Media Nation

A new study argues that Google and Facebook should be paying billions for news

A new study argues that Google and Facebook should be paying U.S. news publishers between $11.9 billion and $13.9 billion a year for the use of their journalism. Of that total, Facebook owes $1.9 billion and Google between $10 billion and $12 billion. That’s a lot of money. By way of comparison, the recently announced Press Forward philanthropic initiative seeks to raise $500 million to support nonprofit local news over the next five years.

An overview of the study, conducted by researchers at the University of Houston, Columbia University and the Brattle Group, an international consulting firm, was published Monday in The Conversation. “Digital platforms benefit from having varied, credible and timely news content provided by publishers,” write two of the four reseachers, Anya Schiffrin and Haaris Mateen. “This enhances user engagement and makes their platform more attractive to advertisers. News publishers benefit by finding an avenue through which they can distribute their content, thereby reaching more readers.”

The study itself, which is based on “game theoretical insights into cooperative bargaining in cases where value is jointly created,” argues that the platforms and news publishers should split the revenue generated by that mutually beneficial relationship on a 50-50 basis rather than allowing the platforms to keep virtually all of it, as is now the case. “We document that Google and Facebook are making payments to publishers around the world that are vastly below our estimates of a ‘fair payment,’” they write.

The study looks at an Australian law passed several years ago that mandated such revenue sharing. The authors also note that the Journalism Competition and Preservation Act, whose principal sponsor is U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., would establish similar payments by forcing the giant platforms to negotiate with publishers for a share of their revenue.

Ben Smith, writing in Semafor, observes that attempts to extract money from the platforms came about because efforts to support news with digital advertising hit a dead end. “The drive to force digital platforms to pay news publishers came after a decade in which publishers chased online ad revenue generated by traffic from social and search platforms — only to find that clicks simply couldn’t underwrite the cost of quality journalism,” according to Smith, who adds: “The new study will be a cudgel for regulators looking to squeeze Meta and (especially) Google.”

The question is whether anything is likely to happen and, more important, if the push for platform revenues is coming too late. The platforms don’t look quite as powerful today as they did a few years ago. Google is currently on trial in a massive antitrust case over its ubiquitous search engine. Moreover, after Canada passed a revenue-sharing law, Facebook simply withdrew all news content, and Google has threatened to do the same.

I’ve long argued that lawsuits filed by news publishers over Google’s ad tech are a more promising route to getting some money out of the platforms. About 200 newspapers are suing Google, claiming that the platform’s control of all aspects of the digital advertising market has driven ad prices through the floor to Google’s benefit. The publishers are also suing Facebook, claiming that Google and Facebook colluded illegally. Separately, Gannett is suing Google, but not Facebook.

The new study takes an interesting look at the extent of the damage that Google and Facebook have caused the news business, but I don’t see how that translates into actual revenues for news — especially with Facebook and Google signaling that they’re willing to walk away from news altogether rather than pay.

The ad-tech cases, on the other hand, are grounded in well-established law banning monopolistic practices that cause harm. Google and Facebook have made it impossible for anyone to extract more than a pittance from digital advertising. That’s fine with the platforms because of their massive scale — but it doesn’t work for news outlets, especially small, local enterprises, because they need more than pennies to pay for quality journalism in their communities.

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Does Fox News lead or follow its audience? Yes.

Brian Stelter. Photo (cc) 2017 by nrkbeta

Does Fox News lead or follow its audience? I’ve long thought it was both.

During the 2015-’16 presidential campaign, Fox tried to take out Donald Trump, as when then-Fox host Megyn Kelly confronted Trump with his misogynistic remarks at the first Republican debate. It didn’t work, and eventually Fox got with the program. Then, after Joe Biden defeated Trump in 2020, Fox tried to play it straight, more or less. Famously, it was the first media outlet to call Arizona for Biden, a state that ensured his victory. But when Fox’s audience started stampeding to farther-right cable channels like Newsmax and OAN, Fox reversed itself and embraced Trump’s lies so tightly that it cost them $787 million in a libel settlement.

Brian Stelter makes that argument in an interview with Tom Jones of Poynter. Stelter, who’s written a new book about Fox called “Network of Lies,” tells Jones that most Fox employees don’t much care about politics. Instead, they are motivated by the usual: making a living. Here’s an excerpt:

For most, it’s just a job, not a calling. Some producer and director types truly believe in the Trump agenda and will stop at nothing to see him reelected. But most are just trying to make good TV. They definitely aren’t losing sleep about Fox’s coarsening of the culture or Trump’s brainwashing of the base.

I write in the book that rank-and-file staffers like to gossip about hookups between hosts and ratings rivalries between shows. On the occasions when I steered my source chats in a more serious direction, toward the impact of Fox-fueled disinformation on society and democracy, staffers turned cagey or dismissive. I heard some predictable whataboutism and rants about the flaws of other networks.

Bottom line: I think introspection and accountability are in short supply at Fox, a tone that’s set at the top, by Rupert, who advised Fox News Media CEO Suzanne Scott years ago to “ignore the noise.”

You should read the whole thing. And by the way, although Stelter probably isn’t interested, I wonder if it might be possible for new CNN head Mark Thompson to lure Stelter back now that the brief, unlamented Chris Licht era is over. Stelter appeared on CNN last week to plug his book, so who knows? I wouldn’t expect to see Stelter return to his old job, which is being ably filled by Oliver Darcy. But Stelter is among the very best media reporters in the business, and it would be great to see him return in some capacity.

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CommonWealth Beacon reports new details on Andrea Estes’ firing by the Globe

CommonWealth Beacon has just published a story by its editor, Bruce Mohl, shedding some light on an exceedingly strange episode from earlier this year: The Boston Globe’s decision to fire veteran investigative reporter Andrea Estes after the paper published a story reporting that three top MBTA managers were living far from Greater Boston when in fact they made their homes in the local area. The story, on which Estes had the lead byline, reported that nine T officials had such an arrangement; in fact, it was six. The Globe had to run several corrections as a result.

Mohl reports that the errors in the story came about because the managers themselves were not allowed as a matter of policy to speak with the press without permission, and that they thought the MBTA public relations office was going to respond on their behalf — but the Massachusetts Department of Transportation (MassDOT) ordered the T to stay silent. Mohl writes:

At the MBTA, workers are advised not to talk to reporters, leaving that job to public relations officials. But in this instance the MBTA public relations officials, on orders from higher-ups at the Massachusetts Department of Transportation, ignored calls from Estes seeking to verify the information she had gathered. The result was a story that unfairly tarred at least three employees at the MBTA and caused the firing of Estes.

Disclosure: I’m a member of CommonWealth’s board of advisers.

This entire saga has been weird, and though Mohl’s story answers some of the outstanding questions, it doesn’t answer all of them. Why would MassDOT not allow the T to defend its own employees? Why was Estes fired if she wasn’t entirely at fault? In addition, editor Nancy Barnes said there would be some public accountability after Estes left the Globe, but Mohl suggests that may have been derailed by a pending arbitration hearing sought by Estes.

A further indication that at least some of Estes’ peers believe she was wronged came when she was hired recently as a staff reporter by the Plymouth Independent, a fledgling nonprofit edited by Mark Pothier, until recently a high-ranking editor at the Globe, and advised by Globe legend Walter Robinson. “Having her on staff sends a strong message about the kind of serious journalism we plan to do,” Pothier said in a press release announcing her hiring.

Thanks to Mohl’s digging, we now know more than we did. I still hope the full story comes out at some point.

Earlier:

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Friedman’s dark vision

Thomas Friedman has been indispensable in the aftermath of Hamas’ terrorist attack on Israel and the war that is now under way in Gaza. Here’s a free link to his latest, which is very dark indeed.

He calls Benjamin Netanyahu “the worst leader in its [Israel’s] history — maybe in all of Jewish history,” someone who is incapable or unwilling to make any of the diplomatic concessions needed to bring about even the slightest glimmer of a more hopeful future. Friedman also argues that, unlike in previous conflicts, Israel really does face an existential threat, with Hamas, Hezbollah, Islamic militias in Iraq, Houthis in Yemen, Iran and even Vladimir Putin’s Russia “threatening Israel with a 360-degree war all at once.”

“It is crystal clear to me, Friedman writes, “that Israel is in real danger — more danger than at any other time since its War of Independence in 1948.”

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Two Globe journalists are among more than 750 decrying Gaza war coverage

Two Boston Globe journalists have signed an open letter that criticizes the Western media for their coverage of the war between Israel and Hamas. According to The Washington Post (free link), more than 750 journalists from dozens of media outlets have signed the letter, which begins:

Israel’s devastating bombing campaign and media blockade in Gaza threatens newsgathering in an unprecedented fashion. We are running out of time.

More than 10,000 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s four-week siege. Included in the mounting death toll are at least 35 journalists, according to the Committee to Protect Journalists, in what the group calls the deadliest conflict for journalists since it began tracking deaths in 1992. Scores more have been injured, detained, gone missing or seen their family members killed.

As reporters, editors, photographers, producers, and other workers in newsrooms around the world, we are appalled at the slaughter of our colleagues and their families by the Israeli military and government.

We are writing to urge an end to violence against journalists in Gaza and to call on Western newsroom leaders to be clear-eyed in coverage of Israel’s repeated atrocities against Palestinians.

The Globe journalists who signed the letter are Peter Bailey-Wells, a multi-platform editor on the Express Desk, and Sahar Fatima, a digital editor for metro coverage. Another signer, Abdallah Fayyad, recently left the Globe’s opinion section to take a position at Vox. “My hope for this letter is to push back on the culture of fear around this issue, and to make decision-makers and reporters and editors think twice about the language that they use,” Fayyad told the Post.

Although the letter makes reference to Hamas’ Oct. 7 terrorist attack on Israel, in which more than 1,400 people were killed and 200 were taken hostage, the emphasis is on the way that Israel has conducted its campaign against Hamas in Gaza. As the Post notes, “Most strikingly, the letter argues that journalists should use words like ‘apartheid,’ ‘ethnic cleansing’ and ‘genocide’ to describe Israel’s treatment of Palestinians.”

The letter may also raise issues at news organizations that ban their journalists from taking sides on controversial matters, although this may prove to be less of an issue than it might have at one time. Several years ago news organizations like NPR and the Globe loosened some of their restrictions on political activities, especially those that advocated racial justice.

Frankly, if I worked at the Globe I would not have signed the open letter because I don’t think it sufficiently acknowledges the suffering of Israelis or their right to self-defense. But it doesn’t strike me that Bailey-Wells’ or Fatima’s journalistic fairness will be compromised because they chose to sign.

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Rhode Island’s public TV and radio operations announce they intend to merge

Downtown Providence, R.I. Photo (cc) 2019 by Kenneth C. Zirkel.

Executives at Rhode Island’s public television and radio operations said today that they intend to merge. Rhode Island PBS and The Public’s Radio will employ a combined staff of nearly 100, which, according to their announcement, will accelerate “their capacity to seamlessly deliver fresh, relevant content to existing and expanded audiences.”

Such a combination is not unusual. In Boston, GBH News — the local operation within public broadcasting behemoth GBH — includes both television and radio, with quite a bit of cross-pollination. In addition, among the projects that Ellen Clegg and I examine in our forthcoming book, “What Works in Community News,” is NJ Spotlight News, which represents a merger between a digital news outlet covering state politics and policy and the state’s public television station. The daily newscast features journalists from Spotlight, while the website integrates clips from the newscast.

Rhode Island PBS’s partnership with The Boston Globe’s Rhode Island operation will continue, according to the Globe’s Lylah Alphonse.

At one time, the news ecosystem in Rhode Island revolved around The Providence Journal, once a robust, nationally respected paper that has been decimated by Gannett, its corporate owner. Though the folks who remain at the Journal continue to do good work, The Public’s Radio, the Globe and a number of smaller outlets now compete for news and mindshare.

The merger must be approved by the FCC and the Rhode Island attorney general’s office. The full announcement is below.

The Public’s Radio and Rhode Island PBS Announce Plans to Merge

Pending Regulatory Approval, New Public Media Entity to Engage Audiences Across Rhode Island and Southeastern Massachusetts

PROVIDENCE – Rhode Island PBS and The Public’s Radio announced today their plan to merge, creating an innovative and dynamic regional public media organization to best serve and support the communities of Rhode Island and southeastern Massachusetts.

Pending federal and state regulatory approval, the unification of these trusted and respected institutions — with deep histories of informing, educating, entertaining, and engaging the public — will allow their combined teams of nearly 100 to collaborate, including the most talented reporters and storytellers in the region, accelerating their capacity to seamlessly deliver fresh, relevant content to existing and expanded audiences.

“We have believed for quite some time that our amazing organizations will be stronger and achieve even greater impact together,” said Dave Laverty, chair of the Rhode Island PBS Foundation Board. “By combining resources and talent, we can build on our respective traditions of trust and integrity to meet audiences where they are, across platforms, to deliver rich programming that is meaningful, accessible, and inclusive. By working together, we will create an opportunity to bring a more powerful and necessary public media voice to serve our community.”

Between the two organizations, they boast a number of awards and distinctions, including Emmys, Telly Awards, and recognition from the Public Media Journalists Association and Edward R. Murrow Awards.

“This is a tremendously exciting moment for our organizations and for the audiences we serve. Together, with our partners in public television, we will bring the incredible work of our teams into more homes and communities, and in new and different ways,” said Elizabeth Delude-Dix, chair of board of directors of The Public’s Radio, formerly known as Rhode Island Public Radio. “As a unified public media organization, we anticipate building new relationships and fostering deep partnerships while opening our audience’s eyes and ears to new experiences in the arts, sciences, humanities, and politics. A vibrant public media can create a stronger civic life and, together, we can better deliver on our missions.”

The proposed merger, which would join the ranks of a number of public media mergers nationwide, is contingent upon a regulatory process by the Federal Communications Commission and the state Attorney General’s office. In the meantime, viewers and listeners will continue to see and hear all their favorite programs.

“At The Public’s Radio, we want our stories to start conversations. Our thoughtfulness and independence are a core part of our mission and identity. These values are shared by our colleagues at Rhode Island PBS,” said Torey Malatia, president, chief executive officer, and general manager of The Public’s Radio. “Together, we want every listener, viewer, and follower — every supporter and every skeptic — to have access to the best information necessary to be engaged in their communities. That will be our north star as we take these exciting next steps forward to create an innovative and inclusive joint public media venture.”

“I have dedicated the last 25 years to Rhode Island PBS because I am a passionate believer in the value of public television,” said David Piccerelli, president of Rhode Island PBS. “The media landscape and the demands of our viewers have changed significantly in that time, and yet we continue to deliver award-winning programming. I am ecstatic about this merger because it enhances our ability to do just that: tell powerful stories and make an impact on our community.”

Malatia and Piccerelli will continue to serve as CEOs. Once the merger is completed, Rhode Island PBS and The Public’s Radio will launch an inclusive engagement process to help co-create a vision for a new combined public media organization focused on serving our diverse communities with quality journalism through broadcast and digital channels.

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Threads may be a better place (for now) than X/Twitter, but let’s not get too excited

These days I do most of my microblogging (now there’s a blast from the past) at Threads, the Meta-owned Twitter alternative that is moving ahead of Bluesky and Mastodon, if not ahead of Twitter itself. Threads is filled with self-congratulatory posts about how nice everyone is along with occasional criticism of people for not walking away completely from Elon Musk, who has transformed X/Twitter from the hellsite it already was into something even worse.

Well, lest we forget, here’s the top to Brian Fung’s CNN story on the latest in a lawsuit brought against Meta by Massachusetts Attorney General Andrea Campbell:

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has personally and repeatedly thwarted initiatives meant to improve the well-being of teens on Facebook and Instagram, at times directly overruling some of his most senior lieutenants, according to internal communications made public as part of an ongoing lawsuit against the company.

The newly unsealed communications in the lawsuit — filed originally by Massachusetts last month in a state court — allegedly show how Zuckerberg ignored or shut down top executives, including Instagram CEO Adam Mosseri and President of Global Affairs Nick Clegg, who had asked Zuckerberg to do more to protect the more than 30 million teens who use Instagram in the United States.

Mosseri, in case you don’t know, is the guy who’s in charge of Threads. As for the great Threads versus Twitter debate, well, pick your favorite evil billionaire. At least Zuckerberg and Mosseri seem to want Threads to be a well-run platform that makes money rather than a plaything for a right-wing sociopath — which is what Twitter has devolved into.

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The incorrigible New York Times

How did the editors not catch this? Or did they actually add it? Just gobsmackingly awful:

President Biden, perhaps Amtrak’s most famous advocate, announced $16.4 billion in funding for rail projects on Monday, exhibiting a business-as-usual approach as polls show him trailing former President Donald J. Trump one year before Election Day.

Speaking at a maintenance warehouse where Amtrak trains are serviced in Bear, Del., Mr. Biden made no mention of the polling from The New York Times and Siena College polls.

Instead, he offered familiar anecdotes about his days as a senator, when a conductor named Angelo would call him “Joey, baby!” and squeeze his cheeks as he made the 90-minute ride between Washington and his home in Wilmington, Del.

Mr. Biden also promoted the $1 trillion infrastructure law he signed into law two years ago, which included $66 billion for investments in rail systems.

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In Marblehead and Waltham, teachers and officials seek to stifle public scrutiny

In Marblehead, a number of teachers and other school staff members recently showed up at a school committee meeting to complain about public records requests filed by a nonprofit news organization that covers the town. In Waltham, the city solicitor issued what amounted to a pre-election gag order, advising city officials who were running for re-election that if they participated in candidates forums they should not address pending municipal business. These two attempts to shut down discussion of important community issues have earned the perps our latest New England Muzzle Awards (see explanation here).

First, let’s take a look at what’s going on in Marblehead. According to Ryan Vermette of the Marblehead Weekly News, the co-presidents of the teachers union, the Marblehead Education Association, said at a school committee meeting that public records requests submitted by Marblehead Current reporter Leigh Blander were costing the town money and creating a stressful situation for their members. Vermette’s article begins:

The library at Marblehead High School was standing room only at the start of the School Committee’s meeting last Thursday night as dozens of district staff stood with committee members against what they alleged was an excessive amount of Freedom of Information (FOIA) requests from a local newspaper.

“Not only does this waste significant time and resources for the district, but it causes significant stress for our educators, who become the subject of these investigations, and their reputations come under attack,” Vermette quoted co-president Jonathan Heller as saying. “While the number of incidents is relatively small to date, the threat they represent is apparent.” The other co-president, Sally Shevory, was not quoted in the story.

Now. for some background, because this is a little complicated. The for-profit Marblehead Weekly News, published by The Daily Item of neighboring Lynn, is one of three independent news outlets covering the town. The Marblehead Current, where Blander works, is a nonprofit. The third, Marblehead Beacon, is a for-profit; oddly enough, Jenn Schaeffner, a founder, editor and reporter for the Beacon is also a member of the school committee. Beacon articles about the school system are appended with this: “She [Schaeffner] is recusing herself from Marblehead Beacon’s coverage of the School Committee and anything pertaining to Marblehead Public Schools.” As best as I could tell, the Beacon has made no mention of the public records issue.

Marblehead has been beset by several controversial issues involving the school system recently, including a heavily scrutinized statement by the superintendent about the war between Israel and Hamas; a bullying investigation involving a former high school soccer coach; and possible disciplinary issues involving a former superintendent. If you’d like, you can read all the details in a Current editorial responding to the public records matter. What’s relevant is that the Current is being called out by union leaders and school officials for trying to hold them to account through their journalism. As Blander said in a statement to the Weekly News: “In pursuit of our mission to foster democratic participation by informing our readers about important issues, including those that impact students and their families, the Current seeks to make responsible use of the public records laws.”

What’s more, there is no evidence that the Current has abused the public records law by filing an inordinate number of requests. According to the editorial, “Since our launch in June 2022, we have filed 15 public records requests, 14 of which have been directed to the School Department.” Eleven of those were related to the departure of the previous superintendent. To be fair, school officials determined that a recent request for records about complaints against teachers would have required poring over nearly 477,000 emails, and that the Current would be assessed $50,000. But as the editorial put it: “As should have been obvious, the Current was not seeking to commission such a voluminous and intrusive search. We agree that would not be the best use of school employees’ time (or our money). Moving forward, if we inadvertently submit overly broad records requests to record keepers, we hope our partners in public service would simply call us and ask, ‘What are you really looking for? Can we find a way to respond without overburdening our staff?'” The editorial concluded:

Our school officials have to realize, though, that if what they are asking is essentially “stop asking so many questions,” we view that prescription as a non-starter. While we will take better care to make our requests more targeted and less burdensome, we will continue to use the public records law to seek answers we believe the public deserves.

The public records law exists so that members of the public — and the press, acting as representatives of the public — can hold government accountable. This particular Muzzle Award goes not to any particular individual but, rather, to union officials and the school committee as a whole for promoting an atmosphere suggesting that they know best, and that the prying eyes of the press are not welcome.

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In Waltham, meanwhile, City Solicitor John Cervone has earned a Muzzle for issuing a ruling calling it “potentially problematic” if elected members of the city council who were participating in candidates forums addressed issues that were currently under consideration. This is an absurd restriction, since a challenger would be free to discuss such issues freely while the incumbent would be forced to sit there and say nothing except “upon the advice of counsel blah blah blah.” As a Boston Globe editorial put it:

The opinion appears to be based on vague — and somewhat shaky — legal grounds, and state officials ought to swat it down before the idea spreads. Some candidates in Waltham have understood it as a gag order in the heat of election season, a curb on political candidates’ speech at multicandidate forums that makes it harder for voters to make educated choices.

Justin Silverman, a lawyer who’s the executive director of the New England First Amendment Association, was quoted as saying that Cervone’s opinion appeared to be based on a misunderstanding of the state’s open meeting law. “If there isn’t a quorum present at public events, then it’s not a violation under the open meeting law,” Silverman said. No doubt — and yet it’s more than theoretically possible that a quorum of council members could be present at a candidates forum if they were all running for re-election.

A mayoral candidate, City Councilor Jonathan Paz, said Cervone’s opinion created a “chilling effect,” adding, “We as candidates are supposed to be candid, we’re supposed to be transparent about our values and our positions on certain matters.” And wouldn’t you know it: Paz lost his challenge to incumbent Mayor Jeannette McCarthy by a wide margin. No doubt it’s a stretch to say that the gag order hurt Paz’s campaign — but surely it didn’t help.

The Globe editorial notes that a similar issue arose in Newton four years ago. It’s time to clarify the law so that muncipal lawyers in other communities don’t travel down a similar censorious path.

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White ex-employees sue Gannett over diversity

A news organization can’t do its job as well as it should unless its journalists are as diverse as the community they cover. The giant newspaper chain Gannett, for all its faults, has long enjoyed a reputation for taking diversity seriously. Now the company is being sued by former white employees who claim they were laid off while less qualified Black staff members kept their jobs. Taylor Telford reports (free link) for The Washington Post:

The case is among the first to test the legality of corporate diversity practices in the wake of a June Supreme Court ruling that struck down affirmative action in college admissions. That decision has sparked a wave of litigation aimed at racial considerations in the workplace, including claims that corporate efforts to increase diversity have disadvantaged White employees.

I’m sympathetic toward anyone who loses their job, but I’m not sympathetic to the argument that the plaintiffs are making. News organizations are like police departments and school systems in that racial diversity is an intrinsic part of serving their community. Who is seated at the table when decisions are being made about what stories to cover and how to cover them? I hope this lawsuit doesn’t go anywhere, but I suspect my hopes will not be fulfilled.

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