Weekly Roundup – July 28th, 2026
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Has Fox Corporation's NFL Reliance Become a Major Liability?
"Bank of America's recent downgrade of Fox Corporation to Underperform, with a $45 price target,
signals deep concern over the company's outsized reliance on NFL media rights.
The impending NFL contract renegotiations are expected to drive significantly higher costs, potentially
eroding Fox's earnings power by an estimated 22% of FY27 EBITDA.
While Fox's CEO has expressed willingness to "rebalance" its sports portfolio, the company's
concentrated asset mix leaves it uniquely vulnerable compared to more diversified media rivals."
Our Take: Well, if Bank of America are going to downgrade Fox over their perceived financial reliance on NFL broadcast rights, then they might as well downgrade CBS and NBC as well (Disney is somewhat immune because they have more diversified revenue streams). While one could make the argument that one of Fox, CBS (Paramount), and NBC (Comcast) have made the attempt to diversify their content portfolio, the fact of the matter is that the NFL remains the ‘Golden Ticket’, their primetime attraction. Without the NFL, one would shudder to speculate on the health of not only these networks, but of cable and streaming more broadly. The NFL is the economic engine of US Television.
Deezer now helps users find AI music on other streaming platforms
"Where like Apple Music and Spotify are merely flagging AI-generated music, "Deezer blocks it
completely from suggestions or editorial playlists on its platform. The company has even made its AI-
detection tool available to other streaming companies in an effort stem the rise of AI slop and fraudulent
streams.
Now, Deezer has announced that it's giving end-users on all platforms access to its technology. "No other
company has followed our lead yet, so we decided to make it possible for everyone to check if their
playlists include synthetic music, no matter which streaming platform they use," said Deezer CEO Alexis
Lanternier in a statement. "Our data show that nearly half of the users joining Deezer from another
platform have AI tracks in their playlists."
To use it, go to Deezer's AI music detection site and provide access to your music streaming platform of
choice (Spotify, Apple Music, YouTube Music, etc.). Once that's done, Deezer will automatically import all
your playlists, just as it would if you were switching to its service from another platform. You can then see
and share your results."
Our Take: As a music consumer, one would understandably ask why doesn’t this platform simply ban the upload of AI music to its services? The answer is that they are all banking on AI ‘coming good’. And by ‘coming good’ I mean that listeners have been beaten over the head with so much AI music slop that they cease to care whether something is made by a human or not. I find it laughable that Deezer has made a publicly downloadable tool to spot AI music on other platforms like Spotify, Apple, or YouTube music. It’s funny to me because they are selling themselves as ‘Anti-AI’ to the lay consumer, while still having reams of AI garbage clogging up their platforms. If they were truly against the proliferation of AI music, they would merely just bar it! Yet they don’t! Deezer are trying to gain positive publicity without sacrificing the potential financial benefits of hosting AI content.
Congress hits a wall on reining in sports betting, prediction markets
"Lawmakers appear to have stalled out on a months-long effort to pass legislation imposing new rules on
the booming business of sports gambling and prediction markets, despite bipartisan agreement the
industries have gone underscrutinized by the federal government for too long.
Critics in both chambers say major online sportsbooks like FanDuel and DraftKings are not doing enough
to limit opportunities for corruption and game rigging, while they reap big profits from millions of
Americans, a growing number of whom are struggling with gambling addictions.
Prediction markets, similarly, are growing in popularity and usage across the U.S., offering customers
more opportunities to wager on outcomes well outside the realm of sports that touch on politics and the
economy.
In recent months, several scandals have popped up involving people who work in some capacity for the
government and have cashed in on knowledge of sensitive information by using prediction markets, which
unlike traditional sportsbooks offer “event contracts” on news, business and pop culture happenings."
Our Take: Congress hit a wall reining in prediction markets and sports betting apps because a lot of the private equity/venture capital backing that industry is represented by well-connected lobbyists on Capitol Hill, giving those interests significant influence over the debate and making meaningful reform much harder to advance. Also, why would a politician champion legislation that limits the profits of the very interests helping finance their campaign? In other words: Sports betting apps and prediction markets are here to stay.
Traffic camera captures real-life Spider-Man's heroic save
"Footage shared on social media by the Jonesboro Police Department shows a man in a wheelchair
struggling to cross a busy intersection.
A man in a Spider-Man costume then climbs out from the driver's side door of a vehicle stopped at the red
light and gives the man speedy assistance to finish crossing.
The masked man was later identified as Christopher Hellenthal, who had been dressed as the Marvel
character for super hero day at his job at Ultimate Air Trampoline Park."
Our Take: The Imposter Syndrome for this person would've probably hit a little too hard if he was just chilling in his car decked out in Spiderman gear watching some guy in a wheelchair struggle to cross a busy intersection
