Top News:
Rob Price / Business Insider:
Twitter is reversing its ban on political watchdog Politwoops — Four months after being banned by Twitter, Politwoops is coming back. — If you're not familiar with it, Politwoops is a kind of social media watchdog. It automatically monitors the Twitter feeds of politicians and highlights whenever they delete a tweet.
Discussion:
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BBC:
Sources: BBC websites hit by DDoS attack, services disrupted for several hours — ‘Technical issue’ hits BBC websites — “Technical issues” made the BBC's websites intermittently unavailable on Thursday morning. — The problems began about 0700 GMT and meant visitors to the site saw …
Discussion:
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Eriq Gardner / Hollywood Reporter:
Crowdfunded ‘Star Trek’ Movie Draws Lawsuit from Paramount, CBS — ‘Axanar’ aims to be a professional-quality prequel and has raised more than $1 million. — For decades, Paramount and CBS have tolerated and even encouraged fans of the Star Trek franchise to use their imagination at will …
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Michael Calderone / The Huffington Post:
Washington Post drops progressive columnist Harold Meyerson, claiming poor social media metrics and excessive discussion of two topics — Washington Post Claims It Dropped A Progressive Columnist Because Of Poor Readership. Readers Aren't Happy. — Bernie Sanders says the columnist's “insights will be sorely missed.”
Discussion:
Washington Post, @sensanders, @jmartnyt, @nickconfessore, @timothynoah1, The Huffington Post, Washington Post, @ryangrim, @ejdionne, Center for Economic …, @katrinanation, @greenhousenyt, @heerjeet, @jackshafer, @jayrosen_nyu, Politico, @demsocialists, @haroldmeyerson, @dangillmor and bookforum.com
Agence France-Presse:
Two Bangladeshi students sentenced to death over blogger murder — A Bangladesh court sentenced two students to death on Thursday for the 2013 murder of a secular blogger, delivering the first convictions over a series of brutal killings that have rocked the Muslim-majority nation.
Discussion:
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Michael S. Rosenwald / Washington Post:
In the age of Amazon, used bookstores are making an unlikely comeback — Early next month, Pablo Sierra is opening a used bookstore in Northwest Washington — an unlikely bet in the digital age made even more inconceivable, given that his only experience with books is reading them.
Discussion:
@rafat, Tallahassee Democrat, 41 NBC News, States Chronicle, Wall Street OTC and TechCrunch
Brian Rohan / Associated Press:
Egypt shuts down Facebook's Free Basics internet service on telco provider Etisalat, reasons unclear — Free Internet service for over 3 million Egyptians shut down — BEIRUT (AP) — Social media site Facebook says a program that had been giving free basic Internet services to over three million Egyptians has been shut down.
Discussion:
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RELATED:
Rick Edmonds / Poynter:
The Atlantic's “What ISIS Really Wants” held readers' attention the longest among 2015 stories from publications using Chartbeat — The best-read digital story of 2015? It's The Atlantic's ‘What ISIS Really Wants.’ — Metrics now allow a fairly exact measure of which stories attract …
Discussion:
@1bobcohn
Darren Rovell / ESPN:
New York attorney general amends suit against DraftKings, FanDuel, seeking that profits made in NY be returned, users' losses be repaid, and $5K fine per case — New York attorney general amends lawsuit against daily fantasy sites — The fight to stay in business in New York got a bit uglier …
Discussion:
Deadline, Fortune, Boston Herald, USA Today, Engadget, BostonGlobe.com, SI.com and The Verge
Hayley Tsukayama / Washington Post:
Authors Guild asks US Supreme Court to consider its case against Google's book scanning without copyright fees; appeals court ruled in Google's favor in October — The Authors Guild files to take Google to the Supreme Court — The Authors Guild has officially asked the Supreme Court …
John Koblin / New York Times:
Fox News had 1.8M primetime viewers in 2015, second only to ESPN; CNN and MSNBC saw growth, helped by major news stories and presidential campaign — Fox News Holds Its Lead in a Year of Growth for Cable News — In a year that featured a number of prominent news stories …
Discussion:
TVNewser, @joelmsiegel, @nickgillespie, @raju and Fortune
Allison Lampert / Reuters:
Jailed Saudi blogger Raif Badawi's health deteriorating, wife says — Imprisoned Saudi blogger's health deteriorating, wife says — Imprisoned Saudi blogger Raif Badawi, recent recipient of a prestigious European human rights award, has suffered fainting spells and deteriorating health …
Discussion:
presstv.ir and Newsweek
Agence France-Presse:
Charlie Hebdo to release million copies of special issue one year after attack — Satirical magazine to release double issue on 7 January to mark a year since 12 people were killed in jihadi killings on its Paris office — French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo on Wednesday …
Discussion:
Guardian, Mirror.co.uk, Bleeding Cool Comic Book …, India.Com, Times of India, Arutz Sheva, Robot 6, Politico, The Times of Israel, DW.COM, Hindustan Times and The Local