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Wednesday, May 3, 2017
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Schibsted is creating new editorial formats — from messaging to personalized homepages“This is not a reorganization that is forced upon a publisher. It’s a joint realization that if we join forces we can do more than by operating on our own.” By Joseph Lichterman. |
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Philly’s Lenfest Institute has raised $26.5 million and could get another $40 million from its namesakeThe institute, which owns the two Philadelphia dailies, also plans to introduce a fellowship program and award grants to help sustain local journalism. By Joseph Lichterman. |
What We’re Reading
BuzzFeed / J. Lester Feder and Edgar Mannheimer
BuzzFeed investigates white nationalist digital media in Sweden →
“It was natural for Spencer to turn to Swedes as partners in the new enterprise, given the country's history as an exporter of white nationalist ideas.”
Ear Buds: The Podcasting Documentary
The trailer for “Ear Buds,” a documentary about podcasts →
“Ear Buds: The Podcasting Documentary.”
BuzzFeed / Steven Perlberg
Former Jared Kushner employees are trying to create ‘the Breitbart of the left’ →
“Elizabeth Spiers, previously the editor-in-chief of the New York Observer and the founding editor of Gawker, and media and politics researcher Peter Feld are attempting to fundraise for the effort, according to two people familiar with the matter.”
BuzzFeed / Steven Perlberg
How ESPN became a conservative cause →
“Once a profit powerhouse, ESPN has become a business in crisis as it struggles to navigate the eroding pay-TV industry. Some conservative critics attribute this to a newly politicized network. Other conservatives say they recognize that ESPN's business problems are deeper — and that the political aspect to ESPN is merely an attempt to generate heat amid that decline. The gleeful reaction, some say, is mostly just schadenfreude. Either way, in the parlance of trolls abusing sportswriters' Twitter mentions, conservatives say ESPN should ‘stick to sports.'”
The Guardian / Emily Bell
Wikitribune venture will not address journalism’s underlying issues →
“Is the problem with news that we are doing it wrong? Or is the problem that the institutions that are doing it right are too few and far between? Or that they don't have enough sustainability and enough reporters to do more? Or is it that actually the broken parts of news are sometimes the journalism, but they are other things too – like the commercial structure of larger organisations such as Facebook and Google?”
J-Source / H.G. Watson
Canada is getting its own edition of The Conversation →
To be edited by Scott White, former longtime editor-in-chief of the Canadian Press.
Digiday / Hilary Milnes
How Teen Vogue is maintaining its “woke” momentum in the Trump era →
“U.S. traffic to TeenVogue.com has grown to 8 million unique visitors as of March, up from 3.5 million in 2016, according to ComScore.”
Poynter / Benjamin Mullin
An offshoot of Berkeley’s Investigative Reporting Program strikes a deal with Amazon to produce over-the-top video →
“If you step way back, what we’re talking about is commercializing the research that’s being done at the university.”
Folio / Becky Peterson
The Economist’s digital subscriptions are up 19% since the U.S. election →
“North American digital subscribers have come to represent 35 percent of annual subscription volume. This number, pulled from the period between December 2016 and February 2017, is a 30 percent increase year on year.”
WGBH
WGBH, a closed-captioning pioneer, is launching free video captioning software →
“The new tool, funded in part by a grant from Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey's Office, will allow users to affordably produce high-quality caption files that are compatible with any media player that supports the display of captions and any web browser.”
The Globe and Mail
The owner of the Toronto Star reports $24.4-million loss, plan to cut 110 positions →
“The company continued to cut costs on the Toronto Star's tablet edition, known as ‘Star Touch.’ The quarter saw a decline of $3.7-million in net investment in that project, which was initially a multimillion-dollar bid to reshape the media company for the future. In his final earnings call in March, outgoing CEO David Holland said that his successor would need to ‘reflect hard’ on the future of Star Touch. The company has planned to invest $2-million to $4-million in Star Touch this year, ramping down its spending and cutting costs.”