Stories about the news media, curated or written by Matt Carroll of the Future of News initiative at the MIT Media Lab. Get the email once a week by sending an email to 3toread (at) gmail.com
How Facebook swallowed the internet | This guy broke the internet | Annotating the abusers
By Matt Carroll <@MattatMIT>April 6, 2016: A trio of news media stories, videos, and data viz compiled weekly. Get notified via email? Email 3toread (at) gmail.com. ¶ The end of the Internet as we know it: How Facebook swallowed journalism: Emily Bell, director of the Tow Center for Digital Journalism at Columbia, takes a hard look at the rapidly evolving relationship between social media and journalism, and doesn’t like what she sees.
Matthew S Carroll5 days ago
3 to read: VR for news ready for takeoff?
By Matt Carroll <@MattatMIT>| Where the newsroom jobs are (physically) | Meet team Beta, from the NYT ¶ By Matt Carroll <@MattatMIT> ¶ Virtual reality in journalism: Every year it seems like “this is the year” for VR. But maybe this *is* the year. The Knight Foundation takes a deep look at VR in this series. Here’s everything you want to know: Key trends, best storytelling practices, key challenges, and metrics. ¶ Internet news jobs are going to the coasts.Matthew S CarrollMar 30
3 to read: The epic journey of Dropbox | The art of the smear | News tips from news geeks
By Matt Carroll <@MattatMIT>Some excellent reads this week. ¶ The epic story of Dropbox’s exodus from the Amazon cloud empire: The epic journey of Dropbox: Dropbox moved to the cloud. Sounds dull as mud for a story, right? Which it should be, unless you have a master writer tell the tale. A fascinating take. ¶ The art of the smear: What happens when a troll takes on a Bloomberg reporter? It’s not pretty, but the troll is getting the worst of it.Matthew S CarrollMar 24
3 to read: Twitter’s savior? | Gender bias in news stories | Mobile’s cool design opportunities
By Matt Carroll <@MattatMIT>A busy week: ¶ — Saving the “fail whale”: Everyone and their mother is kicking around poor Twitter. Can new CEO Jack Dorsey turn around the fail whale? Well, if anyone can, he’s the guy to do it, say people interviewed by Erin Griffith of Fortune. ¶ — It’s still a man’s world: Gender bias in news stories. Atlantic writer Adrienne LaFrance set out to improve the gender balance in the people she interviewed for her stories.Matthew S CarrollMar 16
3 to read: NYT reinvents Page 1 for mobile | Snapchat finds its groove | Controlling comment trolls
By Matt Carroll <@MattatMIT>Lots of cool stuff this week: ¶ Ken Doctor points out what a great job the New York Times has done with “Page 1” of its web site. It’s better even than the much-admired print version, he writes. (I’m also a fan.) ¶ Snapchat is carving its own path through social media. It’s different from the other social platforms. For instance, check out the interesting (if not terribly deep) work in its Discover section, writes Logan Hill.Matthew S CarrollMar 8
Spotlight gives a boost to journos | Readers vs ad blockers: some hope | Why newsrooms need AMP
By Matt Carroll <@MattatMIT>It’s been a busy week: ¶ The “Spotlight” movie won big at the Oscars, providing a much-needed morale boost for journalists. Maybe “Spotlight II” will figure out how to create more revenue for newsrooms… (Transparency alert: I’m one of the reporters in the movie. And yes, I think it’s totally awesome. ;-) ¶ Publishers hate ad blockers. But one study found that readers are willing to turn off their ad blocker, if they get access to a news site.Matthew S CarrollMar 3
News publishers are so over | BuzzFeed: The 100-year plan | It’s getting worse for local news
By Matt Carroll <@MattatMIT>Interesting media pieces, picked up here and there. ¶ emily bell, who runs the Tow Center at Columbia, writes about how news publishers are losing their reason for existing. Other pieces of the news business are doing fine. For instance, distribution platforms — ie, social — and content creators are doing well. But it’s that piece in the middle, the publishers, who are finding themselves squeezed.Matthew S CarrollFeb 24