Happy Friday, FutureParty people. Here’s an update on the first person to get Neuralink’s brain chip implanted into his head: Noland Arbaugh has named it “Eve,” and it’s apparently boosting his ability to learn French and Japanese. Wild.

In other news… ESPN wrestles with its new online identity, Bluesky tries to make social media safer, and Sony develops an internal blockchain.

Want to discover even more newsletters? Here are some of our favorites

• YouTube – Apartment 7A

• X (Twitter) – Jurassic World: Rebirth

• Google – Kaos

• Reddit – Carl Weathers

• TikTok – “Lover, You Should’ve Come Over” - Jeff Buckley 

• Spotify – “Taste” - Sabrina Carpenter

.MEDIA.

ESPN is transforming for the future of sports media

ESPN, arguably the most well-known sports network, is preparing for the eventual end of cable by pivoting to become a sports lifestyle brand that feels tailor-made for the streaming and social media worlds.

The Big Picture: Sports is the main reason why cable has survived, as media companies, sports leagues, and advertisers still reap massive amounts of revenue from the format. But as sports viewership transitions to the fractured world of the internet, legacy cable brands don’t want to get left behind.

Between the Lines: ESPN is undergoing a season of change.

• The network is set to debut its long-in-the-works streaming service, dubbed “Flagship,” which will include all of its TV programming, ESPN+, and sports betting capabilities powered by Penn Gaming.

• It’s using AI to program a personalized version of SportsCenter and a “Where To Watch” tool so that users can figure out when and where to watch games across various platforms.

• It’s also ramping up its presence on social media, especially TikTok (47 million followers), and giving influencers more access to events to help draw audiences.

Closing Thoughts: These moves represent a radical change of thought for ESPN parent Disney, which has been slow to make ESPN accessible outside of its highly profitable carriage deals with cable providers. Going digital means changing the culture of what ESPN is in order to compete, so expect personality to become one of the driving forces at the brand moving forward.

Go Deeper: ESPN’s move into betting is an especially radical change of heart for Disney CEO Bob Iger.

98.2% of you voted Yes in yesterday’s poll: Do you think audiences should be informed when they’re watching a deepfake?

“It’s a start…”

“Usually, you will see some sort of flaw that will make you think it’s a deepfake, but using someone’s image like that is so unscrupulous.”

“My personal belief is that the goal of technology is to blend seamlessly with reality. I think in the future, we won’t make a big deal wondering if something is real or fake.”

Let’s keep the conversation going. Join our Poll Of The Day newsletter so your opinions can shine. Discover how your views line up with your peers’, check out cool insights, and have some fun. It’s data with personality.

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Media, Music, & Entertainment

• Sony has created its own blockchain, Soneium, and is tapping its film and music divisions to help incubate its development. [Read More]

• Fmovies, the largest pirate streaming operation in the world, has been shut down by a partnership between US studios and Vietnamese police. [Read More]

• Forbes lists the most valuable NFL teams of the year, topped by the Dallas Cowboys. [Read More]

Fashion & E-Commerce

• Oakley’s newest sunglasses capsule, the “Players Collection,” highlights the top high school football programs in the country. [Read More]

• Filson, which has been around for over 127 years and is known for its lumberjack attire, is releasing its first womenswear line. [Read More]

• Fashion is really into tennis right now… which probably has something to do with Challengers. [Read More]

Tech, Web3, & AI

• OpenAI is raising money again in a round led by Thrive Capital and Microsoft that would value the company at over $100 billion. [Read More]

• Nvidia has been so successful over the past few years that its stock only seems to drop when it doesn’t totally blow away expectations. [Read More]

• OpenAI and Anthropic have agreed to share their AI models with the US government for third-party safety testing. [Read More]

Creator Economy

• Roblox is behind a $1.2 billion increase in the US creator economy over the past five years. [Read More]

• Brazil may suspend X if Elon Musk doesn’t name a legal representative in the country after the company closed its offices. [Read More]

• Life after viral fame is complicated. [Read More]

.SOCIAL MEDIA.

Bluesky mutes toxicity

Bluesky rolled out several new “anti-toxicity” features to differentiate itself even more from traditional social media, especially its former benefactor, X.

The Big Picture: Social media isn’t really known as a place for positive, healthy interactions with strangers (just look at any comments section), so any platform that can figure out how to make self-expression online safer, mentally and emotionally, could be refreshing for new users.

Between the Lines: Bluesky hopes giving users more power over what content they see on their feeds will make the platform a happier place.

• Version 1.90 of the platform allows users to detach their posts from another user’s quote of it, hide replies, only receive notifications from people they follow, and limit what lists they can be added to.

• It also won’t show every reply in a user’s Following feed; instead, only surfacing interactions between two or more users, which promotes conversation.

• It also plans on introducing a Community Notes-like feature to help users label disinformation — a tradeoff for allowing people to detach their posts from quotes.

Closing Thoughts: Bluesky, which has 6.2 million users, is still small but growing in popularity for users who find X toxic and don’t want to be on yet another Meta-run platform with Threads. If the features do make social media a more user-friendly experience, Bluesky may finally break out as the open-source alternative it’s always billed itself as.

Go Deeper: People don’t really want a digital town square; they want a safe place to share ideas with a like-minded community.

.A WORD FROM OUR FRIENDS AT TIEGE HANLEY.

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Try it out today, and if you figure out how to kiss your own face, let us know.

• Read: WSJ profiles Disney Parks chief Josh D’Amaro, who’s on the shortlist for succeeding Bob Iger as Head Mouse… er… CEO.

• Watch: Toronto Raptors President Masai Ujiri wants to help make the NBA a more global sport… starting with Africa.

• Listen: Don’t Kill the Messenger chats with former Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences president Cheryl Boone Isaacs about her time diversifying The Academy’s membership.

So pure.

LATEST PODCAST EPISODE

Today, on an extra special bonus episode of Future Forecast, our hosts Boye and Chris sit down with Andrew Kenward, the President and COO of Almost Friday Media. Andrew was an agent at WME in the digital media department at WME before being brought into the Almost Friday universe in 2021. We chat with him about his career, his goals for the brand moving forward, and what it's like working in media today.