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Tuesday, November 15, 2016
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Newsonomics: Fake-news fury forces Google and Facebook to change policy“Monday's moves make an interesting first step, but these companies must first embrace their responsibilities — better using both people and machines — in delivering news to vast parts of the U.S. and global democracies.” By Ken Doctor. |
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Hot Pod: Did the election podcast glut of 2016 fail its listeners?Plus: The outlook for podcasts following the election; Radio Ambulante signs a deal with NPR; a Serial spinoff. By Nicholas Quah. |
What We’re Reading
BuzzFeed / Sheera Frenkel
Renegade Facebook employees form task force to battle fake news →
“One employee said ‘more than dozens’ of employees were involved in the task force, and that they had met twice in the last six days. At the moment, they are meeting in secret, to allow members of the group to speak freely and without fear of condemnation from senior management. The group plans to formalize its meetings and eventually make a list of recommendations to Facebook's senior management.”
Digiday / Lucia Moses
Breitbart and the ad tech complex that enables its brand of news →
Automated ad buying via services like Google’s Ad Sense means that money from Target, StateFarm and CB2 is making its way to inflammatory sites like Breitbart.
Tumblr / bloombergmediaforum
Joe Weisenthal is as Bloomberg Digital’s new executive editor of news →
“In his new position, Joe will help serve the news needs of the consumer audience and better coordinate with the rest of Bloomberg News, using his seasoned sense of reader tastes to expand our audience,” Bloomberg Digital Senior executive editor Jared Sandberg said in a memo.
Reuters / Dean Yates
How one reporter dealt with PTSD after 20 years of reporting in Asia and the Middle East →
“When the psychiatrist diagnosed me with post-traumatic stress disorder at the end of our first session early this March, I finally had to accept I was unwell. The flashbacks, the anxiety, my emotional numbness and poor sleep had long worried my wife, Mary. I had played down the symptoms, denied I had a problem. Five months later I'd be in a psychiatric ward.”
the Guardian / Alex Hern
Twitter is finally letting users mute words and conversations →
“Muting conversations serves two obvious purposes: users who have a tweet go viral will no longer have to deal with thousands of replies from strangers, while users stuck in an interminable conversation between people they don't know will be able to silently drop out of the discussion.
Digiday / Lucia Moses
Why publishers turn a blind eye to content-recommendation ads →
“The publishers like to point their fingers at the content recommendation providers, but it's the publishers that control the quality of the links that appear on their site — and too often they choose to turn a blind eye to make more money.”
The Guardian / Alex Hern
Facebook and Google move to kick fake news sites off their ad networks →
“Google moved first, announcing on Monday a policy update which restricts its adverts from being placed on fake news sites.”
Apple
Apple Pay can now be used for donations to nonprofits →
The “Donate Now” button on a nonprofit news org’s article pages just get a little more seamless on iPhones and iPads.