There were very informative zoom sessions this week on journalism and media: They included “Truth Decay” discussed by a number of Harvard lead faculty, the Salant Lecture with Nobel Prize winner Maria Ressa, I learned more about Julia Angwin’s data-driven work at the Markup and gained a better understanding of regulatory bills for better journalism making their way through Congress along with the timing it will take to add some balance to the journalism vs. social media platform approach to the information ecosystem.
But it is Succession that nailed the crisp reality of the situation when Patriarch Logan Roy tells his family in season 2: episode 2, nestled in the Hamptons, that they will build the only legacy media giant left standing by creating their own mega platform. That is the play at hand. Platforms vs. legacy media gone digital.
Both platforms and news giants crave and fight for the behemoth of cash called ad dollars. According to U.S. Census data (and Google), the advertising and public relations industry is approximately 138 billion U.S. dollars. But here is where the war breaks out: One group funds journalism’s existence with its spoils, the other funds technology to keep you here. We need both. Journalism realized it needeed to digitize but have tech platforms realized they need to pay for journalism? Thanks to tech platforms, we have more people tuned in than ever before but for what end?
We need tent poles of truth. Why? Because both journalism and big tech need free markets to survive. (exhibit A. China and Russia’s treatment of journalists and tech entrepreneurs). Free markets are the result of democracy (and its plural governance) that sustains freedom. Democracy and plural governance require journalism to survive and OPERATE. It is a simple equation I try to repeat and repeat: Journalism = Democracy = Free Markets. Also true in the reverse.
At some point, someone has to pay for it – the actual journalism... not just the tools or political PR, even if you win the whole $138b ad industry.
Heidi
Here is the recap:
Facebook Hands Out Cash To Creators To Beat Clubhouse - The Information
Production companies working for Facebook, owned by Meta Platforms, have contacted music artists and social media stars in recent weeks offering payment packages to host Facebook Live Audio Rooms, according to two people with direct knowledge of the outreach. The packages can amount to hundreds of thousands of dollars over several sessions, they said.
Iranian Hackers Broke Into Newspaper Publisher Lee Enterprises Ahead of 2020 Election - WSJ
Computer systems of Lee Enterprises, which owns dozens of daily papers, were targeted in disinformation campaign
On Thursday, the Justice Department said the alleged hackers broke in to the digital systems of an unnamed media company in fall 2020 and tested how to create false news content. People familiar with the matter on Friday identified the company as Lee Enterprises, a publicly-traded company headquartered in Davenport, Iowa, and one of the largest newspaper chains in the U.S.
BuzzFeed plans to start publicly trading in early December - NYT
The publisher’s plan to merge with 890 5th Avenue Partners, a blank-check company, will be put to a shareholder vote on Dec. 2, according to a recent securities filing. If investors agree to the deal, BuzzFeed could start trading on the public markets as soon as Dec. 6.
The extra few days are needed because of a second merger. BuzzFeed, led by its founder and chief executive, Jonah Peretti, will acquire the sports and entertainment publisher Complex Networks as part of its agreement with 890 5th Avenue Partners. Together, BuzzFeed and Complex are expected to generate $521 million in revenue this year with pretax profit of around $57 million.
Maria Ressa warns of authoritarians, social media, disinformation – Harvard Gazette
On Guard in Asheville. Retired journalists lead anew. – The Assembly NYC
I was quoted in this useful piece on how retired journalists can mentor all of these new kids who may have little training in journalism.
“We’ve gone through 20 yr decimation of newsrooms...we’ve lost a generation of mentors. Unless the founder was trained in a newsroom, there’s no one teaching this next generation about ethics, trade, responsibility to truth, conflict of interest, neutrality.” - me
China, U.S. to Ease Limits on One Another’s Journalists - WSJ
Beijing ejected U.S. reporters from The Wall Street Journal, other newspapers in 2020; Trump administration limited China outlets’ personnel.
WNYC Retracts Four Articles on Its News Site, Gothamist - NYT
Watch for copyright cases…“After publishing this story, WNYC found it contained unattributed words or phrases,” each note said. “We have decided to retract this article and are investigating the editing process that led to this mistake.”
The articles, published between March and September, were written by Jami Floyd, a lawyer and former local host of the National Public Radio news program “All Things Considered” who was also a senior editor of WNYC’s race and justice unit.
The retracted articles, which are available on the Internet Archive and carry Ms. Floyd’s byline, used language from Wikipedia entries and articles in Salon and The New York Times without credit, according to a comparison of the pieces and the original sources.
How journalism in middle America helped get communities through the pandemic - Nieman Lab
By talking to journalists in North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, and Louisiana, our project pushed back against the tendency to ignore the middle of the nation and its important journalism. Nieman reporters wanted to know: “How did so many local news organizations — especially newspapers — manage to survive the pandemic?” Weeklies beefed up their daily online news coverage, business models were blown up, and existing rationales for why journalism matters became more than theoretical to rural journalists.
Google signs 5-year deal to pay for news from AFP - Reuters
Alphabet Inc's (GOOGL.O) Google will begin paying Agence France-Presse for its news content as part of broad five-year partnership announced Wednesday that marks one of the biggest licensing deals struck by a tech giant under a new French law.
News organizations, which have been losing ad revenue to online aggregators such as Google and Facebook (FB.O), have complained for years about the tech companies using stories in search results or other features without payment.
New laws in France and Australia - fueled by media lobbying and public pressure - have given publishers greater leverage, leading to a slew of licensing deals around the world collectively worth billions of dollars.
The AFP accord follows France enacting a copyright law that creates “neighboring rights,” requiring big tech companies to open talks with news publishers that want a licensing payment.
Google declined to disclose financial terms of the deal, but confirmed it would run for five years.
The deal (TAKE NOTE) does not bring AFP into News Showcase, a feature that Google launched last year that promotes content from over 1,000 publishers that have agreed to license content for a fee.
Reuters signed a News Showcase agreement with Google in January, and Wall Street Journal owner News Corp (NWSA.O) closed a similar deal a month later.
Facebook last month signed a neighboring rights deal with a French alliance including dozens of publishers such as Le Figaro.
Facebook Isn’t Telling You How Popular Right-Wing Content Is on the Platform - The Markup
Facebook insists that mainstream news sites perform the best on its platform. But by other measures, sensationalist, partisan content reigns
But data collected by The Markup suggests that, on the contrary, sensationalist news or viral content with little original reporting performs just as well as—and often better than—many mainstream sources when it comes to how often it’s seen by platform users.
Data from The Markup’s Citizen Browser project shows that during the period from July 1 to Sept. 30, 2021, outlets like The Daily Wire, The Western Journal, and BuzzFeed’s viral content arm were among the top-viewed domains in our sample.
Terrifying Future of the American Right - The Atlantic OpEd David Brooks
What I saw at the National Conservatism Conference.
100 is the Minimum’—Axios Local Expands to 11 New Cities - AdWeek
The newsletter product will generate $5 million in revenue.
Can The Washington Post De-Snark the News? SWAY by Kara Swisher NYT
Sally Buzbee, The Washington Post’s executive editor, discusses the future of news and the media with Kara Swisher on SWAY.
The 19th announces the creation of the Frances Ellen Watkins Harper Fellowship Program - The 19th
The program will provide recent graduates and mid-career alums of Historically Black Colleges and Universities with full-year, salaried and benefit-laden fellowships in the areas of reporting, editing, audience engagement or newsroom technology.
How food blogger and dropship scammer became king on Facebook - Garbage Day on Substack
According to Facebook’s Q3 report, Thinkarete Lifestyle published four of the most viewed pieces of content on U.S. Facebook this year. Who is Thinkarete Lifstyle? It appears to be a random food blogger from Utah running a drop-shipping scam.
@broderick, looked into Facebook’s top publisher for the quarter and found a cuckoo drop-shipping operation running on a defunct recipe fan page
I Made the World’s Blandest Facebook Profile, Just to See What Happens - The Atlantic
My new Facebook account had the most generic interests possible, and still it brought me to a place no one should ever have to go.
TV Wants Nielsen to Measure Up and Warner Plans to Launch Its Own Alternative in 2022 - NYT and Variety
After years of complaints, NBCUniversal and its peers are looking for other ways to count viewers, with or without the ratings giant.TV executives have been complaining about Nielsen for years, saying their shows have more viewers than they get credit for. They have also claimed that Nielsen, the 98-year-old research firm whose name is practically synonymous with TV ratings, uses antiquated technology that hasn’t kept up with viewers who have moved away from cable and network TV.
Now the television industry is looking for other options.
On Tuesday, NBCUniversal plans to host a forum to discuss alternative ways to measure its audience. Representatives of major advertising agencies, industry trade groups and companies including Ford Motor, L’Oreal and Pfizer are expected to attend. NBCUniversal is also sifting through proposals from 80 measurement companies, Nielsen among them, to create new methods for quantifying viewers. Warner announced they are building their own.
Complex Streaming Deals Push TV Networks to Make Advertising Pitches Far Ahead of Schedule - Variety
The NBCUniversal ad-sales president Laura Molen is ready to unveil two new advertising formats for Peacock, the company’s streaming-video hub, as well as tout a host of new efforts to incorporate advertiser data; new quality standards; and partners like Google DV360, OneView, The Trade Desk, and Yahoo that will help so-called “programmatic” marketers using algorithms to get their ads in front of specific kinds of consumers to make better use of the venue.
Politics of News: Andrew Marr quits BBC after 21 years - The Guardian
The TV presenter, who currently hosts The Andrew Marr Show, revealed he’ll be joining the Global family from 2022 and will continue presenting while also writing for their newspapers leaving the BBC after 21 years.
‘But from the New Year, I am moving to Global to write and present political and cultural shows, and to write for newspapers.
Paul Dacre pulls out of running to be next Ofcom chair - The Guardian
Former Daily Mail editor announces decision not to proceed with the second bid and takes swipe at civil service. When the Guardian revealed a lobbyist at a company with close connections to the Conservative party was picked to help select which candidates should be approved, Dacre announced he would not proceed with an application again despite being urged to “by many senior members of the government”.
He said he had been judged inappropriate to head Ofcom the first time because his “strong convictions” were not compatible with the role.
Medill’s New Index Puts Spotlight on At-Risk Subscribers - Northwestern
Remember, there are only 23M actual English-language paid digital news subscribers in the whole global news ecosystem right now. (Ceiling? Thus my ad chatter at the top today.) Northwestern University’s new Medill Subscriber Engagement Index highlights the need to identify at-risk digital subscribers and find effective ways to reach out to them, from friendly emails to targeted social media to onboarding them better in the first place.