Techmeme
August 8, 2017, 8:55 PM

Top News

The Walt Disney Company:
Disney will pay $1.58B to acquire additional 42% stake in BAMTech, making it a majority stakeholder  —  The Walt Disney Company announced today that it has agreed to acquire majority ownership of BAMTech, LLC and will launch its ESPN-branded multi-sport video streaming service in early 2018 …
Jacob Kastrenakes / The Verge:
Disney to end Netflix film distribution deal in 2019, will launch ESPN streaming service in 2018 and Disney streaming services in 2019  —  Disney will end its distribution deal with Netflix and launch its own streaming service, the company announced today.  It intends to launch the service in 2019.
Ryan Nakashima / Associated Press:
James Damore says he filed complaint with National Labor Relations Board before being fired by Google, claims he was subjected to “coercive statements”  —  MENLO PARK, Calif. (AP) — A former Google engineer who was fired over a memo he wrote about gender differences …
Bloomberg:
Neil Hughes / AppleInsider:
KGI: “iPhone 8” to debut same day as other iPhones in mid-September and come in black, silver, gold; Apple can produce 2M-4M this quarter, 45M-50M by year's end  —  Rumors about an “iPhone 8” delay may have been unfounded, as analyst Ming-Chi Kuo of KGI Securities indicated …
Taylor Soper / GeekWire:
Spotify comes to Xbox One, as Microsoft rolls out new Xbox Live homepage that offers more customization with Fluent Design  —  Xbox Live is getting a new look.  —  Microsoft is rolling out a redesigned homepage for Xbox Live that gives users more control over what they see.
BuzzFeed:
Study of 450+ websites, associated Facebook pages, and their owners reveals inner workings of partisan pages: FB is kingmaker, right-wing's more prolific, more  —  How ideologues, opportunists, growth hackers, and internet marketers built a massive new universe of partisan news on the web and on Facebook.
Susan Heavey / Reuters:
US ITC to review Qualcomm's complaints about Apple iPhone patents, sets date for completing its investigation within the next 45 days  —  WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. trade officials have agreed to investigate Qualcomm Inc's allegations that Apple Inc infringed on patents with its iPhone7 and other devices …
Greg Bensinger / Wall Street Journal:
Sources: Uber plans to close or sell most of its US car-leasing division to stem unsustainably high losses, just two years after starting the business  —  Move by the ride-hailing company is due to unsustainably high losses  —  Uber Technologies Inc. plans to wind down its U.S. subprime car-leasing division …
Alex Heath / Business Insider:
Facebook has killed Lifestage, the Snapchat-like dedicated social networking app for high schoolers it had released last year  —  Facebook has killed Lifestage, the standalone app it released almost one year ago as a dedicated social network for high schoolers.
Samuel Gibbs / The Guardian:
HBO hackers demand a multimillion-dollar ransom and release emails, scripts, and personal phone numbers of GoT stars in latest dump of stolen data  —  Group tells company CEO to pay multimillion-dollar ransom or else risk 1.5TB of shows and confidential corporate data being released online

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Barb Darrow / Fortune:
Jon Russell / TechCrunch: