Top News:
Alexandra Bruell / Wall Street Journal:
A look at the NYT's upheaval over sensitive topics like the Israel-Gaza war and management's push to emphasize neutrality, including via a probe of staff leaks — After internal upheaval over coverage of sensitive topics like the Israel-Gaza war, management renews emphasis on independence and neutrality
Elizabeth Jensen / New York Times:
Robert MacNeil, who anchored evening newscasts for over two decades on PBS and delivered evenhanded, non-flashy news with Jim Lehrer, dies at 93 — With his longtime co-host Jim Lehrer, he delivered thoughtful reports that stood in stark contrast to the commercial networks' ever more sensational newscasts.
Discussion:
PBS NewsHour, Associated Press, The Hill, Washington Post, Media Nation, @judywoodruff, Variety, Deadline, The Daily Caller, Newser, The Hollywood Reporter and CBS News
CNN:
Several journalists were injured Friday in an Israeli attack in central Gaza, including Sami Shehada, who lost a leg; he works for Turkish broadcaster TRT — Israeli forces surrounded and attacked the Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza on Friday, wounding several journalists and at least one other person.
Bloomberg:
Adobe used images created by tools like Midjourney and uploaded to its stock marketplace by users to train Firefly; Adobe says ~5% of images were AI-generated — Company promotes its tool as safe from content scraped from the internet. — When Adobe Inc. released its Firefly image-generating software …
Discussion:
Tom's Guide, more at Techmeme »
Ashley Carman / Bloomberg:
A look at faux podcast ads or “UGC ads” where brands pay actors to tape clips that look like podcast recordings in which they promote company products — Brands like the validating veneer of the podcast look without having to pay premium prices for actual spots on shows
Discussion:
RAIN News and Simon Owens's Media Newsletter
Matthew Choi / The Texas Tribune:
Two groups have filed a campaign finance complaint with the FEC over $630K that iHeartMedia sent to a PAC dedicated to the reelection of US Sen. Ted Cruz — End Citizens United and the Campaign Legal Center asserted Cruz could have broken campaign finance rules.
Discussion:
The Hill, San Antonio Current, News, San Antonio Current, The Daily Beast, RADIO ONLINE, Politico, The Daily Beast and The Verge
Jaffer Zaidi / The Keyword:
Google tests removing links to CA news sites to measure the impact of the California Journalism Preservation Act and pauses investments in the CA news ecosystem — A pending bill in the California state legislature, the California Journalism Preservation Act (CJPA), would create a “link tax” …
Discussion:
Los Angeles Times, Politico, Press Gazette, Gizmodo, @carnage4life@mas.to, Engadget, @erika_d_smith, @adamkovac, @noah__goldberg, @no_such_zone, @megjameslat, @killedbygoogle, @raminskibba, Sam Hoisington on LinkedIn, @jeffjarvis, @shelbygrad, @mattdpearce@threads.net, Matt Pearce, The Verge, Chris Krewson on LinkedIn, Free Press and Jeff Jarvis on LinkedIn, more at Techmeme »
Katie Kilkenny / The Hollywood Reporter:
Condé Nast staff marked for layoffs in November are assigned to a “central editorial group” as they await the outcome of their union's contract negotiations — While their union negotiates with top execs about the scale and terms of layoffs, employees who had been working at GQ …
Discussion:
@willyblackmore, @joshkovensky and @semaforben
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
Appfigures: short drama apps, like ReelShort, collectively made $146M in Q1 2024, up from $1.8M in Q1 2023; Reelshort made $52M in Q1 and DramaBox made $35M — Was Quibi just ahead of its time? Quibi founder Jeffrey Katzenberg ultimately blamed the COVID-19 pandemic for the failure …
Discussion:
Appfigures
Brian Hiatt / Rolling Stone:
A look at Udio, which was founded by four former DeepMind employees in December 2023 and launched a product on April 11 that generates songs from text prompts — Weeks after AI-music generator Suno went viral, a new rival, Udio, is here, backed by tech and music heavyweights.
Alex Weprin / The Hollywood Reporter:
Roku says hackers accessed ~576K accounts using credential stuffing, and made purchases in ~400 cases, after a similar breach affecting ~15K accounts in March — The new security incident was discovered a month after the company learned that 15,000 accounts were impacted in a similar breach.
Discussion:
Variety, CNN, The Streamable, TechCrunch, The Desk, CBS News, Los Angeles Times, The Verge, Engadget, Next TV, MobileSyrup, Forbes, Deadline, The Wrap, Reuters and Cord Cutters News, more at Techmeme »
Jordan Novet / CNBC:
Last week, LinkedIn began letting advertisers pay to amplify posts from some users through Thought Leader ads, as it enters the market of influencer marketing — Ryan Roslansky, CEO of Microsoft's LinkedIn subsidiary, speaks at a LinkedIn event in San Francisco on Sept. 22, 2016.
Discussion:
@apocalypticanow.bsky.social, more at Techmeme »