Wednesday, May 10, 2023 |
| The Athletic’s first live room took place in September 2021. By January 2022, they’d done 100. Today, they’re closing in on 1,000. By Sarah Scire. |
What We’re ReadingThe Verge / David Pierce
Google is putting AI front and center in the most valuable real estate on the internet: its existing search results →“AI may not be killing the 10 blue links, but it’s definitely pushing them down the page.” (
Here’s what that means for news publishers.) Vanity Fair / Charlotte Klein
Why didn’t Politico’s historic Roe v. Wade scoop win a Pulitzer? →“The fact that such a massive glitch had to be flagged in real time raises questions about the process—like whether this has happened in the past. [Pulitzer administrator Marjorie] Miller did not address that question.” New York Times / Karen Weise and Cade Metz
When A.I. chatbots hallucinate news articles →“According to The Times’s archives, all the chatbots were wrong. They cited articles that did not exist. And while coverage of early research on thinking machines dated to the 1930s, it wasn’t until 1963 that The Times first published an article with the phrase ‘artificial intelligence.'”Semafor / Max Tani and Ben Smith
Twitter may solve Tucker Carlson’s need for relevance. Soon, he’ll need to find a business model. →“‘Tucker prioritizes influence,’ said a person familiar with his thinking. ‘Twitter allows him to not just be another podcaster.'”Instagram / Dooce
The pioneering mom blogger Heather B. Hamilton, a.k.a. “Dooce,” has died →You can read more about her life and career
here and
here.FT / Daniel Thomas and Ivan Levingston
A Saudi Arabia state-backed media group looks to launch an English-language news channel to rival Al Jazeera →“Saudi Arabia already owns Al Arabiya, an Arabic broadcaster that rivals Al Jazeera Arabic and the UAE’s Sky News Arabia. All of those channels practise censorship and espouse their government’s views.”Indiegraf / Claire Tran
What news publishers need to know about the Google Analytics 4 transition →GA4 calculates sessions differently and has new ways to weed out bot traffic, potentially resulting in lower numbers. “About 30% of traffic may come from bots, so a 30% drop in traffic is reasonable.”Bellingcat / Logan Williams
The trickiest part of geolocating a photo can be knowing where to start looking. Bellingcat has a new tool for that. →The new tool uses OpenStreetMap data to help geolocate images and identify starting points for geolocation investigations, based on objects and structures you can identify in an image.New York Times / Benjamin Mullin
The New York Times added subscribers but faces an ad spending slowdown →“The Times was not immune from a sector-wide advertising slump. The company said that ad revenue decreased about 8.6% to $106 million in the first quarter compared with the same period last year, driven by declines in spending in the technology and finance categories.”Washington Post / Gillian Brockell
MLK’s famous criticism of Malcolm X may have been fabricated in an act of “journalistic malpractice” →Some of the phrases added to King’s answer appear to be taken significantly out of context, while others appear to be fabricated entirely. The quotes came from a January 1965 Playboy interview with author Alex Haley.The Daily Beast / Dan Ladden-Hall
Ahead of his CNN Town Hall, Trump calls the event a “desperate” attempt by CNN to chase ratings →“They made me a deal I couldn’t refuse!!!” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform. “Could be the beginning of a New & Vibrant CNN, with no more Fake News, or it could turn into a disaster for all, including me. Let’s see what happens?” The Times and Democrat / Lee Harter
The Times and Democrat in South Carolina will move to a three-day per week mail delivery →No more newspaper delivery carriers. The T&D says the scaled-back schedule will result in expanded editions when newspapers are printed on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays.Washington Post / Paul Farhi
White House issues new rules on acceptable “professional” behavior for media →“More recently, press officials — and even some reporters — have bristled during press briefings at interruptions by journalist Simon Ateba, the White House correspondent for Today News Africa. Ateba has gained attention by shouting questions out of turn at Biden press secretaries Jen Psaki and Karine Jean-Pierre, in violation of protocol, if not written rules.”The New York Times Company
The New York Times announces new generative AI effort →Alex Hardiman, chief product officer for the Times, will lead “a cross-company effort to ensure that we think expansively and collectively about how we might put GenAI to use to support our journalists, grow audience and engagement with our products, and scale our business, while working to ensure we protect our intellectual property.” Also announced: longtime exec David Perpich will focus on The Athletic full-time as its publisher. The Hollywood Reporter / Alex Weprin
MTV News is shutting down after 36 years →“The MTV News of 2023 was much smaller and far less high-profile than the MTV News of the 1990s and early 2000s, when it could help define pop culture and cover stories more traditional outlets wouldn’t touch”Washington Post / Jeremy Barr, Faiz Siddiqui, and Sarah Ellison
Tucker Carlson says he is relaunching his show on Twitter →In a reply, Elon Musk
tweeted, “I want to be clear that we have not signed a deal of any kind whatsoever. Tucker is subject to the same rules & rewards of all content creators.”the Guardian / Luke Harding
French journalist Arman Soldin killed in Russian rocket strike in Ukraine →Soldin, a 32-year-old video coordinator for Agence France-Presse, was described as a “fantastic reporter” by colleagues. He’d
recently tweeted about taking care of an injured baby hedgehog in Ukraine.
Nieman Lab / Fuego
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