Reuters: AT&T agrees to buy Time Warner (HBO, CNN, DC Comics) for $85 billion
 

This has to deal with TV and DC, so I guess I'll post it here:

https://i.ytimg.com/vi/GChYRUcM5s0/maxresdefault.jpg

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-ti...-idUSKCN12L1Y0

I don't wanna welcome this new overlord.....

I hope the CEO of AT&T is a Marvel fan.
Maybe he can spare us of all these sure-to-be-bad DC movies.

Isn't this big news?

I remember people going crazy when Disney first announced they were buying Marvel and then Star Wars a couple years ago.

Meh, no one cares about WB or DC.

Of course this is big news, it's a huge acquisition and bigger than Disney buying Marvel or Lucasfilm.

Then why is nobody flipping out? I remember online fandoms when ballistic when they heard Disney was buying Marvel for the first time. Disney also buying Star Wars was quite a surprise too.

Why isn't everyone up in arms coming up with conspiracy theories and shouting from rooftops? Where are the bizarre overreactions and angry rants from fanboys? Where is the madness?

Either that or I'm not looking in the right places.

Nobody flipped out when Comcast bought NBC Universal, I don't think anything is going to happen with the acquisition.

Because as much as nerds like to be armchair CEOs in discussions about they're favorite companies they don't actually care for these things. Disney buying Lucasfilm meant new movies and Marvel meant they were financially set for life etc. This deal means not much is going to change with DC and just like Comcast buying NBC Universal only certain people will be interested not online nerds.

People have been raving about DC beating Marvel in the comics charts for months, so wrong

Be the change you want to see in the world.

I love the irony that AT&T owns Time Warner, but Time Warner Cable is owned by their direct competitor Charter Communications.

I think Disney's purchases were more interesting from a news point of view because Disney specifically went after the Marvel, Star Wars, etc. brands rather than simply buying companies that owned various brands, as is the case with AT&T. DC comics and Warner Bros. have been small pieces of many huge buyout deals, including the infamous Time-Warner/AOL deal in 2000 that more-or-less sunk Ted Turner's empire.

Guess who wants to block this

http://www.bleedingcool.com/2016/10/...op-att-comics/

Yeah this is probably more "interesting" from the telecommunications angle in this case.

The Disney buyouts were more major from a fan angle because now Star Wars and Marvel can legally co-mingle and stuff like that.

https://i.imgflip.com/c6i80.gif

Just imagine--officially licensed DC Comics emojis and ringtones.

I don't see how this would change the comics and their tie-in materials, though I could be very wrong.

I'm genuinely curious... is there any upside to this merger?

"Have to save Martha… money on high-speed wireless broadband..."

You mean Lucasfilm LTD studios. they own US distributation rights to Ghibli and also Muppets rights from Jim Henson Studios and also Pixar

Hopefully this deal is blocked. There is a upside and downside to big business, but as others have said there doesn't appear to be any upside to this deal.

It's official. The federal judge approved the merger today.

Well... since the higher-ups at WB are clueless, this can only really be a good thing.

Eh. That would be the only positive of this but who knows if/when they make any changes.

I don't like this simply based on what could happen. Service providers don't need to be in charge of IP/content at this level. Now they can dictate who has access to certain content at whatever price they want.

So is it a merger or AT&T now in charge of Time Warner?

Merger is a trick word, there's always one company that eats the other despite it and yes in this case AT&T would own Time Warner. Time Warner previously had a hostile take over by AOL, anyone remember how that went?

You don't want a service providers to be in control of the media as well, you're not looking at the big picture Andrew. Even so AT&T would likely let whoever is running things to run things as they don't have experience otherwise.