Facebook’s changes, information overload and mobile journalism

Our personal weekly selection about journalism and innovation. Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter.

edited by Marco Nurra

• Europe tries to fight hate, harassment, and fake news without killing free speech. “While the US has the First Amendment, which provides even hateful speech with significant legislative protection, many European countries have a much more nuanced view of the balance between free speech and social order. But that is making it even harder for them to figure out where to draw the line, or where to have social networks draw it for them.”
  🔔 Mathew Ingram will be a #ijf18 speaker
• Good luck banning fake news — here’s why it’s unlikely to happen. “From a legal point of view, it’s not easy to define what fake news is. The very term suggests intent, but how to separate this from the fact that the media has long been allowed to make mistakes to perform its democratic functions?”
• Facebook’s Changes. “My new definition of journalism: convening communities into civil, informed, and productive conversation, reducing polarization and building trust through helping citizens find common ground in facts and understanding. Will Facebook’s changes help or hurt that cause? We shall see.”
  🔔 Jeff Jarvis will be a #ijf18 speaker
• How small publishers can adapt to Facebook’s News Feed update. Conversation is definitely the harder part of this formula, but it also stands to be the most rewarding — on Facebook, and in your journalism.
• Why the end of news in the Facebook News Feed is great news for news. “There is no way journalism could make the necessary evolutionary shift to the era of personal trust as long as it was locked into a ad-funded business model ranked by scale and emotion. In that context, Facebook may well have done an historic favour by cutting off its supply of dopamine-fuelled traffic to news publishers.”
  🔔 Mark Little will be a #ijf18 speaker
• Facebook changes could help the media kick its algorithm addiction. “Moving from an advertising-focused model to one that relies on reader subscriptions may be the prudent move, but getting from point A to point B could be difficult, and some companies may not be able to make the transition. For them, Facebook’s latest algorithm could be what Mother Jones Senior Editor Ben Dreyfuss called ‘an extinction-level event.’”
• Americans say greater access to news sources is actually making it harder to stay informed, according to “American Views: Trust, Media and Democracy,” a new report from Gallup and the Knight Foundation.
• Breaking News. “The logic of consuming ‘more news’ — getting more information and facts, more numbers, more precise probabilities — is a matter of entertainment, a chance to vicariously feel in the know and to align one’s identity with that feeling. The political ‘wonks’ and ‘nerds’ during the campaign could make you feel super-informed but that feeling is distinct from being informed. The taste for more news becomes its own end.”
  🔔 Nathan Jurgenson will be a #ijf18 speaker
• More female reporters abroad (please). “There’s been a lot of talk about the need to diversify the workplace, and bring in more female reporters. Will media organizations practice what they preach and employ more women in their foreign postings?”
  🔔 Amie Ferris-Rotman will be a #ijf18 speaker
• Seven lessons learned in a year teaching mobile journalism. “Smartphones have been used by journalists for nearly ten years, to create content for radio, online and social platforms and — as the cameras and associated apps have improved — for TV. As mobile journalism becomes more widely used, universities and colleges are building ‘Mojo’ into formal journalism degrees.”
  🔔 Corinne Podger will be a #ijf18 speaker