Top News:
Sheryl Sandberg / Facebook:
Facebook will strengthen enforcement of ad targeting policies, add more human oversight, and urge users to report potential abuses directly — Last week we temporarily disabled some of our ads tools following news reports that slurs or other offensive language could be used as targeting criteria for advertising.
Discussion:
CNBC, New York Times, @mikeisaac, SiliconANGLE, BuzzFeed, The Drum, Adweek, Forbes, Peter O'Kelly's Reality Check, Axios, @buzzfeedben, Wall Street Journal, @mathewi, The Guardian, Business Insider, Los Angeles Times, AdExchanger, Engadget, Recode, Mother Jones, CNNMoney, @jguynn, Ad Age, @craigsilverman, @pierre, TechCrunch, The Verge, @jayrosen_nyu, @propublica, @propublica and USA Today, more at Techmeme »
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Dylan Byers / CNNMoney:
Democratic senators and representatives urge Federal Election Commission to consider rules preventing foreigners from using social media ads to influence voters — Democrats on Capitol Hill are launching new efforts to prevent Russians and other foreigners outside the U.S. from using social media …
Discussion:
CNN, Quartz, Bloomberg, The Hill, @martinheinrich and @dylanbyers
Will Oremus / Slate:
Blaming algorithms obscures the true source of Facebook's ad problem: the structure of the company's ad business and the decision-making of those who run it
Blaming algorithms obscures the true source of Facebook's ad problem: the structure of the company's ad business and the decision-making of those who run it
Discussion:
@rsingel, @kantrowitz, @selenalarson, BuzzFeed, CBS San Francisco, @willoremus, @whatthebit, @ericnewcomer, @zephoria and Fortune
Peter Kafka / Recode:
RIAA: 30M+ pay for streaming, which now accounts for 62% of US music biz; streaming revenue up 48% in first half of 2017 to $2.5B, digital downloads down 24% — Spotify, Apple Music and other services have 30 million U.S. subscribers, and streaming revenue is up 48 percent so far this year.
Discussion:
Radio & Television …, Forbes, RIAA, The Wrap, Financial Times, Wall Street Journal, Variety, Billboard and Jacklail.com
Issie Lapowsky / Wired:
Twitter will meet with the Senate Intelligence Committee investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election next Wednesday — TWITTER HAS CONFIRMED it will meet with the Senate Intelligence Committee investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election.
Discussion:
Politico, Variety, Recode, Engadget, Vanity Fair, Business Insider and TechCrunch, more at Techmeme »
Steven Perlberg / BuzzFeed:
CNN says CNN Digital will bring in $370M+ in 2017, its highest ever, but sources say unit faces $20M shortfall partly due to tough ad market, polarized politics — CNN is having a huge year on TV, but a budget shortfall at CNN Digital has restricted travel for digital employees and scaled back expenses.
Discussion:
@perlberg, @rafat, @robinwigg, @passantino, @joshsternberg and FierceCable
Shan Wang / Nieman Lab:
Philadelphia's The Lenfest Institute announces $1M in grants for 17 local and national small-scale projects and $1M for its Philadelphia Media Network — The Philadelphia Media Network is getting $1 million. Twelve organizations and five entrepreneurs-in-residence will be getting another …
Discussion:
@poynter, @kristenhare and The Lenfest Institute …
Media Matters for America:
The Drudge Report linked to 79 articles from Russia's RT, SputnikNews, or Tass in 2015 and 122 articles in 2016, before dropping to 45 for 2017 through Sept. 18 — Drudge Report has linked nearly 400 times to RT, Sputnik News, TASS since 2012 — On July 17, 2014, Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 …
Jessica Davies / Digiday:
In the last eight months, BBC has shifted funds in “low seven figures” to make hires and establish 12-person fact-checking team to focus on in-depth “slow news” — In the last eight months, BBC News has undergone a major “reprioritizing exercise” …
SecureDrop:
Freedom of the Press Foundation announces $2,500 bug bounty program for SecureDrop, the open-source whistleblowing tool — Created date — The SecureDrop engineering team welcomes the contributions of security researchers. SecureDrop is relied on by sources to talk with journalists …
Allison Schiff / AdExchanger:
Tencent announces suite of ad options for WeChat designed for Western brands and ad agencies, has tentative plans for self-serve ads within six months — Chinese tourists spent $35 billion dollars in the US in 2016. WeChat parent company Tencent rolled out a suite of advertising tools …
Discussion:
Fast Company, Ad Age and CNBC
The Guardian:
Indian reporter Shantanu Bhowmick beaten to death covering civil unrest in country's north-east region, two weeks after murder of editor Gauri Lankesh — Shantanu Bhowmick attacked with sticks outside Agartala two weeks after high-profile murder of another journalist
Discussion:
Times of India, Associated Press, The Indian Express and Press Gazette
Jonathan Keane / Tech.eu:
Swedish podcast platform Acast raises $19.5M Series B, bringing its total funding to $32M, to expand further into international markets — Podcast platform Acast, based in Stockholm, has raised $19.5 million in a Series B round from Swedbank Robur's Ny Teknik and Microcap funds to continue its internationalisation.
Discussion:
Reuters, Financial Times and VentureBeat