Mediagazer: Major ad industry associations, including ANA and IAB, are launching Privacy for America, a new lobby group that will advocate for a federal data privacy law (Wendy Davis/MediaPost)

3:50 PM ET, April 9, 2019

Top News:

Sara Fischer / Axios:

Subscription-based sports site The Athletic is launching 20 ad-free podcasts across its app and website on Tuesday, produced by 12 new hires — The Athletic, a subscription-based digital sports media company, is launching a multi-million dollar podcasting business.

Josh Feldman / Mediaite:

After suing Twitter, Rep. Devin Nunes is suing McClatchy and others for alleged defamation, referring to a McClatchy-owned Fresno Bee article, seeks $150M — Congressman Devin Nunes is filing another lawsuit. — Following the lawsuit he filed last month against Twitter, Liz Mair …

Sahil Patel / Digiday:

Magna Global: OTT-based advertising reached $2.7B in revenue in 2018, up 54% YoY, and is expected to grow 39% in 2019 to $3.8B and 31% in 2020 to $5B — Disney, WarnerMedia and other media giants are going “direct to consumer” with new subscription streaming services.

Discussion: Broadcasting & Cable and FierceVideo

Louise Story / Nieman Lab:

The Wall Street Journal has redesigned its comments section, renaming it “Conversations”, in an attempt to engage readers who do not comment often — Our readers this week will see a lot of changes built around the goal of elevating the quality of community discourse on WSJ.com.

Discussion: Talking Biz News, @toddjolmstead, @janebsinger, @ismaelnafria, @niemanlab, @laurahazardowen and @gvipers

Mike Fleming / Deadline:

Sources: Netflix is in talks to buy the Egyptian Theatre on Hollywood Boulevard in Los Angeles, which would be its first brick and mortar theater acquisition — EXCLUSIVE: Netflix is in preliminary talks with American Cinematheque to buy the venerable Egyptian Theatre on Hollywood Boulevard.

Discussion: /Film, The Week, Bloomberg, The A.V. Club, @uhnet, @theflitecast, The Playlist, @r2b2walton, @functionalnerd and @thathagengrrl

Megha Rajagopalan / BuzzFeed News:

A profile of The Whistle, the only fact-checking organization in Israel working with Facebook, which has just five staffers and a handful of student volunteers — The only Israeli organization working with Facebook to fact-check news ahead of Israel's elections started last week, just days before voters go to the polls.

Discussion: The Verge, @buzzfeednews and @miriamelder

Lauren Easton / Associated Press:
AP announces it will expand its fact checking of false and misleading information that appears on Facebook, now also vetting video and Spanish-language content

Discussion: Poynter

Wendy Davis / MediaPost:

Major ad industry associations, including ANA and IAB, are launching Privacy for America, a new lobby group that will advocate for a federal data privacy law — A group of major ad industry associations is launching a new organization, Privacy for America, that aims to shape federal privacy laws.

Discussion: Adweek and AList

Kelly McCarthy / ABC News:

ABC News producer Alexa Valiente passed away over the weekend at the age of 27 — She will be remembered for her bright personality and infectious love of life. — Alexa Valiente, a producer for ABC News for six years, passed away over the weekend. — Valiente, who had been facing health issues …

Discussion: People.com, TVWeek.com, Politico, @jazdidwhat, @betsy_klein, @abbydphillip, @springer, @alyssanewcomb, @abcworldnews, @kfaulders, @nia_official, @myhlee, @iamamnanawaz, @mattgutmanabc, The Wrap, Fox News and gofundme.com

William D. Cohan / Vanity Fair:

Sources: CBS is struggling to recruit a CEO, as potential candidates are wary of the Redstones and the company's culture; Richard Plepler turned down the job — Plepler is a no. Katzenberg is a no. Ianniello wants to stay—but he's a Moonves guy. Will an A-lister come to clean up Redstone's mess?

Discussion: @gerryfsmith and @media_evan

Sarah Whitten / CNBC:

At CinemaCon in Las Vegas last week, movie distributors and theatre owners alike said streaming services like Netflix were not impacting theatre ticket sales — - At CinemaCon in Las Vegas last week, movie distributors and theater owners alike say there is little to fear from a growing population of streaming services.

Discussion: @ckrewson and @cnbc

Nieman Foundation:

Mother Jones CEO Monika Bauerlein and Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery have been awarded the 2019 I.F. Stone Medal for Journalistic Independence — In recognition of their enduring support of investigative reporting and independent journalists, Monika Bauerlein and Clara Jeffery of Mother Jones magazine …

Discussion: @tasneemraja, @carletoncollege, @niemanfdn, @davidcorndc, @nobleideas, @jayrosen_nyu, @juliachanb and @7im

Ted Johnson / Variety:

YouTube has disabled comments on a livestream of the House Judiciary Committee's hearing on hate crimes because it was generating too much hate speech — WASHINGTON — YouTube has disabled the commenting function on a livestream of a House Judiciary Committee hearing on hate crimes …

Discussion: Mediaite, Splinter, NBC News, @oneunderscore__ and The Daily Beast

Aliya Iftikhar / Columbia Journalism Review:

Rising Kashmir editor Syed Shujaat Bukhari's murder remains unsolved after 10 months, perpetuating a climate of fear and censorship among Kashmiri journalists — Ahead of India's national elections, the mystery of Shujaat Bukhari creates a climate of fear and censorship

Discussion: @cjr, @pressfreedom, @jameelyusuf, @aliyazeba, @pressfreedom, @pressfreedom, @pressfreedom, @pressfreedom, @pressfreedom, @gijn, @jclassrooms and @stphnfwlr

Lucas Shaw / Bloomberg:

YouTube says it will begin developing choose-your-own-adventure-style shows under a new unit, following the success of Netflix's “Bandersnatch” and others — - Video site is steering program dollars into new technology — Company to announce new slate of shows next month in New York

Discussion: Variety, Hollywood Reporter and The Wrap

Charlotte Tobitt / Press Gazette:

Press Association says eight regional news companies have signed up to its robot-powered news service, Radar, which has filed 100K stories since June 2018 — Eight regional news providers have signed up as the first paying subscribers to the Press Association's “robot-generated” news service.

Discussion: @puzzlesthewill

Carolyn Giardina / Hollywood Reporter:

NAB CEO Gordon Smith has called on tech companies including Apple to embed broadcast chips in smartphones to enable broadcasting without a cell network — Gordon Smith called on lawmakers to address the “threat” to local journalism by tech companies by “increas[ing] regulation on the tech industry …

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Roy J. Harris Jr / Poynter:
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Variety:
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Arielle Pardes / Wired:
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Amanda Darrach / Columbia Journalism Review:
Profile of Ruth Sherlock, an NPR correspondent in the Middle East, on covering the ISIS beat amid tabloid sensationalism from other corners of the media

Todd Spangler / Variety:
Viacom's ad-supported streaming service Pluto TV has signed a content deal with BBC Studios and now has 15M MAUs, up 3M from January

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Axios:
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Brian Stelter / CNN:
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Christine Schmidt / Nieman Lab:
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Jon Levine / The Wrap:
Former Fox News host Greta Van Susteren is to host a nightly show, airing on local news company Gray Television's 93 television stations from September

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Benjamin Mullin / Wall Street Journal:
Private equity firm Great Hill Partners has agreed to acquire Gizmodo Media Group from Univision, forming a new company led by digital media exec Jim Spanfeller

BBC:
UK whitepaper proposes “code of best practice” for how internet platforms should deal with harmful content, suggests expanding liability to tech company execs

From Techmeme:

Lee-Anne Mulholland / The Keyword:
Google files its proposed remedies in the DOJ's search antitrust lawsuit, including letting browser companies have multiple default agreements across platforms

Wall Street Journal:
Gina Raimondo says holding back China in the chips race is a “fool's errand”, and investment, more than export controls, will keep US ahead of Beijing

Timothy B. Lee / Ars Technica:
Exploring the scaling challenges of transformer-based LLMs in efficiently processing large amounts of text, as well as potential solutions, such as RAG systems

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