Top News:
Hamilton Nolan / Fusion:
The real threat to journalism is concentration of media in the hands of rich owners with ulterior motives — This week, one little attack on a reporter by a temporarily insane politician has us all fretting over the “Rough Treatment of Journalists in the Trump Era.” The real threat to journalism is much more insidious.
Discussion:
Politico, @evansryan202, @karltaro, @hamiltonnolan, @athertonkd and @libbycwatson
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Shelley Hepworth / Columbia Journalism Review:
CJR begins publicly logging incidents when norms that protect press freedom in the US have been pushed
Discussion:
@mmfa, ACLU, The Wrap, Media Matters for America, @leonardpittsjr1, miamiherald, SPLICETODAY.com, New York Times, Washington Post, @aclu, New Republic, @cjr, @markfollman, @bypetevernon, Breitbart, Real Stories, @journalismfest, @karenspringen, @shelleymiranda, @shelleymiranda, @kylepope and @shelleymiranda
Kara Bloomgarden-Smoke / WWD:
Traffic to women's magazines over past year as they go digital: Vogue up 25.6%, Teen Vogue up 176%, W nearly doubled, Glamour down 1.6%, Allure up 53% — The most recent comScore data provides a snapshot of the transition to digital. — Legacy media is in a transitional moment …
Tom Grubisich / Street Fight:
Borrell report details how local media organizations can prosper in the age of Facebook and Google, says publishers and advertisers need to collaborate — Content is king. But newspapers especially should heed the lament of Shakespeare's King Henry IV: “Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.”
Andrea Wenzel / Columbia Journalism Review:
Profile of Curious City, a radio series creating stories from listener questions, and the offline strategy it's using to expand its demographics — A Curious City journalist interviews a community member in Chinatown, Chicago. Photo courtesy of Bill Healy/WBEZ.
Laura Hazard Owen / Nieman Lab:
The four key elements of a successful fake news story: emotional appeal, veneer of authority, effective insertion point, and an amplification network — Plus: The faces of a Russian botnet, an alt-right newsletter to subscribe to, and “falsehoods in a forest of facts.”
Discussion:
Softpedia News and Forbes
Robert Levine / Billboard:
Spotify settles class action suit filed by a group of songwriters over mechanical rights, to set up $43.4M fund as compensation for unpaid royalties — Spotify has reached a settlement with a group of songwriters who had sued for copyright infringement, eliminating an potential complication …
Discussion:
TechCrunch and hypebot, more at Techmeme »
Tina Nguyen / Vanity Fair:
Breitbart ranked #281 in May according to Alexa, down from #45 in January, while ComScore says the site had 10.7M uniques in April, down from 23M in November — A media business based on attack has been much less successful when forced to defend. — With its former chairman Steve Bannon …
Discussion:
@brhodes, @adamblickstein, @stphn_lacey, @scalzi, @davidfrum, @reaganbattalion, @noahchestnut and @tripgabriel
Max Willens / Digiday:
Behind the Village Voice website redesign and an effort to increase its $50/year subscriptions — The Village Voice wants to sell subscriptions. About 18 months after it changed hands, the alt weekly unveiled a new website this week that supports a broader range of digital ad units …
Josh Russell / Courthouse News Service:
Owners of Russian bank Alfa Group sue BuzzFeed for defamation for publishing Trump dossier; BuzzFeed calls suit a “shameless attempt to bully and intimidate” — MANHATTAN (CN) - Unhappy with BuzzFeed over its reporting of the infamous “Pissgate” dossier, the owners of a Russian bank …
Discussion:
@pkafka, AOL, @juliaioffe, Politico and @emptywheel
Bloomberg:
Sources: DirecTV Now lost 3K customers in February while growth in March was roughly flat — New subscribers to web-TV service have slowed in early 2017 — AT&T CEO: We've ‘pulled back’ on marketing after fast start — AT&T Inc.'s live online video service, DirecTV Now …
Discussion:
Forbes, Fortune and Business Insider
Matthew Zeitlin / BuzzFeed:
Reporters mourn the passing of a not-so-secret username and password for the Wall Street Journal paywall, media/media — Username: media. Password: media. Everyone knew about it, but nobody talked about it. … It was good while it lasted. — For years, one of the best/worst kept secrets …
Discussion:
@pierre, @zackwhittaker, @mattzeitlin, @davidluhnow, @kpolantz, @mikeisaac, @davidenrich and @bydanielvictor
Erik Wemple / Washington Post:
Sputnik White House correspondent Andrew Feinberg leaves the Russian news service — Andrew Feinberg, a correspondent for Sputnik, has announced on Twitter that he's no longer working for the Russian “global wire, radio and digital news service.” And he's intent upon doing so with as much detail as possible:
Discussion:
Sputnik International, @agfhome, @agfhome, @agfhome and Miami New Times
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