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Monday, April 15, 2019
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What will journalism do with 5G’s speed and capacity? Here are some ideas, from The New York Times and elsewhereAlways-streaming reporters, a searchable past, and new internal tools and external products: 5G will have a big impact on news, just as previous-generation networks did. By Joshua Benton. |
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Courting future business models: Are public media and scrappy startups the next trend for mergers?NJ Spotlight and NJTV News may be onto a trend: “Really the quality of the journalism and business model made it viable for us and make it viable for the other legacy stations around the country.” By Christine Schmidt. |
What We’re Reading
Pew Research Center / Elizabeth Grieco
For many rural U.S. residents, local news media mostly don’t cover the area where they live →
“Despite feeling that the local news media are less connected to their communities, rural residents express the same level of desire as urban and suburban residents for getting news from journalists who are personally engaged in their communities.”
Fast Company / Cale Guthrie Weissman
Quartz’s editorial staff is unionizing →
“The group of about 60 editorial employees—including writers, editors, and social media and video producers—have been working on this pursuit for nearly two years.”
WHYY / Avi Wolfman-Arent
Spirited Media’s third site, Billy Penn, lands at Philadelphia’s public radio station WHYY →
“WHYY has 122,000 members and hosts about 75 events each year. Billy Penn has roughly 600 members.”
USA Today / Nathan bomey
Digital First Media signals it would cut costs and consolidate operations if it takes over Gannett →
“MNG Enterprises’ letter came in response to [Sen. Chuck] Schumer’s recent request for information on the company’s bid to acquire Gannett, including its newsroom staffing plans. Schumer wrote Thursday to MNG in a publicly released letter that he was ‘troubled’ by MNG’s response, including what he called the company’s failure to ‘make commitments regarding newsroom staffing, and how you would address potential regulatory concerns.'”
Digiday / Jessica Davies
The European Comission’s GDPR head on why Google and Facebook need to do GDPR compliance better →
“I don't believe [Google and Facebook] are orientated to introduce big changes in terms of a balance of power. In 2017 we received a lot of declarations from businesses including Google, saying they were ready to respect it [GDPR]. But last May, the tsunami of privacy notices sent, often in obscure language, were clearly orientated to protect data controllers, not citizens.”
Reuters / Fanny Poktin and Agustinus Beo Da Costa
How factcheckers in Indonesia are trying to counter hoax peddlers in its April 17 election →
“The Cekfakta (‘checkfacts’ in Indonesian) initiative brings together the non-profit fact-checking organization Mafindo and 24 news organizations that normally compete fiercely with each other during election campaigns.”
Bloomberg / Mark Bergen and Lucas Shaw
YouTube is now trying to reward “quality” content, not just what keeps people glued to their phones →
“The Google division introduced two new internal metrics in the past two years for gauging how well videos are performing…. One tracks the total time people spend on YouTube, including comments they post and read (not just the clips they watch). The other is a measurement called ‘quality watch time,’ a squishier statistic with a noble goal: To spot content that achieves something more constructive than just keeping users glued to their phones.”
Colorado Sun / John Ingold
How the media — including him — unwittingly helped create a Columbine narrative that has inspired murderers ever since →
And this idea of empowerment through murder can spread like a virus, with media attention potentially serving as a vector that carries it from killer to killer. The concept of mass shooting contagion, little studied until just a few years ago, is now gaining momentum in academic circles.
BuzzFeed News / Katie Notopoulos
A transparency tool on Facebook provides a window into the maze of companies you’ve never heard of who appear to have your data →
“The list of Advertisers, a feature Facebook added for transparency, is incomprehensible to anyone who isn't an expert in advertising (and even some who are!), and leads to the unsettling realization that, fuck, man, our data is out there and trafficked without our consent and being used by advertisers in ways we have no clue about.”
Bloomberg / Gerrit De Vynck and Sarah Frier
Procter & Gamble Co., one of the most important advertisers for Google and Facebook Inc., ramped up criticism of internet platforms →
“We've been tolerant for too long,” P&G chief brand officer Marc Pritchard said in prepared remarks. “It's not acceptable to have brands showing up where opioids are being offered, where illegal drugs are promoted, where abhorrent behavior is present or where violence is seen. The apologies are heartfelt and appreciated, but that's not good enough.”
Freakonomics / Stephen J. Dubner
Spotify founder Daniel Ek on building the company and going into podcasts →
“So we started seeing it resonating really well into people's lives, and they thought of Spotify not just as a music service but as a service where they can find audio. And it played really well into our strategy of ubiquity — i.e., being on all of these different devices in your home, whether it's the Alexas or TV screens or in your cars or whatever as just another source where you could play your audio.”