Top News:
BuzzFeed:
11 hoaxes published on The Resistance, which parodies fake news, were reposted by 48 different spam sites, including 16 from Macedonia and 4 from Georgia — When the American man known online as Busta Troll tried to get the Eastern European spammers to stop stealing his content, one threatened to knock his site offline.
Discussion:
@craigsilverman, @walldo, @jaketapper, @buzzfeednews and @janelytv
Benjamin Mullin / Poynter:
Following buyouts, Postmedia to lay off 54 staffers at Vancouver Sun and Province around April 8, according to memo to staff — Canada's Postmedia company is laying off more than 50 employees at The Vancouver Sun and Province after a months-long buyout process aimed at cutting the company's payroll.
Rosie Gray / The Atlantic:
Profile of Newsmax CEO Chris Ruddy, a friend of Trump who has emerged over the past few weeks as one of the president's most prominent unofficial spokesmen — Chris Ruddy is the Zelig of the Trump administration. — He's on CNN, blasting the White House chief of staff.
Discussion:
@mckaycoppins, @costareports, @maggienyt, @ahmed, @yappelbaum, @rosiegray, @yappelbaum, @jacobkornbluh, @elistokols, @rosiegray and @mckaycoppins
Maev Kennedy / The Guardian:
Food blogger Jack Monroe has won about $30K in Twitter libel case against Mail Online columnist Katie Hopkins — Food writer and campaigner wins £24,000 from Mail Online columnist in row over tweets about damage to war memorial — The food writer and campaigner Jack Monroe …
Discussion:
@davidtpegg, Press Gazette, BBC, mirror and Guido Fawkes
Ross Benes / Digiday:
BI UK will test an anti-ad blocker prompting readers to either whitelist BI, pay for an ad-free subscription, or pay a few pennies to see an article without ads — As its staff sized nearly doubled over the last year to 45 employees, Business Insider U.K. moved shop in January …
Discussion:
@digiday and @larakiara
Zeynep Tufekci / New York Times:
WikiLeaks' CIA document cache, which focuses on compromising devices and not apps, underscores the strength of Signal's and WhatsApp's encryption — On Tuesday morning, WikiLeaks released an enormous cache of documents that it claimed detailed “C.I.A. hacking tools.”
Discussion:
@islamrahman, BuzzFeed, @zeynep, BGR, @zeynep, Lawyers, Guns & Money, 9to5Google, @yonatanzunger, @aodespair, @dabeard, @dangillmor, @amy_siskind and @sparrowmedia
Nate Silver / FiveThirtyEight:
Political journalism, ripe for groupthink, produced a failure of the “wisdom of crowds” during the election, which led to an underestimation of Trump's chances — This is the ninth article in a series that reviews news coverage of the 2016 general election …
Chris Roush / Talking Biz News:
TheStreet misses estimates, reporting Q4 loss of $11.6M, with revenue of $15.9M, down from $17M the prior year — Financial news company TheStreet.com reported a fourth-quarter loss that was worse than analyst expectations. — The New York-based company reported a loss of $11.6 million, or 33 cents per share, in the fourth quarter.
Benjamin Mullin / Poynter:
Seven newsrooms have closed their Politifact chapters since the presidential election, including The Richmond Times-Dispatch and The Providence Journal — PolitiFact, the national political fact-checking franchise started by the Poynter-owned Tampa Bay Times, has lost seven of its statewide partners since the presidential campaign.
Discussion:
@itsren and @benmullin
Jeffrey A. Trachtenberg / Wall Street Journal:
Sources: a group including Jahm Najafi, of private investment firm Najafi Cos., and Pamplona Capital Management has emerged as a bidder for Time Inc. — Competitive sales process for publisher appears to be nearing completion, even in the wake of Bronfman group dropping its bid
Discussion:
@asharma, @jeffreyt1 and Fortune
James Warren / Poynter:
New Jersey journalists launch Montclair Local, a 2-section, 16-page weekly newspaper costing $12/year, delivered to about 15K households — Montclair is a New Jersey bastion of the Trump-doubting privileged class that went back to the future Thursday with an imperiled species: a new broadsheet newspaper.
Discussion:
@poynter, Vanity Fair, @jimwarren55 and Montclair Local
Sara Fischer / Axios:
CTA study finds video viewership has increased by 30% in the last five years, but TV accounts for only about half of all video viewership, down from 62% in 2013 — Data: Consumer Technology Association; Chart: Lazaro Gamio / Axios — A new Consumer Technology Association study finds …