YULI AHMADA: November 2016

Rabu, 30 November 2016

Hot Pod: Should Apple become a more useful middleman for the podcast industry — and if so, how?: The latest from Nieman Lab

Tuesday, November 29, 2016

Hot Pod: Should Apple become a more useful middleman for the podcast industry — and if so, how?

Plus: Podcast ad blindness, growth in the potential market for Audible Channels, and how audio ad dollars are seeking scale. By Nicholas Quah.

Quartz launches its Bot Studio with $240K from Knight, and plans for Slack and Echo

The Quartz Bot Studio (which the publication intends to maintain after the grant funding is used up) will develop new bots for messaging platforms like Slack and voice interfaces like Amazon Echo or Google Home. By Shan Wang.

Twice the FOIA fun: MuckRock bulks up its records request resources with the free FOIA Machine tool

What We’re Reading

BBC

BBC News now plays vertical video in its news app →

“All the videos are created specifically with smartphone users in mind: the videos are succinct and sharply edited, designed to be viewed vertically in full screen, and have subtitles. In addition the app will debut new vertical interstitial ad formats.”

FiveThirtyEight / Christie Aschwanden

We asked 8,500 internet commenters why they do what they do →

“Readers are most likely to comment when they know something about the subject that wasn’t in the article.”

Knight Foundation

Video digitization and Internet archival projects among those receiving Knight funding →

Including $200,000 for the nonprofit Rhizome, which “will work with organizations, social media users, journalists, artists and others to help them easily archive their experience of the web.”

The Wall Street Journal / Jack Marshall

Adblocking rates could be declining in Germany →

Ads were blocked on 19.1 percent of desktop webpage views during the third quarter of 2016, down from 21.2 percent in the same period a year ago, according to data from German digital media trade body Bundesverband Digitale Wirtschaft.

The Information / Tom Dotan

How Silicon Valley passed on conservative media →

“But as a social class that lives in cities like New York or San Francisco and spends time around predominantly liberal folks, they tend to invest in businesses that square with their self-image. As a result, they've largely avoided investing in conservative news sites like Breitbart, TheBlaze or Newsmax in recent years.”

CNBC / Matthew J. Belvedere

The New York Times has added 132,000 subscribers since Donald Trump was elected →

“From the election on Nov. 8 through Saturday, the Times has seen “a net increase of approximately 132,000 paid subscriptions to our news products,” the media giant said in an exclusive statement to CNBC. “This represents a dramatic rate of growth, 10 times, the same period one year ago,” the statement said.”

The Guardian / Mariot Chauvin

The Guardian has moved to HTTPS →

For security reasons, but also: Google is starting to favor HTTPS URLs in its search results.

Digiday / Max Willens

‘A classic commons problem’: Publishers are going notifications crazy →

“Notifications are spreading, too. Updates to the Chrome and Firefox browsers over the past 18 months have made it possible for any publisher to send notifications to readers via their respective browsers; Safari allows this too, but only for desktop — publishers that want to slip onto their readers' iPhone lock screens has to do so via Apple News, using the notifications company Urban Airship.”

The New York Times / Christopher J. Daggett

How an FCC auction could transform local media →

“The proceeds from these sales could produce enormous public benefits if they are used to build a 21st-century infrastructure for public interest media. For states, communities and universities holding licenses in play, the auction presents an important opportunity to invest in new ways to meet the information needs of the public.”

Selasa, 29 November 2016

Newsonomics: Canada’s government imagines what a news-less future might look like: The latest from Nieman Lab

Monday, November 28, 2016

Newsonomics: Canada’s government imagines what a news-less future might look like

Canada’s press woes are bad enough unto themselves, but they also serve as a sign of earlier winter for the U.S. press. By Ken Doctor.

ProPublica’s collaborative reporting experiment takes on widespread voter fraud (and finds no evidence of it)

More than 450 reporters from 250 outlets across the country have published over 300 stories as part of the Electionland project. By Joseph Lichterman.

With its first community reporter, The Texas Tribune is turning Texans themselves into its next big beat

The reporter will be charged with forging relationships with readers and using their feedback to help drive The Texas Tribune’s coverage. By Ricardo Bilton.

What We’re Reading

Medium / Madeline Welsh

How The Guardian Mobile Innovation Lab built live notifications for election night →

“This was, to our knowledge, the first use of the new iOS 10 notifications technology in this way, and absolutely the first time live notifications that auto-update have been used on a US election night. It was also the first time the lab's work was available on iOS, and the first time work we had done was integrated into our parent organization's main coverage and core products.”

The New York Times / Mike Isaac

CNN has acquired the social app Beme to cultivate a millennial audience →

“CNN announced on Monday that it had agreed to acquire the technology and talent behind Beme, the social media app built and started by [Casey] Neistat and Matt Hackett, a former vice president of engineering at Tumblr. Beme's 12 employees will join CNN as part of the deal, the terms of which were not publicly disclosed.”

The Huffington Post / Michael Calderone

Media helps boost Donald Trump’s false claim that ‘millions’ voted illegally →

“Too often, news organizations amplify Trump's assertions in headlines with some variation of "Trump tweets" or Trump claims" or "Trump says" ― whether or not those assertions are true. This seems to be the default in many newsrooms heading into Trump's presidency, even after he proved to be a historically dishonest candidate known for frequently spouting falsehoods and pushing conspiracy theories.”

New York Post / Keith J. Kelly

Time Inc. board reportedly rejects investor’s bid →

“[Edgar Bronfman Jr.], who is teaming up with Len Blavatnik's Access Industries, recently submitted a bid to the board of the legendary magazine publisher to buy the company for $18 a share. The price is a 30 percent premium over Time Inc.'s Friday closing price of $13.80 — and 34 cents over the company's 52-week high of $17.66. The Time Inc. board is said to have rejected the offer.”

The Guardian / Jane Martinson

Index on Censorship: journalists now under ‘unprecedented’ attack →

“The study found 406 verified reports of violence, threats or violations throughout European Union member states and neighbouring countries including Russia, Turkey and Ukraine in the three months to the end of September.”

Digiday / Jessica Davies

How Le Monde is taking on fake news with an automated browser extension →

“The plan is to build a hoax-busting database, which incorporates information on which sites are fake and which are verified, trusted sources, and readers can access via Google and Firefox Chrome extensions. The idea is that once a user has downloaded the extension, when they come across articles online a red flag will appear if the site or news is deemed fake, yellow if the source is unreliable or green if it's ok.”

The New York Times / Andrew Higgins, Mike McIntire, and Gabriel J.X. Dance

Inside a fake news sausage factory: ‘This is all about income’ →

“Some analysts worry that foreign intelligence agencies are meddling in American politics and using fake news to influence elections. But one window into how the meat in fake sausages gets ground can be found in the buccaneering internet economy, where satire produced in Canada can be taken by a recent college graduate in the former Soviet republic of Georgia and presented as real news to attract clicks from credulous readers in the United States.”

Politico / Ken Doctor

Covering the Trump era — with shrinking newsrooms →

“The election has been only a temporary distraction from the freefall of print advertising, which sped up further in the recently reported third quarter, and the likely prospect is for continued declines going forward. Those awful numbers – ranging from 11% for Tronc to 15% for Gannett to 18% for The New York Times – signal the accelerating decline of the newspaper-based business.”

WAN-IFRA / Teemu Henriksson

How The Financial Times measures reader engagement →

“Our company-wide model is RFV, short for Recency, Frequency and Volume. It looks over the last 90 days to see how recently a reader visited us, how many times and how much they read over the period.”

Innovation Media Consulting / Georg Altrogge

Inside Axel Springer’s digital strategy →

Axel Springer CEO Mathias Döpfner: "Future growth lies in digitalisation and having a presence in other countries, especially the English-speaking market."

Kamis, 24 November 2016

Here’s another startup trying to make it easier for publishers to engage with readers: The latest from Nieman Lab

Wednesday, November 23, 2016

Here’s another startup trying to make it easier for publishers to engage with readers

Antenna allows readers to react to stories with pre-set emotions, and the company is expanding into e-commerce. By Joseph Lichterman.

“No one ever corrected themselves on the basis of what we wrote”: A look at European fact-checking sites

What We’re Reading

Poynter / Alexios Mantzarlis

Le Monde wants to build a B.S.-detector →

“Developed in-house, the widget facilitates a reader’s search through previously fact-checked assertions.”

Bloomberg.com / Gerry Smith

Facebook’s fake news crackdown: It’s complicated →

“"It's easy to see how an algorithm-only solution to fake news could result in blocking stuff that's not false or is misleading for reasons that are partisan but not inaccurate.”

Politico / Jack Shafer

Opinion: The cure for fake news is worse than the disease →

“We need to learn to live with a certain level of background fake news without overreacting.”

VentureBeat / Ken Yeung

Messaging company Telegram launches Telegraph, a long-form publishing platform →

“The company on Tuesday launched Telegraph, a publishing platform with striking similarities to Medium and Quip. What's interesting about the service is that no account is needed — simply visit the website and begin typing away. When you're done, hit publish and it's immediately on the web.”

Digiday / Ross Benes

“It was a fad”: Many once-hot viral publishers have cooled off →

“Interest in viral publishers — such as ViralNova and Distractify, who built large audiences by sharing uplifting content on Facebook — has cooled as reliance upon platforms left the sites exposed to Facebook's algorithm changes and inconsistent traffic.”

The Information / Tom Dotan

Facebook ad revenue (finally) tops media giants’ →

“Despite all the hype around digital ad growth, Facebook still lagged Comcast and Disney in overall advertising revenue. But for the first time, this year the company's U.S. ad revenue will be larger than the biggest traditional media companies'. And this is likely to create more unease at the TV networks, which can no longer rely on the larger pool of TV ad dollars as a bulwark against digital upstarts.”

Medium / Chris Moran

What I learned from seven years as The Guardian’s audience editor →

“The fact that most people had no idea that Google sent us 10 times more referral than our favorite social network meant that we were making really bad decisions on a daily basis.”

ProPublica

USC students partnered with ProPublica and The Texas Tribune to create a VR documentary →

The documentary follows up on a ProPublica and Texas Tribune story from earlier this year about Houston’s vulnerability to hurricanes. The students traveled to Houston this spring to shoot the video, and it’s now available for viewing in the JOVRNALISM app on iOS.

New York Times / Mike Isaac

Facebook said to create censorship tool to get back into China →

“The social network has quietly developed software to suppress posts from appearing in people's news feeds in specific geographic areas, according to three current and former Facebook employees.” Facebook is blocked in China.

Bloomberg / Mark Bergen

Major ad tech company bars Breitbart News for hate speech →

“AppNexus scrutinized Breitbart’s website after U.S. President-Elect Donald Trump tapped Steve Bannon, former executive chairman of Breitbart, to be White House chief strategist last week. The digital ad firm decided the publication had breached a policy against content that incites violence, said AppNexus spokesman Joshua Zeitz.”

Rabu, 23 November 2016

The Chronicle of Higher Education looks beyond site licenses to focus on individual subscribers: The latest from Nieman Lab

Tuesday, November 22, 2016

The Chronicle of Higher Education looks beyond site licenses to focus on individual subscribers

“The individuals who pay us every year are the readers who are going to count most in our world.” By Shan Wang.

Hot Pod: The indies weigh in on a podcast business gone pro (“Capitalism!”)

“The competition is getting tougher, and the top is crowded by podcasts that have teams and systems behind them. This is good in some ways!” By Nicholas Quah.

What We’re Reading

Medium / Matt Karolian

On election night, The Boston Globe streamed its website to Facebook and it drove a ton of traffic →

The experiment generated 65,000 direct clicks to the Globe’s website, and 580,000 unique live viewers over its three-hour broadcast.

BuzzFeed / Craig Silverman

Zuckerberg’s plan to battle fake news sets off “widespread panic” among big conservative pages →

“The problem is I operate in an environment where sites like Ending the Fed and these unknowns are going to beat us unless we go from tilted to misleading.”

Digiday / Jessica Davies

Publishers, like advertisers, aren’t happy with Facebook’s metrics mishap →

“We need to be persuaded that the success measures there can be tracked robustly; otherwise, a lot of the budgetary decisions on resources, content, deployment of teams, whether it's for Facebook Live or Instant Articles, can change,” said one publisher.

Digiday / Shareen Pathak

In response to complaints, some brands are pulling ads placed on Breitbart →

“Many brands had no idea their ads were appearing on Breitbart.”

Recode / Peter Kafka

Politico co-founder Jim VandeHei has hired an editor to cover tech at his media startup →

It’s Kim Hart, currently the press secretary at the FCC.

Inc.com / Tess Townsend

Meet the Romanian Trump fan behind a major fake news site →

“I thought I can help him to win the presidency by creating a website. So I created http://endingthefed.com. I feel sorry for posting some ‘fake’ news. I removed them but at that time, I didn’t really know about them being fake.”

Medium / Damian Radcliffe

The Tow Center is running a survey for people who work at local newspapers →

“We will be sharing our initial findings in early 2017, showcasing examples great local journalism and the issues that the sector faces as it continues to remain relevant — and solvent — in the digital age.”

Richland Source / Dillon Carr

This local Ohio news site is releasing a live album after holding a concert series in its newsroom →

The Richland Source held seven concerts in its newsroom earlier this year. It recorded the shows and is now releasing an album, called “Newsroom After Hours.” Proceeds from the sales will support future concerts.

Selasa, 22 November 2016

With its new app, RadioPublic wants to tackle podcasting’s lingering challenges: The latest from Nieman Lab

Monday, November 21, 2016

With its new app, RadioPublic wants to tackle podcasting’s lingering challenges

Its ambitions are three-pronged: improving show discovery, improving how (and how deeply) listeners engage with their favorite shows, and improving channels through which show creators can make money. By Shan Wang.

Two NPR designers left their comfort zones to create an experimental podcast for kids

“We wanted to find out more about what NPR could offer for kids.” By Joseph Lichterman.

What We’re Reading

Reveal

These are the 2016-2017 Reveal Investigative Fellows →

The full list of fellows here. “The fellowship's underlying goal is to increase the range of backgrounds, experiences and interests within the field of investigative journalism, where diverse perspectives are critically important.”

The New York Times / Rob Walker

A look at GE’s second podcast, “LifeAfter” →

“As with ‘The Message,’ a notable detail in this branding experiment is that the sponsoring brand is, by design, almost never mentioned.”

The Verge / Casey Newton

Instagram’s take on live video arrives with an ephemeral twist →

As soon as the video ends, it disappears.

Journalism.co.uk / Caroline Scott

Canadian local news site only sources stories from its paying members →

Members ,who pay $100 a year, “are able to log into the online Story Graden and suggest ideas for future articles by asking how and why questions about things they want to know.”

Fortune / Erin Griffith

BuzzFeed wants to sell you stuff →

For the past three weeks, Ben Kaufman — CEO of the failed consumer product startup Quirky — has been leading a team of 10 called BuzzFeed Product Lab. Its mandate is to experiment with all forms of e-commerce until the team finds something that is sustainable. It is unveiling products like the Tasty Cookbook, a custom-printed and customizable collection of recipes, for which shoppers can choose seven different styles of Tasty recipes to include in their book, along with a custom dedication page.

New York Post / Claire Atkinson

Report: ABC is exploring a 24-hour digital news channel →

New York Post claims its “sources say ABC News chief James Goldston is spearheading the effort, and is bullish on it given the election bump from recent Facebook live experiments.”

Huffington Post South Africa

The Huffington Post launches a South Africa edition →

“So another Huffington Post global trait will fit right at home here: a bent towards solutions-based journalism.”

Washington Post / Margaret Sullivan

Call it a ‘crazy idea,’ Facebook, but you need an executive editor →

“Whatever the title, Facebook needs someone who can distinguish a Pulitzer Prize-winning photograph from child pornography and who can tell a baseless lie from a thoroughly vetted investigative story.”

Bloomberg / Gerry Smith

The FT wants to buy companies that can boost its digital subscriptions →

“The publisher is hunting for companies that can "support and accelerate our growth in quality content and, in particular, are based on digital subscriptions," [CEO John] Ridding said in an interview in New York. The company is also interested in technology firms that bolsters its data analytics — valuable for targeting readers with advertising and subscriber offers, he said.”

Digiday / Lucinda Southern

With its own election looming, France sees an influx of US publishers →

“Post-Brexit and post-Trump, next year's French elections could hardly be less predictable or more important and influential.”

Digiday / Lucia Moses

Email newsletters have a measurement problem →

“MailChimp, the company that serves many email newsletters, has technological limits in how it measures open rates, which can lead to underestimates of how much email newsletters are read. Then there's the issue of publishers fluffing their subscription numbers by using come-ons like contests, which may yield email addresses if not necessarily loyal readers.”

NPR.org / Alina Selyukh

Post-election, overwhelmed Facebook users unfriend and cut back →

“Facebook is a source of news for a majority of American adults, but in the vitriol and propaganda of the 2016 election, its proverbial public square for many users has devolved into a never-ending Thanksgiving-dinner debate — or an omnipresent Speakers’ Corner.”

The New York Times / Jim Rutenberg

Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook must defend the truth →

“With a mainstream news media that works hard to separate fact from fiction under economic and political threat, Facebook — which has contributed to that economic threat by gobbling up so much of the online advertising market — is going to have a special responsibility to do its part.”

The New York Times / Sapna Maheshwari

How one fake news story went viral →

“While some fake news is produced purposefully by teenagers in the Balkans or entrepreneurs in the United States seeking to make money from advertising, false information can also arise from misinformed social media posts by regular people that are seized on and spread through a hyperpartisan blogosphere.”