Capital B Gary’s editor-in-chief on collaborating with his hometown community

Monday, February 5, 2024

Capital B Gary’s editor-in-chief on collaborating with his hometown community “We want to meet the people where they’re at, whether that’s churches, neighborhood block clubs, salons, or barber shops.” By Will Fischer.

Microsoft, pushing generative AI in newsrooms, partners with Semafor, CUNY, the Online News Association, and others What We’re ReadingPhiladelphia Inquirer / William BenderDid Philadelphia Sheriff Rochelle Bilal’s campaign make up dozens of false news stories? →“By Friday morning, the link to the 31 phantom news headlines had been removed from Bilal’s main campaign site…On Friday afternoon, Bilal’s campaign restored the 31 headlines to the campaign site and added a note to the bottom: ‘Public Disclaimer: While we endeavor to keep the information up-to-date and correct, we make no representations or warranties of any kind, express or implied, about the completeness, accuracy, reliability, suitability or availability with respect to the website or the information provided.'” How Things Work / Hamilton Nolan“Public funding of journalism is the only way” →“The journalism jobs currently being slashed at what seems like every single publication in America are not migrating into jobs at publications that utilize some new form of technology. They are just going away. ‘Creative destruction,’ so beloved by economic theorists, can be scary but beneficial in the long term. This is not that. This is just destruction.”The Information / Erin WooTwitter is being flooded with ad spam paid for with stolen credit cards →“The episode highlights how X’s ability to deal with spam has been hobbled by [Elon] Musk’s cost-cutting since he took control of the platform in October 2022. X has cut back on staffing to monitor content on the platform since Musk bought it. Now it is struggling to deal with the ad spam.”Financial Times / Daniel ThomasAmazon and British publisher Reach will share user data in response to the coming cookie apocalypse →“Reach said it will partner with Amazon on sharing ‘contextual’ first-party data, for example allowing advertisers to know what articles people are looking at, with the US tech group using the information to sell more targeted advertising on the UK publisher’s sites.”Vox / Rebecca JenningsWant to sell a book these days? Better start a TikTok →“‘Authors are writing these incredible books, and yet when they ask me questions, the thing that keeps them up at night is, “How do I create this brand?”‘ says literary agent Carly Watters. It’s not that they want to be spending their time doing it, it’s that they feel they have to. ‘I think that millennials and Gen Xers really feel like sellouts. It’s not what they imagined their career to look like. It inherently feels wrong with their value system.'”Semafor / Max TaniHow Condé Nast bought and destroyed America’s iconic music publication, Pitchfork →“And even as its GenX and old millennial fans aged and tastemaking shifted to platforms and influencers, Pitchfork remained the premier publication for music criticism, its year-end lists synonymous with critical acclaim. Now it will be an arm of a men’s magazine whose business revolves around searchable e-commerce lists for the best chore coats.”Committee to Protect Journalists / Emell AdolphusIn Guinea, journalists are being increasingly censored, expelled, or arrested →“‘Guinean authorities should immediately roll back the wave of censorship efforts unleashed on the press in recent months, including the suspension or blocking of outlets, arrests of journalists, and repression of those who stand up for press freedom,’ said Angela Quintal, CPJ’s Africa program coordinator, from New York.”The Wall Street Journal / Kirsten Grind, Emily Glazer, Rebecca Elliott, and Coulter JonesElon Musk has done drugs with some of the board members who are supposed to be overseeing his companies →“The connections are an extreme blurring of friendship and fortune and raise questions among some shareholders about the independence of the board members charged with overseeing the chief executive. Such conflicts could run afoul of the loose rules governing what qualifies as independence at publicly traded companies.”The Verge / Jon PorterGoogle Search’s cache links are officially being retired →“…it can also be an enormously helpful news gathering tool, giving reporters the ability to see exactly what information a company has added (or removed) from a website, and a way to see details that people or companies might be trying to scrub from the web. Or, if a site is blocked in your region, Google’s cache can work as a great alternative to a VPN.”Axios / Sara Fischer6AM City raises $10 million, including from local TV partner Tegna →“As part of Tegna’s investment, 6AM will include news and weather from Tegna’s local broadcast stations in its daily newsletters in overlapping markets, the company said in a statement. It will also promote Tegna’s morning newscasts in those emails, and will integrate local sports headlines from Tegna’s local sports network ‘Locked On,’ into its coverage.”The New York Times / Reggie UgwuJoe Rogan renews his Spotify deal, but will no longer be a Spotify exclusive →“Under the new deal, Rogan will be able to expand [his] audience outside of Spotify, which has pivoted away from its exclusivity model in an effort to cut costs and grow advertising revenue.”The Guardian / Margaret SullivanThe spectacular collapse of The Messenger is a lesson on how not to do journalism →“I can understand why some job seekers grasped at The Messenger’s straws. It’s tough out there. But if you’re an employed journalist recruited by a rich guy with lofty notions about saving the industry, you should run. Fast.”The Guardian / Robin McKieMore than 10,000 bogus research papers had to be retracted last year →“Most analysts believe the figure is only the tip of an iceberg of scientific fraud…The startling rise in the publication of sham science papers has its roots in China, where young doctors and scientists seeking promotion were required to have published scientific papers. Shadow organizations — known as ‘paper mills’ — began to supply fabricated work for publication in journals there.”The Wall Street Journal / Patience Haggin and David MarcelisCharter, America’s new No. 1 cable company, isn’t thrilled about it →“The company has spent months openly worrying that the cable-TV bundle was losing its appeal because programmers were increasingly moving their highest-profile content exclusively to their streaming platforms. Its chief executive even wondered whether it still made sense to be in the pay-TV business, which he called ‘broken.'”Press Gazette / Bron MaherPolitico embraces generative AI web crawlers with website redesigns →“By actively trying to get scooped up into the LLMs that power generative AIs, Politico is going against the trend for news publishers, many of whom have outright blocked the web crawlers deployed by Google and OpenAI. [Politico VP for product/design Max] Leroy said that with the deployment of new Google answer formats like Search Generative Experience, ‘when they’re citing different sources — we want to be in those.'”Team GhostGhost is offering laid-off journalists a free year on their newsletter platform →“We’re offering free Ghost(Pro) accounts and support from our team for the next year for up to 10,000 subscribers, to help you get a new publication up and running.”Associated Press / Megan Janetsky and Fernanda PesceMeet the newscaster in drag making LGBTQ+ history in Mexican television →“From its inception, the program ‘La Verdrag’ was meant to radically transform the way the LGBTQ+ community is viewed in Mexican society. First broadcast in October, the program goes against the grain in a highly “macho” country where nearly 4 in every 5 people identify as Catholic.”The Washington Post / Will SommerThe Wall Street Journal shakes up its D.C. bureau with big layoffs →Around 20 staffers were laid off, and “the cuts focused on the bureau’s economics reporters in Washington, which will be folded into the newspaper’s New York-based business team. The bureau’s team covering U.S.-China news will be shuttered.”

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