Monday, December 6, 2021 | “It’s time to acknowledge that the enduring belief of American media’s exceptionalism is toxic, and if it continues, it will take down democracy with it.” By j. Siguru Wahutu. |
| “Journalists must recognize that we don’t have superpowers and we need to be trained in the art of delegating.” By Cristina Tardáguila. |
| “Better late than never — but wouldn’t it be nice if it didn’t take a global catastrophe for newsrooms to consider the needs of people outside their most profitable markets?” By Joe Amditis. |
| “Like the high tides invading Miami Beach, the climate change story is leaking into the newsroom.” By Andrew Freedman. |
| “Populist alt-right and activist left-wing publications will use the tax credit as a cudgel to hammer reporters and editors for being in the pocket of the Biden administration.” By David Skok. |
| “As the audience for on-demand content surges, and as technologies and new markets better enable its production, we have a radical opportunity to democratize media.” By Kerri Hoffman. |
What We’re ReadingThe Washington Post / Matt Schudel
Fred Hiatt, Washington Post editorial page editor, dies at 66 →“Mr. Hiatt was one of Washington’s most authoritative and influential opinion-makers. For two decades, he either wrote or edited nearly every unsigned editorial published by The Post — more than 1,000 a year — and edited the opinion columns published on the paper’s op-ed page and website. He also wrote a column and was a three-time finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in editorial writing.”The Logic / Martin Patriquin
How Facebook is trying to navigate the news business in Canada →“It’s definitely all a soft-power play. There’s all the criticisms of what Facebook has done to journalism, and they want to be a part of the rebuilding. And by [funding news companies], it’s less likely that those news organizations are going to criticize the company as much.”The Wrap / Lindsey Ellefson
BuzzFeed is now a publicly traded company →“In the days leading up to the vote, BuzzFeed had been facing troubles as writers walked out and investors pulled their funds as they questioned its prospects. While it hoped to raise hundreds of millions as a SPAC, it raised just over $16 million as the deal got approved. About 94% of the $287.5 million the SPAC raised earlier this year has been withdrawn by investors, according to its securities filing.”The Washington Post / Drew Harwell
White supremacists are using Twitter’s new privacy rule against journalists →“Neo-Nazis and far-right activists are coaching followers on how to use a new Twitter rule to persuade the social media platform to remove photos of them posted by anti-extremism researchers and journalists who specialize in identifying episodes of real-world hate.”Press Gazette / William Turvill
Canadian news publishers expect to squeeze $100-150 million out of Google and Facebook →“Like Australia, Canada will seek to compel Google and Facebook to pay news publishers for the use of their content. It will grant collective bargaining powers to Canadian publishers, and will threaten platforms with compulsory arbitration if they cannot agree deals with news companies. If and when the law passes, Canadian news publishers will expect to start striking valuable, long-term deals with the technology companies.”The Washington Post / Dana Milbank
The media treats Biden as badly as — or worse than — Trump. Here’s proof. →“At my request, Forge.ai, a data analytics unit of the information company FiscalNote, combed through more than 200,000 articles — tens of millions of words — from 65 news websites…[The findings] confirmed my fear: My colleagues in the media are serving as accessories to the murder of democracy.”Input / Chris Stokel-Walker
Did a former New York Times reporter exploit musicians for his personal gain? →“It was a ‘scam,’ as [musician Benn] Jordan now describes it. And it’s something he brought to the attention of the wider world in a December 2 video posted on YouTube that alleges [Ian] Urbina collects streaming royalties from more than 400 musicians across services like Spotify and Bandcamp…Urbina declined to comment for this story, citing an ongoing contractual dispute.”Politico / Jack Shafer
Time to pull the plug on cable news →“The average audience commanded by Maddow and Cooper and Hannity and all the others slithering down your cable cord is so tiny you can almost get away with calling cable news a niche media…the three major cable networks attract an average audience of only 4.2 million viewers during primetime…Meanwhile, the three nightly news broadcasts together can reliably pull in 21.5 million viewers a night.”The New York Times / Michael M. Grynbaum, John Koblin, and Jodi Kantor
CNN fired Chris Cuomo →“As the gregarious and sometimes combative host of CNN’s 9 p.m. hour, Mr. Cuomo was at the peak of a broadcast journalism career that he had forged outside of his famed political family. But it was the troubles of his brother, who resigned the governorship in August, that ultimately embroiled Mr. Cuomo in a controversy that appeared to precipitate his dismissal.”The New York Times / Katie Robertson
Condé Nast knows faded glory is not in style →“Can Condé Nast, under pressure, take real steps to address both a culture that many employees described as a difficult place for people of color to succeed and content that has in the past elevated a Eurocentric standard of beauty? Can an institution that thrived on paying great attention to the superficial make a deeper-than-surface-level change?”Twitter / Heather Landy
Quartz is getting tougher with corporate PR people’s addiction to “on background” →“There are times when on-background conversations are totally appropriate. But they’re not on background unless we’ve agreed to that first. We’ll be rigid about this with paid company spokespeople. If we request information and it’s emailed to us with a note from a PR person saying it’s being given on background, no dice — we have not agreed to your terms, and we will attribute this usable information as we see fit.”Press Gazette / Charlotte Tobitt
This U.K. newspaper chain is closing two-thirds of its physical offices after nobody wanted to come back in →“We have seen, time and again, from staff survey feedback and the very low numbers of employees who choose to come into our offices, that for the majority of people, home working is a preferred choice.”Associated Press
Donald Trump’s new social media company says it’s raised “$1 billion” from investors, actual investors →That’s according to Trump spokesman
John Barron. (“The institutional investors were not identified in a press release issued on Saturday.”)Press Gazette / Charlotte Tobbitt
Mail Online is blaming “woke” Google execs on its mediocre SEO →“With respect, it feels as though the publications are struggling to see the wood for the trees here. They’re focusing on granular scores as a defining ranking metric, whereas the truth of the matter likely lies within the wider depths of how Google processes, understands and assesses content — particularly content trustworthiness and quality.”St. Louis Post-Dispatch / Austin Huguelet
Lee Enterprises has rejected Alden Global Capital’s attempt to invade its board of directors →Alden “appeared hopeful for a speedy takeover after making its $141 million, or $24 per share, offer for Lee on Nov. 22. It noted that figure represented about a 30 percent premium over the previous day’s market close…But in the past two weeks, Lee shares have risen above $24, putting pressure on Alden to raise its offer.”Vulture / Josef Adalian
Most viewing of HBO content now happens on HBO Max →“And while the pending merger of Max parent WarnerMedia with Discovery Networks brings a ton of uncertainty about the near-term future of the platform, in theory, the added heft from the new partner — not to mention being free of the albatross that was AT&T — should boost the streamer’s growth rate even higher.”The New York Times / Sui-Lee Wee
A Philippine court will allow Maria Ressa to pick up her Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo →The Duterte government had tried to stop her, calling her “a flight risk because her ‘recurring criticisms of the Philippine legal processes in the international community reveal her lack of respect for the judicial system.'”The Guardian / Carole Cadwalladr
“We journalists are the defense line between dictatorship and war” →New Nobel laureate Dmitry Muratov, editor-in-chief of Russia’s Novaya Gazeta: “I think our world has stopped loving democracy and has started reaching for dictatorships…It’s terrifying that countries that have been living in a democracy for so many years are rolling towards a dictatorship. That’s just a terrifying thought.”Press Gazette / Bron Maher
A good year at the FT means $7,700 bonuses for everyone in the newsroom →“Every division and department has performed well, driving a strong recovery from the shocks of the pandemic…Editorial excellence, best in class business performance, collaboration, innovation and sheer hard work have combined with a fair wind to bring about this success — and it’s only right that success on this scale is rewarded.”
Nieman Lab / Fuego / Encyclo
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