Mornin! This is Sean McNulty (connect with me on LINKEDIN here if ya like or email me at seanmcnultynyc@gmail.com), and here’s the Hollywood + Media news to know on Wednesday, June 24, 2026.

Where NETFLIX, you’re now disinvited from my Jersey July 4th BBQ next week, as my invite to yours in my (figurative) Jersey backyard yesterday seemingly got lost in the mail.

Yes, NETFLIX fired up the grills to celebrate the final structural beams being installed in Stages 3 and 4 of the 12 stages planned for NETFLIX’s Central Jersey soundstage facility under construction. (Is this a construction world tradition? Do we do Italian after Stage 6?)

But, I hear they didn’t have a Bridgerton-themed keg-stand competition, so I’m confident mine will be superior.

THEN: APPLE “didn’t show that much interest” in a DISNEY deal when the 2 had some very exploratory talks, according to Bob Iger’s FT exit interview. I’ll break the news to Rushfield.

YEAH: IHEART is planning a fresh new round of layoffs this summer, and just gonna say I think SIRIUSXM made the right call here in not pursuing a deal any further.

AND: In a rather odd development, men’s World Cup TV audience NIELSEN numbers have been revised downward on TELEMUNDO by about 25% per match from week 1 (the accompanying PEACOCK numbers via ADOBE ANALYTICS are unchanged).

BUT: The MEXICO vs. SOUTH KOREA match got 14M viewers last Thursday —7.2M on TELEMUNDO linear with 6.1M coming from streaming, primarily on PEACOCK, which would be yet another massive high (not sure where NBCU is getting the other 700k from there in the press release 🤔).

• PEACOCK is getting large World Cup results to date — far above its NBA audience numbers, and this game was even well above NFL playoff numbers that PEACOCK got in January for games on NBC.

SO: David Ellison has visited the Man of Tomorrow DC set in Atlanta, and producer Lars P. Winther described the vibe as “he’s a big fan, he’s been great with us.”

AH: The AMAZON FIRE TV UI is adding a Creator Hub, featuring creator videos and podcasts.

OH: Tech ripoff artist visionary Zuck has had his next vision — prediction markets! According to the NYT, a small META team is working on a predictions market app where people wouldn’t wager money, but rather some sort of “points” (at least in the app’s initial phase). I mean, as all KALSHI and POLYMARKET users know — just having the street cred of being right is really the main attraction of the product. I’m sure it’ll fit very nicely in the META trash bin next to the leg-less metaverse.

PLUS: GOOGLE’s unique AI advantage over its competitors? It uses the same website crawler for both search and AI, so companies can’t block only unwanted AI bot data harvesting of their content, according to PEOPLE INC CEO Neil Vogel in an Axios talk at Cannes.

YAH: YOUTUBE has opted to settle a Florida teen’s upcoming lawsuit against META, SNAP and TIKTOK over their alleged addictive nature. The other companies will still have their day in court when the trial begins July 27 in L.A.

ALSO: WALMART is taking another step to use its scale to become a big ad-biz player by buying VIBE.CO for $1.4B (including executive retention payments) — a company that allows advertisers to both buy ad time and create ads, with a focus on the small and medium business sector.

• WALMART had $6.4B in ad revenue in 2025, +46% YoY . . . but that’s only about 10% of AMAZON’s 2025 total — so, still a ways to go.
• WALMART is also launching a series of basically infomercial / home shopping shows for its VIZIO TV users, hosted by Josh Gad and Tan France, respectively, highlighting things you can buy at WALMART.

OVER IN CANNES:

NETFLIX Ad Chief Amy Reinhard told Ankler CEO Janice Min that about 65% of all new signups at NETFLIX are now for the ad tier.

Natalie Jarvey will have more from the conversation in her Cannes Daily column from the south of France shortly.

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🤝 The Deal Memo