Netflix jumps to live

Netflix is going live! Well, it's investing in giving others the ability to do so, at least. While the platform has tried out live content before — admittedly with some teething issues — the streaming giant now seems to be making a concerted effort to disrupt the final frontier that cable TV still controls, live broadcast.?

To do this, Netflix launched three live shows with huge stars in the past week alone. These included a variety show with comedian John Mulaney, a new Katt Williams special, and — the biggest of them all — the roast of Tom Brady.?

Between them, these live events have generated huge buzz in the media and social, with more than 3,000 articles about Netflix's live content and 180k+ engagements and rising with those articles.?

The Brady roast generated the most public interest, with snippets of the jokes getting massive attention on multiple platforms. Comedian Andrew Schulz, who participated in the roast, had more than half a million engagements on the clip he shared of himself on TikTok making fun of the attendees.Whichever way you slice it, people are?paying attention?to what Netflix is doing with live content, and that's unlikely to change any time soon.

The brand will air the fight between Jake Paul and Mike Tyson in July, with live sports another territory that cable has traditionally monopolized. This kind of positive reaction to a week of huge live events, with no major technical difficulties, is exactly the kind of result Netflix will have wanted.

Sheetz is the latest brand to be pulled into the DEI discussion

DEI has been a big topic of interest in 2024, and one that has sparked debate among the media and the public as more brands make headlines for their role in this ongoing conversation.?

The Sheetz convenience store chain landed in the hot seat in late April after a lawsuit was filed accusing the company of racial discrimination in its hiring practices. The lawsuit was filed by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) on April 17th, and by the next day there had been 168 articles published about the issue.

Media coverage of the issue came from a variety of mainstream news publishers, but it was conservative outlets and one local news outlet that were the biggest drivers of engagement.?WPXI in Pittsburgh?had the top article about Sheetz, earning over 7.3k engagements, with the Gateway Pundit, Fox Business, and the Western Journal making up the rest of the top four.?

Twitter posts generated even more engagement than media coverage about the issue did, with prominent conservative voices such as Monica Crowley and Charlie Kirk?both capturing attention for singling out the Biden administration and criticizing the lawsuit.

Our latest report dives deeper into how other brands have been mentioned in DEI coverage, and you can read more in our report on societal issues facing brands here.

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