Editor John Laskas, best known for his comedy/lifestyle work, has joined Northern Lights Post, New York.
Laskas spent the past year on assignment at New York boutique agency The Concept Farm, where he headed the post efforts for the "ESPN 25: The Season of the Fan" ad campaign.
Starting his career in 1996 as an assistant editor at Crew Cuts, New York, Laskas left there in ’99 to join Isis Post, New York, as an editor. At Isis Post, he worked extensively on long and shortform projects for both ABC News and ABC Sports. It was also there that Laskas began his long-standing creative relationship with director James Signorelli of Saturday Night Live (SNL), editing many of the show’s classic commercial parodies and short films.
Among the SNL shorts was SNL FANatic, a parody of the MTV show FANatic, directed by Paul Thomas Anderson (Boogie Nights, Magnolia, Punch Drunk Love) and featuring Ben Affleck.
DirecTV Buys Dish As Satellite Rivals Hunker Down Against Onslaught Of Streaming Services
DirecTV is buying Dish and Sling, a deal it has sought to complete for years, as the company seeks to better compete against streaming services that have become dominant.
DirecTV said Monday that it will acquire Dish TV and Sling TV from its owner EchoStar in a debt exchange transaction that includes a payment of $1, plus the assumption of debt.
The prospect of a DirecTV-Dish combo has long been rumored, with headlines about reported talks popping up over the years. And the two almost merged more than two decades ago — but the Federal Communications Commission blocked their owners' then-$18.5 billion deal, citing antitrust concerns.
The pay-for-TV market has shifted significantly since. As more and more consumers tune into online streaming giants, demand for more traditional satellite continues to shrink. And, although high-profile acquisitions have proven to be particularly tough under the Biden-Harris administration, that may make regulators more inclined to approve DirecTV and Dish's pairing this time around.
DirecTV said Monday that the transaction will help it bring smaller content packages to consumer at lower prices. It's hoping this will appeal to those who have left satellite video services for streaming. The company said that combined, DirecTV and Dish have collectively lost 63% of their satellite customers since 2016.
"DirecTV operates in a highly competitive video distribution industry," DirecTV CEO Bill Morrow said in a statement. "With greater scale, we expect a combined DirecTV and Dish will be better able to work with programmers to realize our vision for the future of tv, which is to aggregate, curate, and distribute content tailored to customers' interests, and to be better positioned to realize operating... Read More