Disney is shrinking FiveThirtyEight, and Nate Silver (and his models) are leaving

Tuesday, April 25, 2023

Disney is shrinking FiveThirtyEight, and Nate Silver (and his models) are leaving Silver on ABC: “They have limited rights to some models post–license term, but not the core election forecast stuff.” By Sarah Scire and Laura Hazard Owen.

NPR layoffs beget the first Substack dedicated to war correspondence What We’re ReadingLenfest Institute for Journalism / Charles Jun“What I learned unsubscribing from 22 newspapers” →“I found it a bit odd that I am even required to have a conversation about a decision I’ve already made — but there’s a reason publishers want to direct readers like me to customer service.” (More on the new “click to cancel” rules here and here.)Columbia Journalism Review / Wesley LoweryA test of the news →“The path to better journalism is clear: we must construct an industry that reflects the diversity of our nation, articulate and live by clear values, deploy diligent journalistic methods, and construct a financial model that can insulate those values and methods from the demands of capitalism.”MIT Technology Review / Nika Simovich FisherThe inside story of New York City’s 34-year-old social network, ECHO →“‘On ECHO you own your own words,’ Horn says. It’s one of a handful of guidelines that help keep the peace.”The Verge / Adi RobertsonTwitter users are now wondering if mandatory blue checks are illegal →“The argument is that Twitter violated rules against false endorsement with its message — in other words, that it’s wrongly implying celebrities are paying for a service they actually despise.”Press Gazette / Charlotte TobittWhy Mail Online is expanding its Royal Family coverage →“I’m a great believer in playing to your strengths and I think obviously one of our greatest strengths is our royal coverage, which I’m pretty sure that no one would dispute – we are the market leader when it comes to royal coverage,” said Danny Groom, publisher and editor of Mail Online in the UK. “We’ve got a stable of writers and royal experts which is the envy of the publishing world.”The Wall Street Journal / Sarah Krouse and Jessica ToonkelAmericans are getting nostalgic for the cable TV experience →“Americans have never had more entertainment options, given the ease of playing seemingly any show or movie on demand. That abundance—and the indecision it causes—is prompting some of them to rediscover the joys of channel surfing.”Digiday / Kayleigh Barber and Sara GuaglioneHow the social traffic that gave life to BuzzFeed News ultimately led to its demise →“BuzzFeed News was ‘a social media ecosystem company, and the ecosystem went away,’ said a former BuzzFeed exec who spoke on the condition of anonymity.”Columbia Journalism Review / Jon AllsopTucker Carlson’s News of the World moment →“For now, the circumstances of Carlson’s exit invite more questions than answers. Uncertainty also surrounds two important, future-facing questions: as a Washington Post headline put it, ‘Now what for Tucker Carlson? Now what for Fox News?'”Pittsburgh Union Progress / Torsten OveSix Pittsburgh-area school districts are suing multiple social media platforms over harm to children’s mental health →“The suits say the social media platforms direct content to minors that is ‘harmful and exploitive,’ such as instigating eating disorders, instigating vandalism and encouraging self-harm.”The Guardian / Amrit DhillonIndian ministers rebuke Der Spiegel for a “racist” cartoon that mocks the country’s population growth →“The cartoon shows a rickety old Indian train packed with people and swarms of passengers atop it. On a parallel track, a sleek Chinese bullet train is seen with just two drivers, looking surprised at the sight of the Indian train.”American Association for the Advancement of Science / Kendra Pierre-LouisKendra Pierre-Louis on the vexing road to an award-winning story →“The roadblocks that I encountered were less about the work, about my subject, and more about the industry. Specifically, it is about who in journalism gets to write those long, sweeping stories that grace the cover of magazines, the richly reported features that sprawl along column inches in the newspaper, the stories that take 10, 20, 30 minutes to scroll through on the web.”A Media Operator / Jacob Cohen DonnellyBuzzFeed News never built the brand loyalty it needed →“BuzzFeed News dying feels like the end of an era. Social-first distribution is dead. Any company pretending that it’s going to build a big business off tactics that worked five years ago is in for a rude awakening. It’s time to build brands, but that takes time. That’s why the biggest names twenty years ago are still the biggest names today.”Rest of World / Martin K.N SieleAI is taking the jobs of Kenyans who write essays for U.S. college students →“Collins now fears that the rise of AI could significantly reduce students’ reliance on freelancers like him in the long term, affecting their income. Meanwhile, he depends on ChatGPT to generate the content he used to outsource to other freelance writers.”

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