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Tuesday, July 11, 2017
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The freedom-of-speech institute suing @realDonaldTrump to unblock his critics on Twitter has its eye on other lawsuits, too“Part of the reason we took this case on is that we have seen reports from across the country of public officials blocking their constituents on Twitter or Facebook.” By Shan Wang. |
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How do we build a better recommendation experience for mobile news readers?And why are offline reading apps still so stodgy? By Madeline Welsh. |
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How will we know when we’ve hit Peak Podcast? And are we there yet?Plus: Gimlet gets more transparent about diversity, IAB tweaks its podcast upfront, and SoundCloud shrinks. By Nicholas Quah. |
What We’re Reading
Digiday / Sahil Patel
Publishers are thinking more about watch time — and YouTube →
Publishers are acknowledging that "views can happen by accident.”
Wall Street Journal / Jeffrey A. Trachtenberg and Suzanne Vranica
Time Inc. explores renaming the company, seeking a refresh →
“Such a move would be aimed at Time Inc.'s business and marketing partners, and would be intended to reposition the publisher as a modern media company with growing digital and video ventures….The company isn’t contemplating changing the names of any of its magazine titles, which include TIME, People, Sports Illustrated and Fortune.”
Wall Street Journal / Brody Mullins and Jack Nicas
Paying professors: inside Google’s academic influence campaign →
“Over the past decade, Google has helped finance hundreds of research papers to defend against regulatory challenges of its market dominance, paying stipends of $5,000 to $400,000, The Wall Street Journal found.”
Shorenstein Center / Derrick Z. Jackson
A new report looks at how the national media has failed to cover the Flint water crisis →
“Sustained and widespread media attention was not given until late 2015 and early 2016, when the state of Michigan and President Obama declared an emergency over high levels of lead in the water and in the blood of thousands of children. Additionally, the nature of some of the coverage was problematic: Complaints of citizens were discounted when compared to the comments of officials, residents were portrayed as hopeless and downtrodden despite months of action, and narratives of ‘heroes’ excluded African American activists in a city that is 57 percent black.”
Bloomberg.com
Chinese government tells telecommunications carriers to block access to personal VPNs by February →
“It's unclear how the new directive may affect multinationals operating within the country, which already have to contend with a Cybersecurity Law that imposes stringent requirements on the transfer of data and may give Beijing unprecedented access to their technology. Companies operating on Chinese soil will be able to employ leased lines to access the international web but must register their usage of such services for the record, the people familiar with the matter said.”
Digiday / Lucia Moses
'Playing defense': Allied or not, news orgs face uphill battle against the duopoly →
“The news ecosystem is far more diverse than just the [News Media Alliance]'s members, and it seems strange to launch an initiative without including digital-native publishers and broadcasters.”
Poynter / Benjamin Mullin
With its new, speedier article page, Reuters wants to reimagine how news sites are designed →
“The changes aim to remake Reuters.com from a news website into a news utility. The distinction between the two? ‘A lot of news websites are a reflection of newspaper design. Essentially, the premium is on the storytelling and on the presentation of that storytelling. When you're developing a utility — of course storytelling is important — but what's critical is what you're helping the news consumer to do.'”
TechCrunch / Sarah Perez
On-demand audio streaming hits record high, is up 62.4% over last year, Nielsen says →
“Streaming hit a high point of 7.5 billion weekly on-demand audio streams during the week ending March 9, 2017. That's the first time the figure had ever topped 7 billion, setting a new record.”
Eater / Amanda Kludt
Eater is launching a site in London →
It’s part of Vox Media’s plans to grow internationally.
AdWeek / Richard Horgan
Talk about diversifying your revenue: Hearst is opening whiskey lounges in India →
“The Esquire brand has global recognition, epitomizing cool confidence, wit and style; the lounges will reflect that, offering guests a truly unique experience.”
Venture Beat / Chris O'Brien
Bots have turned Twitter into a powerful political disinformation platform, according to a USC study →
“Bottom line, according to the study by Dr. Emilio Ferrara, a research assistant professor at USC Computer Science Department: ‘Account usage patterns suggest the possible existence of a black-market for reusable political disinformation bots.'”