Tag: stream

  • Netflix to stream WWE from 2025

    Netflix to stream WWE from 2025

    Netflix on Tuesday sealed a long-term broadcast deal with the WWE professional wrestling juggernaut, as the streaming giant pushes further into sporting events.

    Beginning in the United States in 2025, Netflix will become the exclusive new home of “Raw,” the WWE’s flagship program that has been broadcasting on television since 1993.

    The agreement will also see WWE shows and live events streamed across the globe as their rights become available.

    With an initial 10-year term for $5 billion, the deal has an option for Netflix to extend for an additional 10 years or opt-out after the initial five years.

    “This deal is transformative,” said Mark Shapiro, president of TKO, the parent company of the WWE.

    “It marries the can’t-miss WWE product with Netflix’s extraordinary global reach and locks in significant and predictable economics for many years,” he added.

    The three-hour show has helped launch the careers of Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, “Stone Cold” Steve Austin and John Cena, among other stars.

    It is currently the most-watched show on the NBCUniversal-owned USA network in the United States.

    The WWE is a ratings blockbuster that owes much of its success to entrepreneur and promoter Vince McMahon.

    After buying what was then the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) from his father in 1982, he turned the second-rate league into an entertainment giant.

    Transformed into World Wrestling Entertainment in 2002, the league passed the billion-dollar mark in annual sales last year.

    The deal marks another move by streaming giants to build their portfolio of live sporting events.

    Netflix won the rights last month to a tennis duel between Rafael Nadal and Carlos Alcaraz and previously streamed a golf tournament featuring Formula One drivers and pros.

    Amazon announced last week that it would invest $115 million in Diamond Sports Group, the leading network of local sports channels in the United States, gaining regional rights for sports ranging from hockey to basketball.

    It had previously acquired certain rights to the English Premier League, the French Ligue 1, the French Open tennis tournament and the NFL American football league.

    Apple TV, for its part, owns global rights for US Major League Soccer.

  • Elon Musk disables Twitter Spaces after clash with journalists

    Elon Musk disables Twitter Spaces after clash with journalists

    Twitter Inc.’s live audio platform, Twitter Spaces, is down after many journalists who had just had their accounts suspended learned they could still participate in it.

    Elon Musk, the owner of Twitter, announced late on Thursday that the company was resolving an old fault and that the audio service “should be working tomorrow.”

    Earlier, Musk’s network suspended journalists for seven days, including those from CNN, the Washington Post, and the New York Times, for allegedly leaking the whereabouts of his private jet.

    Drew Harwell of the Washington Post and Matt Binder of Mashable, two of the suspended reporters, joined BuzzFeed News reporter Katie Notopoulos on Twitter Spaces to discuss the sudden wave of suspensions.

    They could no longer post new tweets and their old ones were no longer viewable, but they could still interact with other users on the Spaces site.

    Musk also joined the session after it attracted thousands of listeners to bluntly state that anyone who doxxes—gives another person’s personal location information—will be suspended. The journalists said that they had not posted any real-time flight data, as Musk alleged, but by then the billionaire had quit the call.

    The live session drew more than 40,000 listeners at its peak.