Top News:
Ken Doctor / Nieman Lab:
Interview with Mark Aldam, president of Hearst Newspaper Group, which now seeks acquisitions and is focusing on local news, marketing, and events — Because it's privately held, Hearst isn't as big a part of industry conversations around the future of newspapers as its publicly traded peers.
April Glaser / Recode:
Google's Digital News Initiative awards $805K to Radar, a project building software to automate the writing of 30K local stories a month — Journalists, beware! — Google is awarding the Press Association, a large British news agency, $805,000 to build software to automate the writing of 30,000 local stories a month.
Discussion:
TechCrunch, @kylepope, Press Association, The Hill, Mashable, Sputnik International, Engadget and The Verge
Catherine V. Moore / Columbia Journalism Review:
As an antidote to parachute journalism, Appalachian news outlets like 100 Days tell their region's story from the inside out — After the 2016 election, the calls and emails rolled into West Virginia, as the press scrambled to make sense of a place that hadn't occupied this much space …
Discussion:
The Root
Cory Doctorow / Electronic Frontier Foundation:
After controversial vote, W3C announces it will publish Encrypted Media Extensions, a type of DRM for web video, without protection for security researchers — Early today, the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) standards body publicly announced its intention to publish Encrypted Media Extensions …
Discussion:
@benadida, The Verge, Engadget, lists.w3.org and Techdirt, more at Techmeme »
Patrick Hipes / Deadline:
WGAW 2017 report: total number of writers and total salaries down YoY; TV writers earnings down 1.7% YoY to $860.9M, film writers earnings down 6.45% to $359.8M — The WGA West has unveiled its annual report, which shows the total number of member writers working in the industry fell compared with a year ago as did total salaries.
Michael Kinsley / Slate:
Journalism's ethics police needlessly worry about expensive New York Times travel packages — The Washington Post published a piece earlier this week raising questions about the New York Times' latest desperation attempt to raise a few pennies: around-the-world cruises with New York Times reporters and columnists.
Discussion:
Washington Post
Gwyneth Doland / Columbia Journalism Review:
Alternative weeklies are trying to stay afloat by launching their own nonprofits and partnering with advocacy groups that have a direct interest in coverage — JULIE ANN GRIMM was at an annual convention of alternative news organizations last year when it struck her: Why not start a nonprofit?
Joe Flint / Wall Street Journal:
TV networks misspell show names to trick Nielsen's automated rating system into ignoring broadcasts on nights with few viewers — In a game largely sanctioned by TV-ratings firm Nielsen, television networks try to hide shows' poor performances on any given night by forgetting how to spell.
Discussion:
Vanity Fair
Laura Hazard Owen / Nieman Lab:
Circa, once a news app that broke stories into small bites, is reinvented as Sinclair's site aimed at millennials, with some staff close to Fox's Hannity — What was once an imaginative mobile news app has become a big part of Sinclair's national strategy — one that critics say pushes its conservative views on audiences.
Discussion:
bookforum.com and @jayrosen_nyu
Erik Wemple / Washington Post:
Rachel Maddow warns other media that her show received a tip with a bogus document about Trump-Russia, in what she thinks was an effort to discredit her — It wouldn't have been the first time that a major media organization had reported a stunning development that turned out to be untrue.
Discussion:
The Intercept, @maggienyt, @mitchellvii, The Daily Caller, YouTube, @snowden, @benjaminwittes, TVNewser, @andymschneider and @csmcdaniel
Jessica Davies / Digiday:
The Economist is using its subscription and registration data to sell targeted ad campaigns, on-and-off Economist properties — The Economist prizes its high-quality environment, but that doesn't mean it's against audience targeting. — The publisher is tapping into its subscriptions data …
Brandon Weigel / Baltimore City Paper:
Baltimore Sun Media Group, owned by Tronc, plans to close 40-year-old City Paper later this year — The Baltimore Sun Media Group plans to close City Paper later this year. No official end date has been announced for the alt-weekly, now in its 40th year.
Discussion:
@chrisfromabc2, @burgessev, @erikwemple, @notrivia, wbal.com and Talking New Media
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