Mediagazer: Inside the Paris Review's search for an editor after sexual harassment allegations led to Lorin Stein's ousting; at least seven of eight candidates are women (Boris Kachka/Vulture)

3:35 AM ET, March 17, 2018

Top News:

Paul Grewal / Facebook:

Facebook suspends Trump-affiliated data analytics firm Cambridge Analytica after reports it and affiliated psychologist lied about data retention practices — We are suspending Strategic Communication Laboratories (SCL), including their political data analytics firm, Cambridge Analytica, from Facebook.

Benjamin Mullin / Wall Street Journal:

Sources: Univision-hired consulting firm's preliminary recommendation calls for cuts of Fusion's budget by up to 35%; Fusion has 600 staff, ~$150M annual budget — Parent company Univision has hired a consulting firm to review the entire business and recommend budget reductions

Discussion: Seeking Alpha, The Hill and @adamweinstein

Molly McHugh / The Ringer:

Digg to shut down Digg Reader, its barebones RSS reader, on March 26 — A requiem for a haven from algorithms and trending topics — On Wednesday, Digg announced that it will be shutting down Digg Reader on March 26. The RSS reader, for me and likely many others, was a godsend after the 2013 shuttering of Google Reader.

Discussion: TechCrunch, The Next Web, Android Community, @ringer, Associations Now, @nbj914, Buggy App, Liliputing, Beautiful Pixels, BetaNews and Yahoo! News, more at Techmeme »

Daniel D'Addario / TIME:

Fox's Shep Smith on separating news and opinion programming, quitting if the show changes to accommodate viewers, concerns about who would replace him, and more — In a Manhattan Fox News studio on a recent Tuesday in February, Shepard Smith sits ready to begin taping his 3 p.m. newscast.

Discussion: The Daily Beast, New York Daily News, Media Matters for America, Washington Post, TVLine, The Independent, @oliverdarcy, TVNewser, Mediaite, @jayrosen_nyu, The Wrap, @oliverdarcy, @jtreece406, @daviduberti, @wmtwsteve, @k_barua and @jayrosen_nyu

Boris Kachka / Vulture:

Inside the Paris Review's search for an editor after sexual harassment allegations led to Lorin Stein's ousting; at least seven of eight candidates are women — Two days after the widow of George Plimpton, the late founder of the Paris Review, threw a party billed “Last Call at 72nd Street …

Janko Roettgers / Variety:

Sources: Facebook plans to launch Oculus Go standalone VR headset at f8 developer conference on May 1 — Facebook is looking to officially launch its Oculus Go standalone virtual reality (VR) headset at its f8 developer conference on May 1, Variety has learned from multiple sources familiar with the company's plans.

Discussion: UploadVR, TechRadar.com, Engadget, CNET and SlashGear, more at Techmeme »

Wikimedia Blog:

Wikipedia survey across 14 languages with 215K+ responses shows about 35% seek a specific fact, 33% want a topic overview, and 32% want to read a topic in-depth — Wikimedia's mission is to provide educational content and to effectively disseminate it. Doing so requires understanding …

Discussion: Nieman Lab and Fast Company

Alex Hern / The Guardian:

Facebook apologizes and says it is investigating why its search box autocomplete suggested sexual videos, child abuse content, and other strange results — Searches starting ‘video of’ returned autocomplete suggestions of sexual videos and child abuse content

Discussion: @alexhern, The Wrap, Engadget, New York Magazine, The Verge, Newsweek, USA Today, Gizmodo, Motherboard and Mashable, more at Techmeme »

Amanda Pfeffer / CBC News:

Radio-Canada reporter Antoine Trépanier arrested, not yet charged, for criminal harassment after requesting an interview with the subject of investigative story — Antoine Trépanier was arrested this week after a harassment complaint from an investigation suspect

Discussion: @mspratt, National Observer, @lawyerintoronto, Toronto Sun, globalnews.ca, Boing Boing, Canada NewsWire Group, Canadian Press, CTV News, Ottawa Citizen, VICE and TheSpec.com

Joe Pompeo / Vanity Fair:

Naming Nancy Dubuc CEO of Vice signals both its commitment to changing its internal culture and a traditional shift from visionary founder to proven operator — A+E's Nancy Dubuc has picked hits (Duck Dynasty, Ice Road Truckers), acts like an adult, and is female—which is precisely what Vice needs right now.

Discussion: Splinter

Felix Salmon / Recode:

As Reuters receives $10B over 30 years and retains editorial independence in Blackstone M&A deal, it should expand internationally and acquire digital news orgs — Reuters News just won the lottery. What will it do with all that money? — It's the biggest assignment in journalism …

Discussion: @felixsalmon, @edmundlee, @lucas_jackson_ and Reuters

Lucia Moses / Digiday:

BuzzFeed tests making its episodic shows available at the same time across platforms, including YouTube, Facebook, Amazon, Hulu, and Roku — BuzzFeed is experimenting with a new windowing strategy to get people to tune into its distributed series. Starting March 18, BuzzFeed will make the new season of …

Jessica Davies / Digiday:

The Times of London to pilot an algorithm that aims to serve subscribers relevant content at opportune times and help convert registered users into subscribers — To accelerate subscriptions growth and reduce churn, The Times of London and Sunday Times are embarking on an ambitious machine learning project.

Discussion: @chrisduncania

Wall Street Journal:

Preview of AT&T-Time Warner lawsuit: antitrust unit says merger would raise prices, and its chief swears AT&T CEO asked whether a CNN sale would get deal OK'ed — Next week, a federal judge will begin trying an antitrust case that has broad ramifications for media …

Discussion: Reuters, New York Times and @davidmwessel, more at Techmeme »