‘Spotlight’ gives journalists a morale boost | Readers disable ad blockers for news | Why Google’s AMP helps newsrooms

By Matt Carroll <@MattatMIT>

March 2, 2016: A trio of news media stories, videos, and data viz compiled weekly. Get notified via email? Email 3toread (at) gmail.com.

1. Spotlight — A welcome shot in the arm for the news business: The Oscar winner provided the beleaguered news business with a huge morale boost, writes Brendan James of the International Business Times. Will it be a major recruitment tool for journalism programs? Some colleges think so. (Transparency alert: I am totally conflicted here because Brian d’Arcy James plays me in the movie. And I’m damn proud of that and am still hoarse from shouting myself silly at the Oscar ceremony.)
2. More use ad blockers — but many willing to turn them off too: Sometimes all you have to do is ask. Publishers in the UK have found that more than half of readers using ad blockers will turn them off in order to get content, writes Lucinda Southern for Digiday. That’s surprising — but heartening — for publishers who have watched the rise of ad blockers with dread and fury.
3. Why Google’s bid to speed up the Internet is good for newsrooms: Google’s AMP project helps newsrooms for a simple reason — it makes opening web pages blazing fast, says Dan Gillmor for Backchannel. That’s a change for many pages that load like slugs, weighed down by all the crappy ads that publishers lard on pages, and a treat for readers. It’s also a response by Google to the threat of Facebook’s Instant Articles. Gilmor also gives a nice description of what AMP does, without getting too technical.

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Matt Carroll runs the Future of News initiative at the MIT Media Lab.