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Friday, June 16, 2017
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From jobs to journalism: Task & Purpose is finding a niche reporting on veterans’ issuesThe veterans-focused site, born out of a jobs board, is expanding beyond its original conception with original reporting, a growing staff of full-time writers, and its own revenue streams. By Ricardo Bilton. |
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Want a “news-style soft article”? That’ll be $15. Or splurge and discredit a journalist for $55,000Plus: Can machine learning fix (some of) the fake news problem? And Facebook wants you to help it answer some hard questions. By Laura Hazard Owen. |
What We’re Reading
TechCrunch / Sarah Perez
The first ad network for the Amazon Echo is dead →
“A series of policy changes at Amazon that detail how advertising will be supported within Alexa's voice-enabled apps, called ‘Skills,’ have now had their first casualty: VoiceLabs. The startup was the leading way for third-party developers to make money from their Alexa applications, through the use of VoiceLab's ‘Sponsored Messages.'”
Financial Times / Rochelle Toplensky
Google faces big fine in first EU case against search practices →
“EU officials are expected to say in the coming weeks that the company abused its search market dominance to build its Google Shopping service, and the bill could top the record abuse penalty of €1bn ($1.45bn) handed out to chipmaker Intel in 2009, according to two people familiar with the case.”
Pew Research Center / Elisa Shearer
Pew: Podcast and online radio audiences continue to grow →
“While terrestrial radio reaches almost the entire U.S. population and remains steady in its revenue, online radio and podcasting audiences have continued to grow over the last decade”
BuzzFeed / Charlie Warzel
Alex Jones scoops Megyn Kelly and proves the media isn’t ready for the trolls →
“An uncanny ability to hijack the news is a trait that Jones shares with the pro-Trump media that he helped create. And while the pro-Trump media have a number of unfair advantages — including but not limited to playing fast and loose with the facts — the reason is largely that the movement understands the internet far better than its mainstream counterpart.”
Digiday / Lucinda Southern
The Financial Times is splitting up video into verticals →
“This plays into the FT's broader video trend of creating more series-led content rather than one-off stories tied to the news agenda. While news-agenda stories won't be ignored completely, the focus is to create more evergreen content that it can feed to viewers over time and keep them coming back.”
Pew Research Center
Network TV news remains appointment viewing for more than 20 million Americans →
“Financially, in recent years, the news programs of the three major networks – NBC, ABC and CBS – have generated growing revenue…Combined average viewership for the ABC, CBS and NBC evening newscasts remained stable, down 1% in 2016.”
Columbia Journalism Review / Carlett Spike
These are some of the best outlets to freelance for →
“CJR asked more than two dozen freelancers about their experiences, with the goal of recognizing publications that value freelancers. We focused on pay, the editing process, turnaround time, and the ability to maintain a relationship with the publication.”
New Republic / Clio Chang
Do we need women’s news? →
“Jezebel works because the site has always insisted that serious news and women's news are, in fact, the same thing. It's well past time for the rest of the mainstream media to do the same.”
Columbia Journalism Review / Stephanie Russell-Kraft
I learned the hard way why non-competes are bad for journalists →
“Journalists and journalism both benefit when reporters and editors can change jobs and gain exposure to different news-gathering and writing styles across publications. We shouldn't need to hire lawyers to do so.”
Recode / Brett Frischmann and Mark Verstraete
We need our platforms to put people and democratic society ahead of cheap profits →
“The economic incentives that push Facebook to collect as much user data as possible also explain why we should not rely on Facebook to stem the tide of fake news.”
Columbia Journalism Review / Jon Keegan
A request to Facebook from a data journalist: more data, please →
Facebook wants to hear from people about what topics and issues it should address. One journalist just wants the company to release more data.