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Facebook says it will hand over information on Russia-linked ads bought during 2016 election campaign to Congressional investigators — Two weeks ago, we announced we had found more than 3,000 ads addressing social and political issues that ran in the US between 2015 and 2017 and that appear …
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Facebook will make Pages disclose who paid for political ads and let users see all current ads from that advertiser, rolling out over the coming months — I just went live a minute ago. Here's what I said: — Today is my first day back in the office after taking parental leave.
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New York Times, Facebook, BuzzFeed, @paulblu, The Verge, Recode, The Guardian, Ad Age, @brianstelter, Forbes, @issielapowsky, TechCrunch, Wired, New York Magazine, The Hill, NPR, @hshaban, @pkafka, Mashable, @kreissdaniel, Engadget, @derekwillis, The Daily Caller, @zeynep, @amir, @mikeisaac, @alexhern, Gizmodo, The Week and Sunlight Foundation, more at Techmeme »


Two Democratic senators seek co-sponsors for bill requiring digital platforms with 1M+ users to keep public files of all political $10K+ ad buys — How Facebook plans to fight election interference — Amid growing concern over Facebook's sale of political ads to Russians …
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@michaelwhitney, CNNMoney, @matthewstoller and Recode


Twitter will meet with the Senate Intelligence Committee investigating Russian interference in the 2016 election next Wednesday
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Mashable, Engadget, Vanity Fair, Variety, Recode and Business Insider, more at Techmeme »

Facebook will strengthen enforcement of ad targeting policies, add more human oversight, and urge users to report potential abuses directly
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The Guardian, New York Times, The Verge, Marketing Land, CNBC, BuzzFeed, Peter O'Kelly's Reality Check, The Drum, Slate, CNNMoney, Editor & Publisher, Forbes and SiliconANGLE


Facebook designates Rohingya activist group Arsa as dangerous, bans posts by and in support of it as 400K Rohingya flee Myanmar — As hundreds of thousands flee a brutal campaign by the Myanmar military, the social media company labels an insurgent group a ‘dangerous organization’
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The Daily Beast, @noahshachtman, @zeynep, @lifewinning and Engadget


TV host Jimmy Kimmel, viewed as a genial lightweight amid political voices like Colbert, shows that little separates entertainers from politicians — Back during the second Bush Administration, when Jon Stewart's “Daily Show” was being heralded, and in some corners derided, as the place where …


When Amazon's algorithms grouped “bomb ingredients” together, reporters driven by speed and others' coverage created a false narrative — On September 18, the British Channel 4 ran a news segment with the headline, ‘Potentially deadly bomb ingredients are ‘frequently bought together’ on Amazon.’
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@garymwatson, @riptari, @dylan20, @pinboard and @vikingux, more at Techmeme »


Facebook rolls out Custom Audience tool that lets advertisers target users who interacted with physical store, called a business office, more — Facebook is using its online-to-offline ad measurement tools for offline-to-online ad targeting. — Facebook is making it easier for brands …
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Facebook, Adweek and The Drum, more at Techmeme »


Parse.ly and BuzzSumo reports show drop-off in referral traffic and engagement for publishers via Facebook — For all the steps Facebook has taken to support publishers, two new reports offer a stark reminder of who's really in charge. Parse.ly data shows that across its 2,500-site network …
Thanks:@amontalenti

Freelancer Jason Prechtel sues FCC for refusal to fulfill his FOIA request for details on bulk uploads of net neutrality comments after 3+ months — For months now we've noted how somebody is intentionally filling the FCC's net neutrality comment proceeding with bot-generated bogus comments supporting …


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.
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@perlberg, @rafat, @robinwigg, @passantino, @joshsternberg and FierceCable

The Intercept announces new hires: Shaun King, Vanessa Gezari, Aída Chávez, Maryam Saleh, and contributing writers Kate Aronoff and Rachel M. Cohen — The Intercept is welcoming several exciting journalists to our team. — Shaun King will be joining us as a columnist.
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@vanessagezari, @rmc031, @shaunking, @bypetevernon, @katearonoff and @weinbergersa


Vice Media's video and TV programming workers unionize with Writers Guild of America East and the Motion Picture Editors Guild — The move adds 300 employees to the ranks of union-represented media workers in New York. — Vice Media employees creating video content have unionized …
Discussion:
Wall Street Journal, @jamieson, Variety and @mikeelk