The media and technology mogul Barry Diller referred to AT&T’s plans to get out of the media business as “the great escape” on Friday morning in an interview with CNBC.

AT&T (ticker: T) is in the process of unwinding a costly acquisition spree from the prior decade, while also reducing its debt and cutting its dividend payment. It unveiled plans to shed DirecTV and its other pay- TV operations in February, and announced a deal on Monday morning to spin off WarnerMedia and merge it with Discovery (DISCA). Diller, who has led...