Want to boost local news subscriptions? Giving your readers a say in story ideas can help

[Nieman Lab: The Daily Digest] Thursday, September 14, 2023 [Want to boost local news subscriptions? Giving your readers a say in story ideas can help]( “By providing a service that answers questions posed by audience members, audiences are more likely to reciprocate through subscriptions.” By Sophie Culpepper. What We’re Reading Freedom of the Press Foundation / Caitlin Vogus [U.S. politicians retaliate against the press using public notices →]( “A [quirk of Kansas law]( has allowed localities to [exempt themselves]( from the state law requiring publication of public notices in local newspapers. [Several bills]( that would eliminate the requirement that public notices be published in newspapers were introduced in other states in 2023.” The New York Times / Benjamin Mullin [Cable TV is on life support, but a new bundle is coming alive →]( “Already, many cord-cutters are piecing together their own bundle, subscribing to a mix of services including Netflix, Max and Hulu. The deal between Disney and Charter has made it clear that cable providers — which often provide broadband internet service — are eager to put together streaming bundles for them.” The Daily Beast / Corbin Bolies [Bob Boilen, creator of “Tiny Desk” series, leaves NPR after 35 years →]( “Boilen’s desk has seen the likes of Taylor Swift, Usher, Weezer, and Megan Thee Stallion occupy the space to play a collection of hits, spawning a critically acclaimed franchise for NPR. It followed Boilen’s All Songs Considered, which has become the cornerstone of the company’s music division.” Poynter / Angela Fu [Dallas Morning News offers buyouts as it seeks profitability →]( “The company has not had a profitable quarter since Q4 of 2021, and it ended its most recent quarter with a net loss of $0.9 million due in part to declines in print advertising revenue.” Futurism / Victor Tangermann [Microsoft publishes garbled AI article calling tragically deceased NBA player “useless” →]( “The full story is that back in 2020, MSN fired the team of human journalists responsible for vetting content published on its platform. As a result, as we reported last year, the platform ended up syndicating large numbers of sloppy articles about topics as dubious Bigfoot and mermaids, which it deleted after we pointed them out.” The Washington Post / Tim Starks [In a first, spyware is found on phone of prominent Russian journalist →]( “When you have such a globally unregulated tool, it’s just going to become part of the norm — that human rights defenders, activists, journalists, opposition figures and so forth are going to be regular targets.” The Rebooting / Brian Morrissey [The messy middle of video →]( “In the survey [of 165 publishers] and through stakeholder interviews, we found that publishers are scrambling to catch up as consumers’ preference shifts to video, yet they’re struggling to match that with revenue. In fact, half of respondents to our survey said they are generating less than 10% of their revenue from video.” Rest of World / Nilesh Christopher [AI image generators have a moderation problem →]( “Particularly around things like violence, platforms would come back and reject those kinds of queries completely across the board. Midjourney did that pretty much consistently. DALL-E did that as well when it came to violent images, or child sexual abuse material. Stable Diffusion, on the other hand, I didn’t really see a ton of content moderation in general.” Los Angeles Times / Matt Pearce [Bill Maher is bringing “Real Time” back to HBO — without striking writers →]( “Maher’s move echoes the previous 2007-08 writers’ strike, when he restored his show mid-stoppage (along with hosts Jay Leno and Conan O’Brien) without writers or writing, and will likely face picketing by the Writers Guild of America.” Silver Bulletin / Nate Silver [Journalism needs more Taylor Swift reporters →]( “Taylor Swift didn’t take the local reporting jobs away. She won’t bring most of them back either, but if Swift can have an impact big enough to show up on the Federal Reserve’s radar, the Swiftie beat is at least worth a try.” Press Gazette / Bron Maher [New CEO of the UK’s Full Fact: Fact-checkers may need “to be a bit more rock and roll” →]( “Are there people that don’t like it in some media circles? Yeah, of course there are. I’m happy to debate them about it, frankly.” TechCrunch / Sarah Perez [WordPress blogs can now be followed in the fediverse, including Mastodon →]( “WordPress’s support for ActivityPub follows a number of moves by other publishers to embrace the fediverse. Earlier this year, Medium announced it would launch its own Mastodon server and integrate with ActivityPub. Magazine app Flipboard also announced it was launching its own instance on flipboard.social and integrated with Mastodon so its users could follow Mastodon updates in the Flipboard app.” [Nieman Lab]( / [Fuego]( [Twitter]( / [Facebook]( [View email in browser]( [Unsubscribe]( You are receiving this daily newsletter because you signed up for for it at www.niemanlab.org. Nieman Journalism Lab Harvard University 1 Francis Ave.Cambridge, MA 02138 [Add us to your address book](