 2025, to $375 million.” [Emphasis mine.] If you told investors that you projected 74% growth but delivered 13%,1 that’s not ideal. But it’s not just MrBeast. Logan Paul and KSI’s Prime had sales drop in half for their energy drinks. It’s one thing to build a successful entertainment company and an entirely different thing to succeed in the heavily-consolidated-but-also-very-competitive consumer packaged goods space! CPGs are dominated by a few firms with very wide moats compared to YouTube, which has few barriers to entry. These businesses require different skill sets and have completely different business environments. WRONG: Does the NBA Have an $8 Billion Bidder? Almost as soon as I published my article about the NBA’s finances, casting skepticism on NBA expansion, I saw this Front Office Sports headline: One group “claims to have already raised $8 billion” for the Vegas expansion team. I mean, wow. That’s just $2 billion less than what the Los Angeles Lakers were valued at when they were sold just last year. And they’re arguably the most popular team in the NBA. (Side note: the new owner is now under an investigation for fraud in how he went about financing the Lakers and the Dodgers purchases.) So much for the “dried up” language I used in that article. (This is why I usually stick to my “Entertainment Nuance Guy” tone in articles...) I went off old information—from April, when I read/heard about the NBA downplaying expansion efforts—instead of doing a quick double-check for new news. That said...if you read the article, the market for Seattle is “slow”, with just one reported bidder. So I wasn’t entirely off. This goof has annoyed me since I first published it, mainly because it undercut that article’s real point, which I stand by: NBA franchises are really overvalued right now. Now, I get why NBA teams are overvalued. When it comes to owning sports teams, it’s basically never wrong to assume that some rich person somewhere will care more about owning a team (or just being part of a group since they’re so expensive) than the actual financials. There are only so many teams to own, and opportunities to buy in preferred markets don’t come along very often. This explains why the teams sell for such high multiples (usually above a 10 to 12.5 revenue multiple, which is very high). You only need one person to overpay! Beyond the ultra-wealthy luxury good explanation, I worry NBA teams are becoming speculative assets. More and more private equity investors are buying into NBA teams. But the value, in owning a team, comes from selling it later, not any meaningful relationship to revenue or profit growth. In other words, the newer NBA owners are increasingly expecting someone later to buy their inflated asset. That’s not sound economics; that’s the “greater fool” theory at work.2 At some point, actually making money has to matter. Especially since revenue growth is now below the growth of the stock market. (And this matters because the NBA doesn’t have easy levers to pull to drastically lower their costs—half of their revenue has to go to players and then you actually have to run a team, including coaching, training, travel, media expenses, and more—or raise revenues aside from one-off expansions in America and overseas.) I just don’t see how investors make their money back buying NBA teams, except for selling at a higher price later on down the line. But if revenue/profit growth continues to slow, at some point, someone will be left holding the bag. RIGHT: Baseball and Basketball are about equally popular. Related to the above, I wanted to cite two quick pieces of evidence for one of my other theories: that the NBA and MLB are about as popular as each other, but the NBA gets much, much better media coverage. One YouGov survey has that fans prefer basketball to baseball by 52% to 48%, which I’m guessing is within the margin of error for that poll. That’s virtually even, meaning they’re about the same popularity. Over on NBC, a recent Red Sox-Yankees game averaged 4 million viewers, higher than Sunday Night Basketball’s average of 3.4 million on the same network. A Yankees-Dodgers game averaged 3.9 million two weeks ago. Not every game averages this much, but it shows you that baseball isn’t far off from basketball, depending on the matchup. Altogether, the NBA is just slightly more popular than baseball, but NBC is paying MLB a fraction of what they pay the NBA, a point I’ve made before. RIGHT: Angel, MUBI and Neon Updates... I’ve long been skeptical about many of Hollywood’s buzziest startups/smaller indie studios. It’s not that they don’t make great movies—films like Anora and Everything Everywhere All at Once are amazing—or that they’re not (rightfully) pushing the majors to make better films, but...they get a ton of hype, and that hype often doesn’t live up to the reality or difficulty in scaling up. Starting with MUBI, well, The Wall Street Journal wrote a feature on MUBI’s struggles last April, best summarized by the subheader “After Sequoia valued Mubi at $1 billion, a left-wing revolt sent the indie film company into a tailspin”. MUBI lost $7.3 million on $200 million in revenue in Q4 2025, but reportedly hit a record 1.7 million subscribers at the end of Q1. As for Neon, Department M purchased a “significant stake” in the company earlier this year. How much is that “stake” worth? According to Deadline, “No financial figures for the Neon-Department M deal were disclosed.” So...that’s not great! If it was a big valuation, we’d hear about. Also, I found this curious: “Both Neon and Department M already have separate partnerships with Qatar. The Qatar Film Committee has a slate deal in place with the former, and a biopic production pact with the latter.” Color me skeptical about much Middle Eastern investment dollars. See: LIV Golf. Finally, as for Angel (formerly Angel Studios), their stock very, very slightly popped last month after Young Washington ($20 million budget) which made $45 million in the US, but their stock is still way down from its opening. Smaller Updates RIGHT: The WGA should focus on antitrust concerns! I’ve been on this for years. Post-WGA/AMTPT deal in 2023, I wrote an article for the Ankler calling on the WGA to focus and organize against industry consolidation. Sure enough, the WGA filed a lawsuit against the Paramount-WBD merger, and people are organizing around this issue now. I wish this energy had coalesced earlier (specifically to lobby Washington much earlier), but better late than never! WRONG: Actually, the chip shortage might be due to market manipulation. In my last “Long Reads for the Long Summer” article, I shared an article about how LLMs are causing memory chip prices to spike, which will make all electronics more expensive. Well, turns out, three RAM manufacturers control 90% of the market, and now a private lawsuit accuses them of price-fixing. So yeah. WRONG/UPDATE: The Odyssey will hold! Two weeks ago, I wrote, “As of this moment, we haven’t had a super-blockbuster, though The Odyssey, Spider-Man: Brand New Day and Avengers: Doomsday could all cross the $500 million mark. (At this point, The Odyssey would need a very strong hold to get there.)” Well, it’s safe to say it’s going to have that hold! It only dropped 30% in weekend two and IMAX screenings are sold out all month. Spider-Man: Brand New Day is also off to a great start. RIGHT: People are rushing to get shows out yearly. I’ve long been bullish on yearly, weekly-released shows, and Leslie Goldberg at The Ankler wrote about how many people in town are now listening. WRONG: Mark Carney reverses Canada’s stance on homegrown production. After writing about Canada installing domestic production quotas, Canada has backed off. WRONG: I don’t trust Spider-Man: Brand New Day’s online “views”. When I originally wrote about the latest Spider-Man film’s record-breaking trailer, I thought this was just YouTube views, but after watching this Corridor Crew video and doing more research, well, it’s all social views of the trailer globally. Really? That stat includes TikTok, Reels and YouTube Shorts views. Basically, I don’t trust it anymore. (This film will probably set record, but I trust the pre-sales data more.) RIGHT: Celebrity Production companies are still struggling. I’ve written about this for years, but the company that I didn’t track was Kevin Hart’s HartBeat, which was valued at $650 million but is struggling now and might just end soon, especially after Kevin Hart pulled his endorsement deals. And Bad Robot is moving to NYC. CORRECTION: SpongeBob is a “second run” title. In my 2025 recap article, I had _SpongeBob SquarePants_labelled as a “library” title, when it is still a “second run” show, with new episodes still coming out on Nickelodeon. CORRECTION: In my last “What I Got Right, What I Got Wrong” update, I offered a correction from Doug Creutz and misspelled TD Cowen. Thanks, Grammarly! 1 Though he could have increased prices to make up for the gap, he couldn’t have increased them that much. 2 There’s a theory, which I think that Daryl Morey created and Bill Simmons popularized, that, to be successful building your team, you only need a handful of bad GMs in the league to take advantage of. To be clear, Daryl Morey’s theory was also for signing bad contracts, that you could always get out of bad contracts. Basically, there’s always someone who will make a bad trade. It’s not the same exact thing, but similar enough to the Greater Fool Theory that I really like it.