digital news

The former president’s apparent decision to skip the first debate is a major affront both to the Republican National Committee and to Fox News, which is hosting the event.

Roughly 18 months after choosing Denver as the test market for an original local news experiment, the national app NewsBreak plans to pull the plug. “While disappointed with this decision, I understand the changing media landscape,” said NewsBreak Denver’s editor, Sara Hansen.

Facebook is shunning the news business in the U.S. The Meta-owned company has quietly made changes in recent months that have dramatically reduced referral traffic to media outlets, more than half a dozen publishers say. The move has put considerable dents in the daily traffic publishers see, with the damage appearing to be more pronounced among those who publish more hard news-oriented content. “If you’re a major publisher, you’ve gotten nicked,” said an executive at a major media company, who like others spoke on the condition of anonymity.

Hawk+ is a streaming platform brimming with original content produced by students at Montclair State University. They’re hoping it’s a new model for student media to follow.

Ahron Young, CEO of Ticker News and its primary anchor, explains why he turned solely to FAST channel terrain for what he’s positioning as a global news service. A full transcript of the conversation is included.

Meta has begun the process to end access to news on Facebook and Instagram for all users in Canada, the company said on Tuesday. The move comes in response to legislation in the country requiring internet giants to pay news publishers. Meta’s communications director, Andy Stone, said the changes will roll out in the coming weeks.

NBC’s Today has introduced new motion graphics that embrace the show’s sunrise and build upon recent changes at Nightly News. Debuting with the Monday, July 31, edition of Today, the design pays homage to the program’s iconic sunrise logo, with its arcs and curves integrated throughout the broadcast design package.

It’s the latest evolution for scrappy nonprofit Mississippi Today, founded seven years ago by former NBC News executive Andy Lack. Pictured: Mississippi Today reporter Anna Wolfe (center), with her parents, Bethel and Chris Wolfe, celebrating the news that she had won the 2023 Pulitzer Prize for Local Reporting in Jackson, Miss., in May. (Rogelio V. Solis/AP)

The cable company acquired the network, once billed as “CNBC for millennials,” in 2019 for $200 million.

When WOIO, Gray’s CBS affiliate in Cleveland, launched its OTT desk, little did it know that it would lead to a company-wide initiative at Gray and give WOIO the ability to launch a live 6 p.m. newscast on its Telemundo affiliate WTCL.

The company was part of a group of bidders that offered $225 million to acquire the bankrupt media company.

Nearly 20 journalists will lose their jobs and more than 20 others will be moved to new assignments.

Fox News has sent a cease-and-desist letter to Tucker Carlson as he ramps up a competing series on Twitter that drew a combined 169 million views for its first two episodes. Fox is continuing to pay Carlson, and maintains that his contract keeps his content exclusive to Fox through Dec. 31, 2024. Carlson is making a First Amendment argument for posting on Twitter, and asserts that Fox has committed material breaches of his contract.

The company will pay more than 150 U.S. news publications to feature their content.

Lester Holt has a new way of delivering headlines to the NBC Nightly News crowd. NBC News is updating the look of its venerable evening newscast, which has been on the air since 1970 and hasn’t undergone a significant overhaul of its graphics since Brian Williams sat in the anchor chair. The new presentation will move away from traditional colors associated with evening news programs in favor of purple and a warm blue, says Marc Greenstein, senior vice president of design and product for NBC News and MSNBC. Also on tap: a new “N” that can be used in innovative fashion on the many new screens on which Nightly plays in the era of digital video.

Fox News Wednesday notified Tucker Carlson’s lawyers that the former prime-time anchor violated his contract with the network when he launched his own Twitter show on Tuesday, according to a copy of a letter obtained by Axios. A breach of contract claim sets Fox News up to explore potential legal action against Carlson, a move that would intensify the already thorny public battle between the two parties. Carlson’s lawyers told Axios that any legal action by Fox would violate his First Amendment rights.

Meta is preparing to block news for some Canadians on Facebook and Instagram in a temporary test that is expected to last the majority of the month. The Silicon Valley tech giant is following in the steps of Google, which blocked news links for about five weeks earlier this year for some of its Canadian users in response to a controversial Liberal government bill. Bill C-18, which is currently being studied in the Senate, will require tech giants to pay publishers for linking to or otherwise repurposing their content online.

Facebook parent company Meta is threatening to remove news content on its platforms Instagram and Facebook in California if the state legislature passes a new proposal that would make tech companies pay publishers for news content. “If the Journalism Preservation Act passes, we will be forced to remove news from Facebook and Instagram rather than pay into a slush fund that primarily benefits big, out-of-state media companies under the guise of aiding California publishers,” reads a statement posted to Twitter by Meta spokesperson Andy Stone.

Bret Baier, chief political anchor at Fox News Channel, will moderate the third installment of The Senate Project series, which features senators from different ends of the political spectrum debating key issues. Sens. Joni Ernst (R-Iowa) and Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.) are featured. It takes place Monday, June 12, at 11 a.m. ET at the Edward M. Kennedy Institute for the United States Senate in Boston. The event will run live, commercial-free on Fox Nation and will air on Fox News Channel Sunday, June 18, at 10 p.m. ET.

CNN will shift the bulk of its operations behind its Spanish-language efforts to Mexico City, scaling back production of content for linear television in favor of work aimed at reaching a younger audience that favors mobile video. The move is likely to mean the elimination of jobs in Miami and Atlanta, but will also result in a ramp-up of jobs in Mexico and Los Angeles, where CNN will aim to add more than staffers, according to a person familiar with the plans, which were disclosed to employees Thursday afternoon.

The media start-up’s new backers include Henry Kravis, a founder of the private-equity giant KKR, and Jerry Yang, a Yahoo founder.

The company’s high-volume approach to digital publishing has led to duplicated stories and alienated some of its journalists. At least one editor has already resigned.

The findings in two new reports raise fresh concerns over how artificial intelligence may transform the misinformation landscape online.

Just weeks after benchmarking the number of AI-generated news and information sites at 49, NewsGuard has updated the figure to 125 — a 155% increase, according to a new report published by the news and information ratings service. “The number of AI-generated content farms continues to proliferate,” NewsGuard states, adding a new classification of “unreliable AI-generated news site,” or UAIN to the lexicon of questionable news and information content being tracked by the service.

Kyle Rogers, news director of Gray Television’s Local News Live, explains how the streaming news service has upped its game and its polish since its relocation to Washington, D.C., and settling into a more conventionally anchored approach to stitching together local reports from around the U.S. A full transcript of the conversation is included.

Vice Media Group, popular for websites such as Vice and Motherboard, filed for bankruptcy protection on Monday to engineer its sale to a group of lenders, capping years of financial difficulties and top-executive departures. Vice said that the lender consortium, which includes Fortress Investment Group, Soros Fund Management and Monroe Capital, will provide about $225 million in the form of a credit bid for substantially all of the company’s assets and also assume significant liabilities at closing.

Amid continued erosion of the cable bundle (and therefore the reach of cable news channels), NBC News is embarking on a fresh pitch for its NBC News Now streaming offering. The free, ad-supported streaming service (which the company says is profitable) launched four years ago, but NBC News EVP Janelle Rodriguez, who oversees News Now, thinks there is more to do. “We want to keep reintroducing ourselves to new audiences who are seeking out that kind of 24-hour news accessibility,” she says.