Universal Music's underlying subscription growth sped up to 9.5% as prices and subscribers rose
Excluding Downtown, UMG's subscription revenue grew 9.5% in the third quarter, up from 6.7% in the second, the company said on October 29.
Culture and trends, and the data behind them
News Trend covers music, TV and streaming, gaming and internet culture, with the industry data behind each trend, checked before we publish.
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By the scene
Music
Deezer raises its 2026 outlook as it readies a switch to hide AI-generated music
Third-quarter revenue rose 1.8% to €133.8 million, Deezer said on October 27, as it prepares a filter that removes fully AI-generated music from search.
TV & Streaming
Starz's streaming revenue rose 1.7% on higher prices as linear TV kept shrinking
Starz said on October 29 that OTT revenue rose to $226.6 million in the third quarter. Its 2026 results releases no longer give subscriber numbers.
Thursday Night Football is averaging 17.7 million viewers on Prime Video, Amazon says
Amazon said on October 29 that its fifth NFL season had its best start, and that NBA on Prime's opener more than doubled last season's average audience.
Gaming
Paradox's quarterly revenue rose 15%, helped by Transport Fever 3 and a bigger Crusader Kings III expansion
Paradox said on October 29 that revenue rose 15% to SEK 456 million. A SEK 40 million gain from selling a mobile studio helped lift operating profit 27%.
Roblox bookings fell 12% and daily users 9% as it lapped 2025's viral hits
Roblox said on October 29 that third-quarter bookings fell 12% to $1.7 billion, beating its own forecast, as daily users dropped 9% from a year earlier.
Internet Culture
Wikimedia urges the OpenAI copyright court to treat AI training as fair use but not chatbot retrieval
Wikipedia's host told the court in the OpenAI copyright case that model training is likely fair use but copying its pages into chatbot answers likely is not.
Reddit says falling search referrals could cut its daily users in the fourth quarter
Reddit's daily users held at 130.3 million in the third quarter as U.S. users fell 5%, and it warned of a low-double-digit drop if search keeps falling.
Trend Data
Nielsen puts NBC's primetime NBA opener at 6 million viewers, short of TNT's 2010 record
NBC called 76ers-Knicks the most-watched NBA tip-off primetime game ever, at 7.7 million on NBC and Peacock. Nielsen puts the game at 6 million on NBC.
Three in five Pinterest users live in regions that bring in 7% of its revenue
Pinterest's 394 million users outside the U.S., Canada and Europe brought in $87 million of its $1,174 million third-quarter revenue, its figures show.
Latest from official sources
Headlines as each source published them, with links to the original releases.
- Google's general search and search advertising servicesCMA cases: digital markets (GOV.UK) ·
- Apple’s mobile platformCMA cases: digital markets (GOV.UK) ·
- Google’s mobile platformCMA cases: digital markets (GOV.UK) ·
- DCMS sector Economic Estimates: Productivity 2024 (provisional)DCMS research and statistics (GOV.UK) ·
- Economic Estimates: Employment January 2025 to December 2025 for DCMS SectorsDCMS research and statistics (GOV.UK) ·
- Music Streaming FraudU.S. Copyright Office (Federal Register) ·
- Information Collections Being Submitted for Review and Approval to Office of Management and BudgetFederal Register: FCC documents on video programming ·
- Autumn StandardsLibrary of Congress: In The Muse (Music Division blog) ·