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:
The New York Observer, Fox News Insider, bookforum.com, The Week and Slate, more at Techmeme »
Cynthia Littleton / Variety:
Early estimates from Nielsen suggest ratings for Sunday's 90th Academy Awards dropped significantly since last year's show — Live viewership of the 90th annual Academy Awards ceremony was down significantly from the 2017 telecast, according to preliminary Nielsen ratings for ABC's nearly four-hour telecast.
The New York Times Company:
The New York Times promotes Deputy Culture Editor Patrick Healy to role of politics editor — Patrick Healy has been named politics editor. Read more in this memo from Dean Baquet, Joe Kahn and Matt Purdy. — The midterm elections are shaping up as an epic battle …
Discussion:
@nycsouthpaw, @amychozick, @rpogrebin, @lpolgreen, @anandwrites, @mattgertz, @patrickhealynyt, @jswatz, @samsifton, @ashleyrparker, @owillis and @samdolnick
Paul Farhi / Washington Post:
A look at NewsGuard, led by Steven Brill and Gordon Crovitz, which has raised $6M and plans to use journalists to rate reliability of ~7,500 online news sources — Media entrepreneur Steven Brill thinks there's something missing from all the efforts to separate fake news from the real kind: Some smart and discerning humans.
Discussion:
CNNMoney, @pilhofer, @bareham2016, @ibarguen, @kris_sacrebleu, @maxboot, @sulliview and @brianstelter
Jay Solomon / Columbia Journalism Review:
Journalist Jay Solomon lost his job as a foreign correspondent with the Wall Street Journal after being targeted by hackers who were likely state sponsored — How hacked emails and a yacht in Monaco ended my career — Off the coast of Monaco in the summers of 2014 and 2015 …
Discussion:
@jpodhoretz
Joey Rhyu / Facebook Media:
Facebook has been testing adding a breaking news label to stories and is now expanding that beta to publishers in Latin America, Europe, and Australia — Earlier this year we made a commitment to show more high quality news on Facebook. People tell us they want to see informative news …
Discussion:
Search Engine Journal
Joseph Bernstein / BuzzFeed:
Profile of PragerU, a nonprofit site whose five minute explainer videos, presented by well-known conservative pundits, have amassed 1B+ YouTube, Facebook views — A right-wing online “university” is on track for a billion views in 2018, its professors are some of the best-known conservatives in media …
Discussion:
The Outline
Margaret Sullivan / Washington Post:
The world - and Hollywood - has changed since last year's Oscars, thanks to courageous reporting by the press on men like Harvey Weinstein — The world has changed since last year's Oscars — and for the better. — So let's not forget what got us there: great journalism.
Discussion:
@elizwgreen, @marinafang, @1312sam, @paulkingsley7, @briannolan1974, @eduardosuarez and @sulliview
Frederic Filloux / Monday Note:
A “Spotify for News” won't work for the same reasons Spotify itself is struggling: competition from the “big four” in tech, which will ramp up over time — Spotify's IPO is scheduled for this spring. Its SEC Filing offers an interesting perspective on the future of the news industry.
Discussion:
One Man & His Blog
Carlotta Gall / New York Times:
Turkish government attempts to clamp down on country's digital media with proposed law which will make broadcasting via internet illegal without a license — ISTANBUL — Having already brought Turkey's mainstream media to heel, and made considerable headway in rolling back Turkish democracy …
Discussion:
pulse.ng
Tom McKay / Gizmodo:
YouTube says it did not tell Alex Jones his Infowars channel would be deleted from the site on Sunday; as of Sunday evening, it was still available — Conspiracy theorist and Infowars founder Alex Jones, that guy who thinks the government is flooding waterways with chemicals that turn frogs gay …
Discussion:
Tubefilter, BetaNews, Media Matters for America, Engadget and The A.V. Club
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."