Top News:
Peter Elkind / Fortune:
Sources: Sumner Redstone ousts Viacom CEO Philippe Dauman and director George Abrams as trustees of entity that will control Viacom and CBS — Sumner Redstone, it seems, has at least one power move left in him—and he appears to be using it to benefit his daughter, Shari.
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Wall Street Journal:
Sources: Verizon and others are expected to bid $2B to $3B for Yahoo's core business, less than $4B to $8B figure reported earlier — Most of previous bids for core business came in the range of $4 billion and $8 billion; bids are due first week of June — Verizon Communications Inc …
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Mike Isaac / New York Times:
Current and former workers say Facebook Trending Topics group was ill-managed, relied on personal news judgment, had no intentional, institutional bias — SAN FRANCISCO — Last July, in a seventh-floor conference room at Facebook's Lower Manhattan offices, a small group met to discuss the future of news media on the social network.
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Glenn Beck:
Complaints from conservatives at Facebook meeting sounded like requests for “affirmative action for conservatives”
Complaints from conservatives at Facebook meeting sounded like requests for “affirmative action for conservatives”
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Stassa Edwards / Jezebel:
Reaction to a horrid post on xoJane about an ex-friend's death reveals nasty formula fueling personal essays — On Thursday, xoJane published an essay titled “My Former Friend's Death Was a Blessing,” which outlines a series of petty grievances with a woman who, the piece reveals, later committed suicide.
Robert Cookson / Financial Times:
UK trade body BPI says song plays through platforms like YouTube nearly doubled in 2015 but revenue rose less than 1%, generating less income than vinyl sales — The UK record industry has launched a barrage of criticism against YouTube, claiming the video streaming service makes even less money for labels than sales of vinyl.
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Ryan J. Reilly / The Huffington Post:
Reporter's nine-month battle with St. Louis County's broken justice system was punishment on its own — St. Louis County authorities finally agreed on Thursday to drop charges they filed against Washington Post reporter Wesley Lowery and me in connection with our unlawful arrests in Ferguson on Aug. 13, 2014.
Discussion:
FishbowlDC, Associated Press and @digiphile
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Alex Hern / Guardian:
Google takes right to be forgotten battle to France's highest court — Company is appealing against decision by French data protection authority to apply search-results ruling to all its domains — Google is appealing to France's highest court over a legal ruling that could require …
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David Wertime / Foreign Policy:
Study: 488M, or 1 of every 178 posts, on China's social media each year come from pro-government propagandists — New research exposes a “massive secretive operation” to fill China's internet with propaganda. — They are the most hated group in Chinese cyberspace.
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Financial Times:
EU to propose rule that video streaming services like Netflix and Amazon Prime have 20% EU content in catalog — Netflix and Amazon's video streaming services could be forced to devote “at least” 20 per cent of their catalogues to European films and TV shows as part of an overhaul of the EU's broadcasting rules.
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Max Willens / International Business Times:
Rhapsody's free VR app for iOS and Android offers access to 360-degree videos from music concerts — In its quest to stay in the streaming music race, Rhapsody is going virtual. The service said Thursday that it has debuted a virtual reality app, Rhapsody VR, which allows users …
Discussion:
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Anna Nemtsova / The Daily Beast:
The firing of RBC editors was a sacrifice to the Kremlin from Mikhail Prokhorov, the last oligarch who had supported opposition voices — Under pressure, the last oligarch supporting opposition voices bends to Putin's will. — An earthquake has shaken Russia's battered media landscape.
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Shan Wang / Nieman Lab:
The Hindustan Times is working to build the definitive online source of real-time air quality in all of India — A recent World Bank report on South Asian development handed Delhi the undesirable title of the “world's most polluted city,” with recorded air pollution levels three times higher than those in Beijing.