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Mark Zuckerberg says showing fewer viral videos reduced the total time people spent on Facebook by ~50M hours every day, as MAUs reach 2.13B, up 14% YoY — The world's biggest social network is almost minting money, but Mark Zuckerberg has warned news feed changes could hurt business.
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Facebook, CNBC, Ad Age, The Wrap, TechCrunch, New York Times, Recode, New York Magazine, CNBC, Forbes, VentureBeat, Variety and @anthony, more at Techmeme »
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Facebook's daily active user base in the US and Canada fell for the first time ever in Q4, dropping from 185M to 184M in the previous quarter — It was a small but negative change to daily active users in Facebook's most valuable market. — Here's a troubling data point if you're a Facebook investor …
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Fortune, more at Techmeme »

Twitter accounts for celebrities and media figures lose followers after NYT probe into firm that sold followers and as officials call for scrutiny of practice — Federal and state authorities are investigating the sellers of artificial followers and other fraudulent social media engagement.
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21st Century Fox wins 5-year contract for NFL's Thursday Night Football in deal sources say is worth $660M+/year; streaming rights to be sold in next few weeks — Thursday Night Football is changing networks once again. — The NFL announced Wednesday morning that the package will go to Fox for the next five seasons.
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SportsBusiness Daily, Variety, Broadcasting & Cable, nflcommunications.com, Radio & Television …, The New York Observer, Bloomberg, Forbes, Ad Age, Fortune, Adweek, Business Insider, FierceCable, TVWeek.com, VideoNuze Analysis, ProFootballTalk, Deadline, @darrenrovell, @sportslawguy, @helmandc, @nicksundberg, @richbtig and @cyleeder

Twitter now says 1.4M+ US users interacted with tweets from Russia-linked accounts during 2016 election, up from 670K previously announced, has notified them — Twitter on Wednesday said it notified 1.4 million people in the US that they engaged with Kremlin-linked troll accounts during the 2016 US election.
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@cfarivar, @kantrowitz, The Hill, Recode, Engadget, @markseibel, TechCrunch and Fortune, more at Techmeme »

Meredith CEO Tom Harty says editorial staff face no changes yet at Time Inc. as Meredith takes over; Time Inc. CEO Rich Battista, other top executives to leave — Meredith is moving in. — The $2.8 billion acquisition of Time Inc. becomes final on Jan. 31, and Meredith officially takes over Feb. 1.
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@davidzmorris, @abbywestnyc, Vanity Fair and TVWeek.com

Memo: Vox CEO Jim Bankoff says company hit its financial targets for 2017, says hiring growth will slow in 2018, and hints at some projects being “scaled back” — Vox Media Chairman & CEO Jim Bankoff on an era where quality, scale and sustainability matter more than ever.

The Awl, born in 2009 from the idea that intelligent readers wanted resonant, weird, and amusing news and ideas, has now passed away; archives survive — The Awl was born of the following thoughts: What if there were a website with a wealth of resonant, weird, important, frightening and amusing bits of news and ideas?
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@tomscocca, Boing Boing, @dvnjr, @snackwave_julie, @andrewlavallee, @mishaangrist, @johndelsignore, @kottke, @casey_cac, @tcarmody and @jyarvin

Memo: Jeffrey Good, an executive editor at New England-based Pioneer Valley Newspaper group, said he was fired for advocating equal pay for female employees — Jeffrey Good, executive editor of Newspapers of New England's Pioneer Valley Newspaper group, said he's been fired for advocating equal pay for women employees.

Netflix resumed production of the sixth season of House of Cards on Tuesday, after a three-month hiatus following Kevin Spacey allegations and firing from show — Kevin Spacey is out. Diane Lane and Greg Kinnear are in. — The sixth and final season of “House of Cards” …

Alt-right personality Mike Cernovich has made a $500K bid for Gawker's assets — A leaked pitch deck shows how Cernovich would turn Gawker into a platform for his media ambitions—and, perhaps, a cudgel to get back at a site that once called him a “D-list right-winger.”

Federal appeals court rules Twitter not legally responsible for two American deaths in ISIS-linked attack, says ISIS' Twitter use not directly linked to attack — Islamic State may have used its access to Twitter to spread its message of terrorism and recruit new members …
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MediaPost, LAW.com, Reuters, San Francisco, CA Patch, Law360, courthousenews.com, Associated Press, Hit & Run and Splinter

BBC Director-General Tony Hall says the corporation made a “mistake” in failing to review Carrie Gracie's salary as China editor — Tony Hall appears in London's House of Commons in a public evidence session along with other top executives of the public broadcaster and former China editor Carrie Gracie.
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