☀️ ‘Less Worse’: TV Bundle Melt Continues at Charter, Comcast

Mornin! Here’s the Hollywood + Media news to know on Friday, Nov. 6, 2026.

Where I now pronounce FOX and ROKU a corporate couple 💒, as the deal officially closed this morning.

I can’t wait for all of the “pro forma” talk on the Q4 earnings call, amirite? (Ah, come on, that joke’s gonna kill at my corner pub tonight).

AND: The Voice is launching a TIKTOK live-streaming companion show hosted by Josh “Bru” Brubaker, which will begin 20 minutes before each remaining episode this season and stream live along with the show.

YEAH: BUZZFEED is in tough shape even with Byron Allen’s (potential) money (remember, only $20M put in was up front). Its stock was -39% yesterday, putting it well below the $1-a-share danger threshold at $0.56 . . . then again, with numbers like this in Q3, that kinda tracks:

• Revenue: $26M (-44% YoY)
• Net Loss: -$18.7M (2.5x worse than a year ago)

WELL: LETTERBOXD is seemingly about to become part of the NY TIMES Corporation, or at least according to the, uh . . . NY Times, which reports that it’s close to a deal valuing LETTERBOXD at $330M, or 22x its 2026 revenue of approx. $15M. 🤯

• No word on how many people pay for LETTERBOXD Pro or Patron accounts ($19 and $49 a year, respectively, for no on-site ads, plus some bells & whistles), but presumably the NYT sees more opportunity on the ad-sales side to justify that price.

PLUS: Here are your Election Night viewership numbers according to NIELSEN BIG DATA + PANEL numbers. Keep in mind TELEMUNDO and UNIVISION were only added starting in 2018, and anything before 2020 didn’t count out-of-home viewing and didn’t have the benefit of BIG DATA + PANEL measurement.

• Total: 31.2M viewers
  • Far bigger than 2022 (25.4M) and 2014 (22.7M)
  • About the same as 2006, oddly enough #MiddleEastWar (31.4M)
  • Below 2018 (36.1M) and 2010 (34.9M)
• 57% was broadcast, 43% was cable
• 19.7M was over-55 (63%)
• 2.9M was 18-34 (9%)
• Top networks:
  • NBC: 6.7M
  • ABC: 5.2M
  • FOX NEWS: 4.3M
    • FOX BUSINESS added 346k with a simulcast
  • CNN: 4.2M
  • MS NOW: 3.7M
  • CBS: 2.8M
  • NOTE: FOX NEWS and MS NOW were below everyone else in the 25-54 demo #OlderViewers

YEAH: Gotta love this U.K. holiday ad from grocer TESCO, whose delivery employees are having a good laugh at . . . essentially saying that “Um, yeah, you’d fire our asses in 3 seconds if we did any of the actions in your Christmas ad!” — including giving customers a ride in their vans, calling customers on their personal phones and not delivering to the address on the order. Well done, TESCO!

SPEAKING OF: AMAZON is taking the food delivery wars up a notch, giving PRIME customers free UBER EATS delivery for any orders over $25. Take that, INSTADOOR DASH!

OH: Formerly Saudi-backed LIV GOLF couldn’t have picked a more thematic week to officially collapse. Hopefully the sports media ecosystem will survive without its favorite sport to write about . . . except for, ya know, remotely writing anything about what happened in the actual LIV matches each week for the past 5 years.

OH BOY: Have fun with this one today, internet! AMAZON says “You’re Welcome.”

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📉 Earnings Season

TV Bundle Subscriber Losses in Q3 are “Less Worse” . . . Barely

Before I dive into the “new era” coming at CHARTER, here’s how the numbers came in for Q3 for the traditional TV bundle business so far as we try to gauge just how much that revenue core of SKYDANCE, VERSANT and FOX CORP (and DISNEY to a much smaller degree) is melting.

• Note that FUBO and HULU +LIVE TV won’t come until Nov. 17, and DISH/SLING numbers should come in at some point as well.
• DIRECTV, FIOS and YOUTUBE TV do not release public numbers.

But, here’s where we’re at.