Wall Street Journal
Along with longtime entrepreneur and investor Jeff Stibel, Kobe Bryant just launched a venture-capital fund focused on technology, media and data companies. “The two men are contributing … $100 million -- which they expect to invest over the next few years -- and aren’t seeking outside investors yet,” The Wall Street Journal reports.
Bloomberg
A group of Chinese investors have reportedly acquiring ad-tech startup Media.net for roughly $900 million in cash. “Media.net, which is based in Dubai and New York, is touting this as the third-largest ad-tech acquisition in history,” Bloomberg reports. “However, the complex deal more closely resembles a reverse merger, where a private company takes over a public one and bypasses the formalities of an initial public offering.”
The New York Times
From Ziff Davis to Univision to New York Magazine, The New York Times considers a number of suitors eyeing Gawker Media’s assets. “Ziff Davis was the first company to publicly put a dollar figure on its interest in Gawker Media, and its $90 million bid might be more than other companies are willing to pay,” it writes. Meanwhile, “New York magazine most likely does not have enough cash on hand to buy Gawker Media by itself.”
Wall Street Journal
Google parent Alphabet is reportedly not happy with the high costs associated with it high-speed internet business. “Now the company is hoping to use wireless technology to connect homes, rather than cables, in about a dozen new metro areas, including Los Angeles, Chicago and Dallas,” The Wall Street Journal reports.
New York Post
Up to seven suitors plan on attending Gawker Media bankruptcy auction, on August 16, The New York Post reports. “The auction will kick off a ‘stalking horse’ bid of $90 million from Ziff Davis, which agreed to assume some of Gawker’s liabilities but not the $140 million invasion-of-privacy judgment for former pro wrestler Hulk Hogan,” it writes. “Univision … is expected to give Ziff Davis a run for its money.”
Re/code
Officially, Arianna Huffington is leaving Huffington Post because she’s too busy launching her new health and wellness startup Thrive Global. Unofficially, it’s because Huffington would likely have seen her stature diminish significantly under new Verizon ownership. “It was pretty clear that in Yahoo/AOL, she wouldn’t have the same position that she has now,” a source tells Recode.
TechCrunch
Randstad Holdings -- an Amsterdam-based human resources and recruitment specialist -- has agreed to buy job hunting portal Monster Worldwide for $429 million. “It is a far cry from the heady days of 2000 -- when Monster … had a share price of over $91 and a market cap of nearly $8 billion,” TechCrunch notes. “Even in 2007, when its stock was around $51, Monster was valued as high as $5.5 billion.”
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Under the guise of maintaining Turkey’s stability and rooting out the plotters, President Erdogan is settling political scores and crushing dissent. The journalists silenced by President Erdogan’s order are those who also happen to be the most openly critical of the AKP’s increasingly authoritarian moves, especially after the coup. Amnesty International called the intimidation and crackdown on journalists “a brazen attack on press freedom.”
The Washington Post
The Trump campaign is slapping on "false or unbalanced reporting" as part of a new email series it is calling "media bias of the day." The idea is to call out what the campaign considers the day's most unfair Trump coverage. But the examples he cites -- The New York Times' on Iran payments and MSNBC not covering his entire Maine rally live -- don't fit the bill.
CNN Money
The Sprite "brutally refreshing" campaign used phrases such as "She's seen more ceilings than Michelangelo," and "You're not popular, you're easy." The Irish ad campaign was quickly slammed as "sexist" and "misogynistic" by social media users. Parent company Coca-Cola removed it from billboards and sites across the country.