Mediagazer: Interview with Anna Veduta, one of two people running the English-language version of Latvia-based Meduza, an independent Russian news site (Shan Wang/Nieman Lab)

4:55 AM ET, March 5, 2018

Top News:

Gardiner Harris / New York Times:

State Department has spent $0 of the $120M allocated by Congress since late-2016 to counter foreign efforts to meddle in elections or sow distrust in democracy — WASHINGTON — As Russia's virtual war against the United States continues unabated with the midterm elections approaching …

Discussion: Slate, more at Techmeme »

CNNMoney:

Brands like Nike, Expedia, Acer suspend ads on Infowars' YouTube channels when contacted by CNN; some wonder why YouTube filters failed to block ads on Infowars — Facebook, YouTube fail to blunt conspiracy theories — Some of the biggest brands in the U.S. had ads running on the YouTube channels …

Discussion: Gizmodo, TechCrunch, Mashable, Engadget, Media Matters for America, The A.V. Club, Motherboard and The Verge

Daniel Funke / Poynter:

Snopes fact-check of a satirical story led Facebook to flag it as false, flag removed after complaint; Snopes says it received several inquiries about the story — A recent debunk from Snopes exposed a grey area for Facebook's fact-checking tool. — It started as a joke.

Discussion: @krazy_cat_katy and @prageru

Issie Lapowsky / Wired:

Facebook says it doesn't know how many followed Russia's IRA accounts on Instagram; researcher finds that 27 of 170 deleted accounts had ~2.2M followers total — FOR MORE THAN a year, Jonathan Albright has served as something of a one-man General Accounting Office for the tech industry.

Discussion: @rasmus_kleis, @justinhendrix, @wired and @benioff, more at Techmeme »

Shan Wang / Nieman Lab:

Interview with Anna Veduta, one of two people running the English-language version of Latvia-based Meduza, an independent Russian news site — The English edition of the three-year-old Russian news site now gets an average of 100,000 monthly unique visitors and can count among its readers everyone …

Andy Bechtel / The Editor's Desk:

Interview with Lisa Tozzi, global news director at BuzzFeed News, about curating breaking news, headline writing, and advice for journalism students — Lisa Tozzi is global news director at BuzzFeed News, a position she has held since 2013. She previously worked at The New York Times …

Discussion: @tjdoyle and @sulliview

Wayne Ma / Wall Street Journal:

Marriott US staffer says he was fired after HR questioned him on Tibet related tweet he liked via Marriott's account; China pressured Marriott over Tibet issue — The severity of the penalty—termination, not reprimand—highlights the unforgiving consequences for companies that offend China

Discussion: @africasacountry, VentureBeat, @ethanwsj, @marcorubio, @rwhelanwsj, Gizmodo, @martinsfp and @marcorubio, more at Techmeme »

Zoë Beery / Columbia Journalism Review:

Journalists say the editing tests they're given during the hiring process amount to too much unpaid work and often receive no feedback — In the spring of 2015, GQ asked freelance writer and editor Beejoli Shah to produce a four-page front-of-book section for the magazine.

Discussion: @wxdam, @angryblacklady, @srussellkraft, @octonion, @janine_j, @shafldn, @katzish, @britnidlc, @theronalisa, @michelleruiz, @andyrichter and @alexwexelman

Christine Schmidt / Nieman Lab:

Profile of Outlier Media, a free text message-based news service for low-income residents in Detroit offering to check the public record of houses or landlords — “I was not satisfied with covering low-income communities for a higher-income audience. I wanted to cover issues for and with low-income news consumers."

Pew Research Center:

Study: in the US, 78% of 18-24 year olds use Snapchat, 71% use Instagram, 45% use Twitter; nearly 75% of US adults and 94% of 18-24 year olds use YouTube — A majority of Americans use Facebook and YouTube, but young adults are especially heavy users of Snapchat and Instagram

Discussion: @pewinternet, @pewresearch, @pewresearch and Forbes, more at Techmeme »

New York Times:

Advertisers complain Facebook is inconsistent and gender biased in its process of determining whether images should be rejected for being sexually suggestive — Advertisers, especially smaller ones, complain of inconsistency and gender bias in the process that determines whether images are rejected for being sexually suggestive.

Discussion: @oliviasolon, @nytimestech, @andrewtshaffer, @sapna, @stockroom_com, @nytimesbusiness and TechCrunch, more at Techmeme »

Rick Gladstone / New York Times:

World's longest-imprisoned journalist, Yusuf Ruzimuradov, has been freed in Uzbekistan after spending 19 years in jail — Uzbekistan has freed a reporter who was incarcerated for nearly two decades on sedition charges, the longest-known prison term served by a journalist, human rights advocates said Friday.

Max Willens / Digiday:

Publishers like ViralNova, 9gag, Bored Panda, Diply see engagement drop precipitously after Facebook algorithm changes; Distractify saw traffic decline 78% YoY — LittleThings shut down after Facebook's algorithm change cut its organic reach by 75 percent, but it's not the only social publisher that's …