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Paramount Global is cutting 3.5% of its U.S. workforce as customers switch away from traditional pay-TV bundles in today’s shifting media landscape and uncertain economy. The latest round of layoffs come as the media giant prepares to merge with movie studio Skydance Media. Paramount Global parent company National Amusements and Skydance Media agreed to merge last July, but it is still waiting for regulatory approval. Paramount, owns Paramount Pictures movie and television studios, Paramount+ streaming service, MTV, Nickelodeon, BET, Comedy Central and the CBS television network, including CBS News. Shares in Paramount Global (PARA) were trading up about 1% in late morning trading, at the time of this writing. Here’s what to know. What happened? On Tuesday, Paramount’s co-CEOs George Cheeks, Chris McCarthy and Brian Robbins notified staff of layoffs in a memo, which said the 90% of those impacted would be notified on Tuesday, according to CNBC. Last August Paramount began the process of reducing its U.S.-based workforce by 15% after laying out a cost-cutting plan. The layoffs are just the latest to hit the beleaguered media industry, which has seen staff cuts at Disney and Warner Bros. Discovery, to name a few. Paramount Global by the numbers In Paramount Global’s latest round of earnings, for the first quarter of 2025, ending March 31st, 2025, the media company reported an earnings per share (EPS) of $0.29, missing analysts estimates; quarterly revenue of $7.19 billion, slightly beating analyst expectations of $7.14 billion; and forecast earnings would grow by 54.67% next year, from $2.25 to $3.48 per share. The company is next slated to report Q2 earnings in early August.
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E-Commerce
Since Friday, protests over immigration raids have erupted across Los Angeles. The demonstrations escalated after President Trump deployed the National Guard into the city on Saturday. Troops used aggressive tactics to disperse the rallies, including firing rubber bullets, using flash-bang stun grenades, and spraying tear gas into the crowds. The photographs emerging from the weekend are unsettling. An unlikely symbol of whats happening in the city has emerged in images of protesters near Gloria Molina Grand Park taking cover behind hot pink benches, chairs, and tables. Demonstrators frequently use whats available around them as barricades, and often thats street furniture: trash cans, benches, construction signsanything that can be picked up and moved. But those hot pink seats tell an L.A.specific story of the conflict at hand. [Photo: Apu Gomes/Getty Images] Designed by the architecture firm Rios, Grand Park has been at the center of the pro-immigrant demonstrations. It is adjacent to Los Angeless City Hall and just a few blocks away from the Metropolitan Detention Center, a site where protesters gathered and where ICE is holding its detainees. The park itself was designed to represent Los Angeless multicultural population and to be a park for everyone. Rios was adamant that the public space feature movable seatinglike in New Yorks Bryant Park and Pariss Luxembourg Gardensso that visitors had flexibility in how they used it (aside from sleeping on them), so they designed a custom collection to meet those needs. The furniture is made from powder-coated aluminum, and the hot pink color nods to the hue of the flowers that grow in equatorial countries, where many of the citys residents have roots, and to the bougainvillea vines found throughout the city. When the park opened 11 years ago, it was furnished with hundreds of these pieces, more specifically 26 freestanding benches, 41 wall-mounted benches, 120 cafe tables, and 240 cafe chairs, all made by the Southern California manufacturer Janus et Cie. Grand Molina Park, ca. 2012. [Photo: Channone Arif/Flickr] The park is a place for people to come together and find community, says Andy Lantz, the co-CEO and creative director of Rios. This idea of being able to reconfigure the use of the space with movable furniture was fundamental to making it a park for all. In the years since it opened, the park has become the gathering place Rios intended, hosting weekend dance parties, morning yoga classes, food trucks, and political rallies. The community-focused nature of the space represents whats at risk because of the raids. Angelenos are worried about their friends and neighbors and are doing what they can to protect their communities and civic values. Amid this context, the furniture found a new use to provide security and protection. While endless configurations was part of the furniture design brief, Lantz never imagined what that might mean in the context of a demonstration. He experienced a flood of emotion when he first saw photographs of protesters using the powder-coated aluminum furniture as a shield. The benches, which are about six feet long and weigh 70 pounds, have just the right dimensions to cover a human body when propped on its side; a chair, which weighs about 25 pounds, can be held up by its wire frame and crouched behind. I’ve looked at [the photos] multiple times todayI’ve been proud, I’ve been upset, I’ve been startled, he says. Seeing our work repurposed in a moment of collective action was humbling and powerful. Since Grand Park opened, Rios has used the Civic collection of street furniture in parks it designed in Palm Springs and Houston, among other cities. Bright blue editions are also present in New Yorks Brooklyn Bridge Park. Lantz wonders if the events that happened over the last few days in L.A. will inspire designers to think about the parks they make in new ways. As designers, do you need to start thinking of public space as defensible for these types of actions? he says. It seems that the design brief for street furniture just got a lot more complicated.
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E-Commerce
June 14 is shaping up to be a big day, with millions of Americans expected to take to the streets in an event dubbed “No Kings Day,” which organizers have said will likely be the largest single-day turnout of the anti-Trump, pro-democracy protest movement since President Donald Trump took office for a second term in January. Organizers expect 1,800 rallies will take place on Saturday for “a nationwide day of defiance” in every state and major city across the countryexcept Washington, D.C., as to avoid clashes with the Army’s 250th anniversary celebrations, which will be held that day in the nation’s capital (more on that below). In a statement to Fast Company, the No Kings organizers described their event as “peaceful, organized, and united.” They added: “Make it clear: We dont do kings in this country.” The No Kings website further explains: “From city blocks to small towns, from courthouse steps to community parks, we’re taking action to reject authoritarianismand show the world what democracy really looks like . . . On June 14th, were showing up everywhere he [Trump] isntto say no thrones, no crowns, no kings.” The No Kings protest is sponsored by Indivisible and a broad coalition of over 180 partner organizations, including: the ACLU, Common Cause, Greenpeace, Physicians for Social Responsibility, Standing Up for Science, and a number of unions, including the Communication Workers of America and teacher federations. “Even conservative estimates say that 3.5 million people turned out for the Hands Off mobilization on April 5,” Indivisible’s Ezra Levin told Fast Company. “No Kings [in the U.S] is on track to exceed that by millions more . . . With events [in] red states, blue states, purple states, rural areas, suburban areas, urban areas, United States, North America, Europe, South Americawere all over.” The anti-authoritarian, pro-democracy protests aim to counter President Trump’s multimillion-dollar military parade in Washington, D.C., that day to celebrate the Armys 250th anniversary, which will be held on Trumps 79th birthday, which is also Flag Day. According to the Associated Press, Trump has long wanted a military parade, which is expected to feature 6,600 soldiers, 150 vehicles, and 50 helicopters on a route from Arlington, Virginia to the National Mall, where there will be a fireworks display. The Army initially estimated that the cost for the day’s birthday celebrations, including the parade, would range from $25 million to $45 million, with the cost now looking closer to $40 million, according to USA Today. The celebrations come at a time when the Trump administration’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has slashed budgets and jobs at federal agencies, including the Defense Department, per the AP. The parade’s enormous price tag has further angered many Americans and Trump critics already fed up by the president’s overall mishandling of the economy from tariffs to immigration, which has been dubbed the TACO presidency, for “Trump Always Chickens Out.”
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E-Commerce
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