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Monday, April 8, 2019
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What kind of local news is Facebook featuring on Today In? Crime, car crashes, and not too much communityOur analysis of the links 10 cities saw in Facebook’s local news section found funeral home obituaries, years-old stories, and yes, some meaningful local journalism. But not a lot. By Christine Schmidt. |
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Gizmodo Media Group is sold to a private equity firm, and Univision is out of the English-language website businessThe plan is “targeting marketers who are seeking brand-safe content and high-quality audiences that are difficult to find elsewhere.” By Christine Schmidt. |
What We’re Reading
Nieman Foundation
Top Mother Jones executives Monika Bauerlein and Clara Jeffery to receive I.F. Stone Medal for Journalistic Independence →
“While serving as co-editors from 2006 to 2015, the pair reinvigorated the storied nonprofit magazine to safeguard and expand its important role as one of investigative journalism's leading voices. The women are responsible for the magazine's explosive growth online and in print, and for opening bureaus in Washington, D.C., and New York.”
The Atlantic / Taylor Lorenz
Incoming college students are re-creating Facebook on Instagram →
“‘I didn't start using Facebook until I got in in December, and that was the case for my friends too,’ said Alexis Queen, who runs Harvard's class account, adding that the school's official Facebook groups are ghost towns. ‘The most popular post in our admission group is just, “Comment your Instagram handle,”‘ she said. ‘Facebook is just an easy way to find people on Instagram.'”
TechCrunch / Josh Constine
“Snapchat's plan is to let other apps embed the best parts of it rather than building their own half-rate copies” →
“This is how Snapchat colonizes the native app ecosystem similarly to how Facebook invaded the web with the Like button. Snap's strong privacy record makes these partners willing to host it where now they might fear that Facebook and its history with Cambridge Analytica could tarnish their brand.”
BBC News / Chris Fox
The U.K. proposes fining or blocking online platforms if they fail to tackle “online harms” such as terrorist propaganda and child abuse →
“The paper suggests establishing an independent regulator that can write a ‘code of practice’ for social networks and internet companies, giving the regulator enforcement powers including the ability to fine companies that break the rules, considering additional enforcement powers such as the ability to fine company executives and force internet service providers to block sites that break the rules.
Twitter / Kytja Weir
How the Center for Public Integrity and Gannett collaborated on the “model legislation” investigation →
“But we knew the tracker could uncover even more. At the same time, a cracker jack team at @azcentral was trying to do the same thing. Same difficult computational problem, different approach. So @Gannett and @Publici joined forces to create even more powerful journalism than we could have alone.”
Trusting News / Joy Mayer
What news consumers say they trust (and how an outlet could regain their trust) →
“Overall, when asked to describe what separates good journalism from bad, here is what interview subjects valued: Balance (77.8%), Honesty (51.9%), Depth (46.9%), Reader agency (23.5%), Professionalism and reputation (22.2%), Simplicity (12.3%), Relevance (6.2%). Participants were not given a list of qualities to choose from.”
Columbia Journalism Review / Nico Lang
How an LGBTQ news site has survived 16 years in digital media →
“I've always said the most radical thing we could do was to stay alive.”
The Economist / Sarah Leo
Breaking down The Economist’s bad charts (and how the team improved them) →
“After a deep dive into our archive, I found several instructive examples. I grouped our crimes against data visualisation into three categories: charts that are (1) misleading, (2) confusing and (3) failing to make a point.”
Vox / Kelsey Piper
Google cancels its AI ethics board in response to outcry →
“A role on Google's AI board was an unpaid, toothless position that cannot possibly, in four meetings over the course of a year, arrive at a clear understanding of everything Google is doing, let alone offer nuanced guidance on it.”
Reynolds Journalism Institute / Jennifer Nelson
From a pop-up newsroom to a pop-up disaster collaborative coverage playbook →
“Unfortunately, these types of events don't give much warning, so [Fergus Bell] decided to develop a playbook to lay out how to pull off a collaborative pop-up newsroom effort. The playbook includes budgeting, organizational concerns, who's going to be involved in the collaboration, communication needs, where newsrooms partners will be located and how to work with competitors.”