Top News:
Ed Pilkington / The Guardian:
Senate Democrats launch an investigation into the FCC and Paramount's “partisan censorship scheme” over blocking Stephen Colbert's interview with James Talarico — Richard Blumenthal seeks records from FCC and Paramount Global amid claims of political censorship
Discussion:
Inside Radio, TV Tech, Fox News, Status, Mediaite and LateNighter
Perry Stein / Washington Post:
A federal judge in Virginia denies the US DOJ's request to search Washington Post reporter Hannah Natanson's devices as part of a national security leak probe — A federal judge in Virginia denied the Justice Department's request to search a Washington Post reporter's devices in a national security leak probe.
Discussion:
Poynter, The Hill, New York Times, Politico, The Guardian, @ellenenders.bsky.social, All Rise News, Reuters, Wall Street Journal, The Gateway Pundit, CBS News, KVIA-TV, Associated Press, @dianaresists.bsky.social, @kylegriffin1.bsky.social, @maddow.bsky.social, Raw Story, @Nonilex@masto.ai, @runasand.bsky.social, @JamesWNeal@mstdn.social, @aaronschaffer.com and @johnphudson.bsky.social
Tom Singleton / BBC:
The UK ICO fines Reddit £14.47M for unlawfully using children's personal information; Reddit began verifying user ages in July 2025 to comply with the UK OSA — Reddit has been fined £14.47m by the UK's data watchdog for unlawfully using children's personal information.
Discussion:
Engadget, Infosecurity, Help Net Security, The Guardian, Tech Times, Mashable, @timsweeneyepic, @iconews, @aswren, UK ICO, Android Headlines, Sky News, Ars Technica, Biometric Update, Euro Weekly News, Reclaim The Net, PC Gamer, Cyber Security News, CyberInsider, Benzinga, The Record, BleepingComputer, RTÉ, The Register, WPXI-TV, 9to5Mac, The Independent, The Sun, BusinessCloud, Politico, UKTN, Telecompaper, r/ukpolitics, r/technology and r/unitedkingdom
Eduardo Suárez / Reuters Institute:
Q&A with Carlos Dada, founder and EIC of the Salvadoran newspaper El Faro, on outlet's impact, covering his country from afar while living in exile, and more — In this interview, he discusses his work and the challenges of reporting from exile — Carlos Dada is one of the most …
Max Tani / Semafor:
Sources: Jasmine Crockett ejected an Atlantic reporter from an event and called police on a CNN reporter; the Atlantic's editor called the ejection unacceptable — The Scoop — Rep. Jasmine Crockett is taking a harder line on the political journalists covering her Texas Senate campaign …
Hanaa' Tameez / Nieman Lab:
Q&A with Bostopia's Evan George on his TikTok and Instagram videos under @bostopianews, summarizing Boston local news while offering his own opinions — “You don't need to pretend to [to be neutral] or be worried about [what people think]. Because now it just sounds like you're hiding things …
Discussion:
@niemanlab.org
Lauren Hirsch / New York Times:
WBD says Paramount's new $31-a-share offer could lead to a better deal than Netflix's, potentially triggering a four-day period for Netflix to revise its bid — Warner Bros. Discovery said Paramount's new offer of $31 a share could lead to a “superior proposal” to the deal it signed with Netflix.
Discussion:
Variety, Deadline, @lindseygrahamsc, CNN, Warner Bros. Discovery, Inc., @laurenshirsch, The Daily Upside, Forbes, New York Post, The A.V. Club, Awful Announcing, The Movie Blog, Screen, World of Reel, NBC News, Screen Rant, Bloomberg, New York Sun, Reuters, Wall Street Journal, Axios, Gamereactor UK, Financial Times, The Guardian, The Hollywood Reporter, Los Angeles Times and Benzinga
New York Times:
The FTC and FCC are engaging in a hostile takeover of the marketplace of ideas by treating editorial decisions as fraud and conditioning mergers on news content — The Federal Trade Commission and the Federal Communications Commission were designed to be independent stewards of the public interest …
Ben Deighton / Scientific American:
Cuts to USAID and other US government funding have seriously impacted grants for science-based investigative journalism, particularly in poorer countries — Federal freezes to foreign assistance are affecting grants for investigative reporters everywhere—but especially in poorer countries
Discussion:
@sciam.bsky.social
Charlotte Tobitt / Press Gazette:
UK weekly street newspaper Big Issue promotes Deputy Editor Steven MacKenzie to editor, succeeding Paul McNamee, who led the publication for 19 years — Weekly street newspaper Big Issue has promoted deputy editor Steven MacKenzie to editor. — MacKenzie will succeed Paul McNamee, who has led the publication for 19 years, in March.
Charlotte Tobitt / Press Gazette:
Beehiiv CEO Tyler Denk says creators on the platform are generating nearly $5M in collective annual earnings from subscriptions and its ad network — The CEO of Substack rival Beehiiv says the growing platform has a key philosophical difference from its more established rival.
Trishla Ostwal / Adweek:
Koah, which embeds sponsored ads directly into AI chatbots and aims to build an AdSense for AI, raised a $20.5M Series A led by Theory Ventures — The two-sided marketplace connects AI apps with advertisers, betting that native ads-not subscriptions- will fund generative AI's future
Discussion:
Trishla Ostwal on LinkedIn, Koah, @koahlabs, Pulse 2.0, Ventureburn, SiliconANGLE, Koah, FinSMEs, Unite.AI and Tomasz Tunguz
