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Friday, September 1, 2017
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There’s a long list of old-fashioned parallels to today’s fake news. Here’s one that’s actually helpfulPlus: Why fake news spreads so fast on Facebook, a fake news “taxonomy,” and a few podcast episodes for your weekend listening. By Laura Hazard Owen. |
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HuffPost is taking its reporters on a “listening tour,” seeking stories, new readers, data, and solidarity“If we’re going to put new reporters in different regions, strategically where should they be? What will they be covering? What matters to these communities?” By Shan Wang. |
What We’re Reading
Talking Points Memo / Josh Marshall
A serf on Google’s farm →
“So let's go down the list: 1) The system for running ads, 2) the top purchaser of ads, 3) the most pervasive audience data service, 4) all search, 5) our email.”
BuzzFeed / Craig Silverman
Big conservative Facebook pages are spreading a false claim that Black Lives Matter blocked Harvey relief efforts →
The two false articles, from Mr. Conservative and Conservative Post, have identical headlines and use an image taken in 2015 in Boston as their thumbnail. People who click through those posts are presented with an article that reports on a real protest from members of the Texas Young Democrats.
Bloomberg / Lucas Shaw
The head of original podcasting and video operations at Spotify is out →
“With the move, Spotify is narrowing its video ambitions. Tom Calderone, the former head of cable network VH1, commissioned a dozen series from producers including Tim Robbins and Russell Simmons. He also oversaw podcasts, an area of growing importance at the world's largest paid music service. Now the company is making clearer that it wants videos on the service to stay closer to the music industry.”
BuzzFeed / Jim Waterson
The BBC’s flagship newspaper review show is finally going to include online news sources →
“The breakfast program — which shapes the daily news agenda for most UK politicians and much of the British news media — currently features two substantial newspaper round-ups during every three-hour show. The program has recently hit record high numbers of listeners, reaching 7.6 million Britons a week.”
Journalism.co.uk / Madalina Ciobanu
A decade after launching, Monocle is still confident about print →
Monocle has around 18,300 subscribers; print advertising brings in most of its revenue. (Its limited-run summer print newspaper, printed in Italy, was profitable before it even started shipping.)
Washington Post
The Washington Post is using its in-house automation tool to cover high school football games in the D.C. area →
Using in-house technology called Heliograf, the Post will automate stories drawing from “scoring plays, individual player statistics and quarterly score changes. The stories will be automatically updated each week using box-score data submitted by high school football coaches, and shared on The Post's Twitter account for high school sports.”
Reuters / Sheila Dang
Time Inc shifts toward online video, with new programming for platforms like Netflix to Facebook’s Watch service →
“The company plans to produce about 40 hours of TV programming this year to be licensed to 12 broadcast, cable and digital networks, up from just five hours of programming in 2014.”
Columbia Journalism Review / Corey Hutchins
From civil to cesspool: Local news battles offensive comments →
The comments solutions company Civil Comments offers one (paid) option for resources-strapped local outlets looking to clean up their comment sections. Coral Project, the Mozilla Foundation’s joint effort with The New York Times and Washington Post, has rolled out free, open-source products news organizations can install now.
Digiday / Jessica Davies
Conde Nast’s Ars Technica falters in its UK expansion →
“The site's UK URL will remain for now, but it will be staffed by just one person — Ars Technica UK consumer editor Mark Walton — and a mix of freelancers. The publisher confirmed four editorial staffers were laid off.”