Monday, May 22, 2023 |
| “We ask people every day to let us in at their worst moments. To give nothing of ourselves in return sometimes feels like denying that we’re [also] people in this equation.” By Sophie Culpepper. |
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| Including a hair stylist in Overland Park, Kansas, a podcast on Ugandan politics, the 15th track on Linkin Park’s 2010 album A Thousand Suns, and “a watery zone within which a naked man slowly materializes.” By Joshua Benton. |
What We’re ReadingSlate / Dahlia Lithwick
Imagine if the press covered the Supreme Court like Congress. You can’t, can you? →“SCOTUS should not only become a national news story when a Justice says something snappy that goes viral at arguments. The best time to pay attention is not just during the last two weeks in June. But this is how the court has been covered historically, which is why we are living through a boom moment of outsiders gobbling up the scoops. They think we’re sleepy junior varsity law professors who forgot to hold power to account. We think they’re gossipy low-information neighbors.”NPR / David Folkenflik
A federal inquiry details abuses of power by Michael Pack, Trump’s CEO over Voice of America →“Taken together, they depict Pack’s brief tenure as an ideologically driven rampage through a government agency to try to force its newsrooms and workforce to show fealty to the White House. Pack punished executives who objected to the legality of his plans, interfered in the journalistic independence of the newsrooms under his agency, and personally signed a no-bid contract with a private law firm to investigate those employees he saw as opposed to former President Donald Trump. The law firm’s fees reached the seven figures for work typically done by attorneys who are federal employees.”The New York Times / Benjamin Mullin
Tensions flare inside The Messenger, a fledgling news site →“Journalists have chafed at demands to mass-produce articles based on competitors’ stories. Senior editors huddled with staff on Thursday to address criticism of the site, which had come from Columbia Journalism Review, Harvard’s
Nieman Lab and The Wrap, a Hollywood trade publication. And a politics editor quit on Friday after a clash with the company’s audience chief.”Press Gazette / William Turvill
Canada news boss urges global peers to stick to their guns in battle with Google and Facebook →“As the Online News Act has made its way through Ottawa’s parliament, Google and Facebook have both issued stark warnings to Canada’s politicians and publishers. Google has experimented with blocking some users’ access to news, while Facebook has said the bill could force it to remove news from its platforms in Canada.”The Washington Post / Paul Farhi
White House reporters stuck with $25,000 charges after Biden trip canceled →“Biden’s decision underscores the enormous costs news organizations incur — and sometimes lose — to cover presidential travel. It also highlights a growing concern among reporters: that charters on lengthy foreign trips have become impractically expensive for all but the richest news organizations.”Press Gazette / Charles Baker
Why a Guardian paywall would be good for U.K. journalism →“It’s very hard to establish an identity and win an audience if people can’t read your content. But at the same time, it’s increasingly difficult for new publications to make any money if they don’t have a paywall. But then why would potential readers, who are already feeling the pinch of the cost-of-living crisis, pay for something they can get for ‘free’ from the BBC, or The Guardian?”Inside the News in Colorado / Corey Hutchins
I followed a Colorado newspaper’s sports betting advice and lost $32.55 →“…the explosion of sports betting content is really absurd and unnecessary…It’s bad enough when its sportsbooks and their partners doing it. Actual journalistic enterprises doing it too is not great, IMO.”The New York Times / Sapna Maheshwari and David McCabe
TikTok users sue Montana, calling its state ban unconstitutional →“The ban has also set off an outcry from TikTok and civil liberty and digital rights groups…Under the law, TikTok will be fined for operating the app within the state, and app store providers like Google and Apple will be fined if TikTok is available for download in Montana.”MediaPost / Ray Schultz
The Washington Post wants younger readers, so it’s taking subscriptions over Venmo →“New subscribers will get $5 in their Venmo account after paying for their first four weeks — for a limited time…’We see this unique deal as an opportunity to tap into the next generation of readers who may have never considered subscribing to The Post or any other news outlet,’ says Phoebe Connelly, director of Next Generation audience development at The Washington Post.”The Verge / James Vincent
Meta hit with record-breaking $1.3 billion fine over Facebook data transfers from Europe to the U.S. →“EU courts believe such data transfers expose EU citizens to privacy violations — a complaint that stems back to 2013 and revelations by whistleblower Edward Snowden about US mass surveillance programs…The fine exceeds the previous EU record of €746 million levied against Amazon in 2021 for similar privacy violations.”Press Gazette / Dominic Ponsford
Tabloids need better rules in place to deter paparazzi-pursuit pictures →“While recollections may vary about the exact nature of the incident, the fact remains that little was to be gained by the activities of the photographers (given the Sussexes had already been pictured arriving at and leaving an awards ceremony by numerous reputable agency photographers).”The New York Times / Kellen Browning
The e-sports world is starting to teeter →“After years of fanfare, e-sports in the United States are giving way to economic realities. Unable to turn a profit, team owners are cutting costs by laying off employees and ending contracts with star players. In some cases, they are selling their teams and sometimes at a loss, offering a blunt reality check to people who believed e-sports could be the next big thing in entertainment.”The Verge / David Pierce
Neeva, the would-be Google competitor, is shutting down its search engine →“The company says it’s pivoting to AI — and may be acquired by Snowflake, The Information reported — but mostly seems to believe it failed…’Throughout this journey, we’ve discovered that it is one thing to build a search engine, and an entirely different thing to convince regular users of the need to switch to a better choice.'”Deadline / Ted Johnson
ABC has hired The Economist’s G. Elliott Morris to oversee FiveThirtyEight after Nate Silver’s exit →“Morris, who will start on June 26 and will be based in Washington, D.C., will launch ‘a full suite of poll-aggregation and election-forecasting models for U.S. elections to be used across broadcast, streaming and digital’…Morris said that a number of the models “will be rebuilt from the ground up,” adding that he had been ‘running very similar election and polling models’ for The Economist for the past five years.”The Guardian / Fiona Sturges
How watching TV became a lonely pursuit — and how podcasts are rushing to fill that void →“Right now, there are at least eight series delivering swift and comprehensive post-show analysis of the HBO juggernaut Succession, the finale of which arrives at the end of the month.”The New York Times / Blake Gopnik
A copyright case against Andy Warhol could have broader implications for remix culture →“Copyright law is supposed to leave room for the ‘fair use’ of someone else’s creation, but this new decision might easily be read as making Warhol’s use of [photographer Lynn] Goldsmith’s image ‘fair’ in the art world, but unfair where something closer to pure commerce is involved, such as licensing — in magazines but possibly in museum gift shops or on T-shirts.”Press Gazette / Bron Maher
Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet prototypes a “rather cringey” AI rap to tell news stories →“The paper provided two ‘News as Music’ options to its young consumers: stories could be experienced either as a rap or as ‘summarised news texts in rhythm to AI-generated music that enhances the experience.’ The paper said approximately half of the test users chose to listen to both formats.”Techdirt / Mike Masnick
Supreme Court leaves Section 230 alone for now, but Clarence Thomas explains why it exists in the first place →“The general tenor of the response from lots of people is…’phew, Section 230 is saved, at least for now.’ And that’s not wrong. But I do think there’s more to this than just that. While the ruling(s) don’t directly address Section 230, I’m somewhat amazed at how much of Thomas’s ruling in Taamneh, talking about common law aiding and abetting, basically lays out all of the reasons why Section 230 exists: to avoid applying secondary liability to third parties who aren’t actively engaged in knowingly trying to help someone violate the law.”The Wall Street Journal / William Mauldin
Russia again denies a consular visit for Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich →“Russia’s Foreign Ministry linked the move to a complaint that its journalists didn’t get U.S. visas to travel with Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov to the United Nations in New York last month. The ministry had rejected an earlier request for a consular visit over the same complaint. Russian reporters aren’t behind bars in the U.S.”The Washington Post / Robert Barnes and Cat Zakrzewski
U.S. Supreme Court rules for Google and Twitter in a closely watched Section 230 case →“The claim against Google specifically focused on whether Section 230 protects recommendation algorithms.”
Nieman Lab / Fuego
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