 |
Thursday, May 25, 2017
 |
Facebook will let publishers convert Instant Articles to Google AMP and Apple News formatsThe move comes after a number of high-profile publishers have stepped back from Facebook’s distributed-content offering, preferring to direct Facebook mobile users to their websites. By Joseph Lichterman. |
 |
With its Special Projects Desk, Univision is keeping Gawker’s spirit alive at Gizmodo Media GroupThe investigative unit, now at eight people, is dedicated to covering the inner workings of our most powerful institutions. By Ricardo Bilton. |
What We’re Reading
TechCrunch / Darrell Etherington
Instagram direct messages now support web links and different photo orientations →
“Instagram's Direct feature just got more generally useful as a messaging option, with support added for external web links, and the ability to send photos and video in their original portrait or landscape aspect ratios without cropping. The first is really far more important than the second, mainly because it means users have less reason to go seeking other messaging options outside of Instagram.”
Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society / Justin Clark, Rob Faris, and Rebekah Heacock Jones
Switching to HTTPS has limited governments’ ability to censor Wikipedia →
“…our study finds that, as of June 2016, there was relatively little censorship of Wikipedia globally…HTTPS prevents censors from seeing which page a user is viewing, which means censors must choose between blocking the entire site and allowing access to all articles.”
BBC
The BBC reaches 372 million people around the world each week →
“The data shows the BBC's weekly global news audience has risen by 8 per cent to 346m, with TV, audio and social media driving the increase.”
Times Open / Nick Rockwell
The New York Times relaunched its Open Blog on Medium — and here are its first 3 posts →
“While the blog began life with an engineering focus, we are expanding coverage to include everyone who builds our digital products at the Times. You'll see posts on design, product development, management, editorial, and yes, definitely engineering. Most posts will come from our team, but you may also see occasional guest posts, from people we are collaborating with in some way.”
Politico / Joe Pompeo
Apple News is hiring an editor-in-chief →
It’s “Lauren Kern, one of New York magazine's most high-ranking editors and a former deputy editor at The New York Times Magazine. It's unclear what exactly the role will entail, and Kern declined to comment. But at the very least, it would seem to suggest that Apple has ambitions for its two-year-old aggregation app, which replaced the Apple Newsstand in 2015 but hasn't really gained traction in a big way.”
MediaShift / Sami Edge
Stacy-Marie Ishmael on the ‘flattening’ of news and its consequences for trust →
"Design conventions in digital have gotten super boring, and very similar looking to each other. We're making it harder and harder and harder for people to know what they're doing in digital, even as the environment in which we're operating has gotten more and more complex."
Reuters / Jessica Toonkel
Facebook signs BuzzFeed, Vox, others for original video shows →
“Facebook is planning two tiers of video entertainment: scripted shows with episodes lasting 20 to 30 minutes, which it will own; and shorter scripted and unscripted shows with episodes lasting about 5 to 10 minutes, which Facebook will not own, according to the sources.”
Digiday / Lucia Moses
To update its breaking news strategy online, CNN takes cues from TV →
“CNN is applying lessons from TV news reporting in other ways. Instead of waiting until an event ends to write a story, in the newspaper tradition, it's publishing more curtain-raisers that preview upcoming events. CNN also is trying out more formats, like GIFs of big, buzzy news moments. It also overhauled its approach to news alerts when it redesigned its main app in February, replacing its one-size-fits-all delivery to a choice of three levels of alerts, ranging from one or two alerts to all alerts.”
The Boston Globe / Scott LaPierre and Taylor DeLench
Video: Inside The Boston Globe’s printing facility →
The Globe has been printed in the same facility since 1958, but the paper is moving to a new printer in the city’s suburbs next month.
Elle / Rachael Combe
Maggie Haberman doesn’t tolerate spin, sells, or lies; so why does Donald Trump keep calling? →
“Journalists have become part of the story in the Trump administration, enablers and heroes of a nonstop political and constitutional soap opera, and last year Haberman was the most widely read journalist at the Times, according to its analytics.”