Top News:

News Media Alliance, with members including NYT, WaPo, and News Corp, seeks antitrust exemption from Congress to negotiate collectively with Google and Facebook — Google and Facebook continue to gobble up the digital advertising market, siphoning away revenue that once paid for the quality journalism …
Discussion:
Wall Street Journal, Axios, Recode, @lmoses, @pt, @pt, Los Angeles Times, Talking New Media, @pt, @nxthompson, @jason_kint, @rafat, @rafat, @mathewi and Fast Company, more at Techmeme »
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How Bannon became Trump's key henchman: arranging for Ann Coulter to pen a policy paper and weaponizing Breitbart against Megyn Kelly, before he joined campaign — Why does Trump double-down every time it seems like he should retreat? Because Steve Bannon is back in his boss's good graces.

Source: The NYT is undecided on whether to participate in Facebook's Instant Articles subscriptions, with the paper seeing no “great upside” to being involved — Facebook is moving ahead on plans to let people subscribe to publications through Instant Articles.

How spammers, ripoff artists, and even superstars juice their numbers on Spotify with covers, tricky song titles, silent tracks, and large albums — A few weeks after the release of Kendrick Lamar's “Humble,” the hard-charging lead single on his fourth album Damn., the song landed at No. 1 on Billboard's streaming chart.
Discussion:
hypebot, BetaNews, The Guardian, @adamkraymond and The FADER, more at Techmeme »

Financial news network Cheddar is buying StockStream, a stock-picking game created by a 26-year-old former Amazon engineer that went viral — Cheddar Inc., the streaming financial-news network that was recently valued at $85 million, is buying a viral stock-picking game started …
Discussion:
Business Insider, Thanks:@jonsteinberg

USC study suggests there may be a black market of bots used to spread misinformation across Twitter during elections — As if Twitter's reputation hasn't been battered enough, a new study sheds light on how the social media platform can be hijacked by bots to spread political disinformation during election campaigns.
Discussion:
@manjusrii and @moorehn

A profile of CNN reporter Jim Acosta, described by WH Press Sec Sean Spicer as a prime example of a journalist in a “YouTube, click-driven industry” — These are times that try a White House reporter's soul. Jim Acosta hasn't kept quiet about what's been troubling his.
Discussion:
Mediaite, @jayrosen_nyu, @farhip and @markfollman

Podcast database and discovery site Podchaser focuses on episodes rather than entire shows, with user-generated tagging and episode-level reviews — “One of our big advantages is we're trying to build this bottom-up, feature-wise, and talking to a hundred different podcasts and tons of listeners and asking exactly what they want."

Time Inc. Vice-Chairman Norman Pearlstine is retiring from the company later this month, after which he plans to work as an adviser for early-stage media firms — Publishing industry veteran Norman Pearlstine is retiring from Time Inc. this month, after which he plans to work as an adviser …

Q&A with Jake Sherman and Anna Palmer, two of Politico Playbook's authors, on their forthcoming book, expansion of the Playbook franchise, more — Inside the transfer of power at Playbook, the most influential newsletter in politics. — It's been a year since Anna Palmer, Jake Sherman …
Discussion:
@kenvogel, @gbrotman and @mlcalderone

The BBC is to propose cutting employee pay perks, including paid overtime and certain travel expenses, as it attempts to cut £80M from its news budget — Proposals include abolishing unpredictable hours allowance and cutting overtime as corporation prepares to reveal top salaries
Discussion:
@hirider750 and @sarahschijen

As an antidote to parachute journalism, Appalachian news outlets like 100 Days tell their region's story from the inside out — After the 2016 election, the calls and emails rolled into West Virginia, as the press scrambled to make sense of a place that hadn't occupied this much space …
Discussion:
Radio & Television … and The Root