Media Insider: Verizon Explores Sale of Media Assets, Gannett Pay Gaps Exposed, NYT Retires “Op-Ed”

Welcome to Media Insider, PR Newswire’s roundup of media news stories from the week.

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL | BENJAMIN MULLIN AND MIRIAM GOTTFRIED
Verizon Explores Sale of Media Assets, Including Parts of Yahoo and AOL

Verizon Communications Inc. is exploring a sale of assets including Yahoo and AOL, as the company considers exiting digital media. Private-equity firm Apollo Global Management is said to be among possible bidders in a deal that could be worth $4 billion to $5 billion. Verizon paid more than $9 billion to acquire the portfolio of once-dominant websites hoping to resurrect the brands, but it failed to reach its target of $10 billion in annual revenue by 2020. Verizon has since shifted its focus to partnerships with streaming video services that can be bundled with its wireless and home internet plans.

ICYMI: Guardian film Colette won the Oscar for best documentary short.

THE NEW YORK TIMES | KATHLEEN KINGSBURY
Why The New York Times Is Retiring the Term ‘Op-Ed’

The New York Times announced it will retire the term ‘Op-Ed’ from its pages. The Op-Ed page was given its name because it appeared opposite the editorial page but in a digital journalism world, that is no longer geographically accurate. Columns by the Times’ staff writers will continue to be known as editorials and pieces by external contributors will now be known as “Guest Essays.” Kathleen Kingsbury, Opinion editor at The New York Times, writes, “Readers immediately grasped this term during research sessions and intuitively understood what it said about the relationship between the writer and The Times. It reflects our mission to invite and convene a wide range of voices and views.”

More NYT updates: NY Times introduces ‘global days off’ to offset pandemic burnout.

CNN BUSINESS | KERRY FLYNN
‘Punched-in-the-gut feeling.’ Gannett under fire for paying some women nearly $30,000 less than male peers

News Guild-CWA released a study exposing gender and racial pay gaps at Gannett. The union represents employees at 14 newsrooms owned by Gannett. It generated the study using fall 2020 salary and demographic data from 466 employees at those newsrooms.

The study found that women at Gannett earned $9,845 less than the median salary of men and the gap grows to $15,727 for non-white women as compared to white men. The study also found women who worked at Gannett for at least 30 years earned $27,026 less than the median pay for male colleagues with similar tenure. Journalists of color earned $5,246 less than the median salary of white staffers, who make $53,252 a year.

A Gannett spokesperson responded, “It is troubling that the NewsGuild’s document would issue a ‘study’ that fails to take into consideration critical analysis factors and then espouses the benefits of joining a union as the solution. Using selective data to drive a narrative that has clear bias raises questions of credibility and integrity.”

Read the full study published by News Guild-CWA.

MEDIAPOST | RAY SCHULTZ
‘Time’ Unveils New List – 100 Most Influential Businesses

TIME debuted a business vertical called TIME Business and released its first list of the TIME100 Most Influential Companies. Edward Felsenthal, CEO and editor in chief of TIME, said the goal of the new vertical is to cover “the global impact of business and the ways it intersects with our public and personal lives.” TIME evaluated each nominated firm for relevance, impact, innovation, leadership, ambition, and success. The list will be accompanied by five covers, each highlighting a CEO from a company on the list.

Continue reading about Time: Why Time sees opportunity in Bitcoin for advertisers and consumers as an ‘additive business line.’

THE VERGE | ASHLEY CARMAN
SiriusXM acquires Roman Mars’ 99% Invisible and a bigger stake in the podcasting world

SiriusXM announced it will acquire Roman Mars’ company 99% Invisible Inc. Mars and his team will continue to host and produce the popular 99% Invisible podcast while also creating new shows under Sirius’ podcasting company Stitcher. Mars said he is leaving the life of independent podcasting behind because he wanted to escape growing administrative duties and give himself and his staff more resources and time to focus on the creative. Sirius hopes the acquisition will give the company a bigger stake in podcasting and help attract more podcast talent.

Read next: Spotify takes on Apple with new podcast subscription platform.

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Erin Wade is a Senior Customer Content Specialist with PR Newswire. She is also an animal lover and aspiring world traveler. Tune into her insights as a social curator at @TotalCSR.