What We’re Reading

We keep an eye out for the most interesting stories about Labby subjects: digital media, startups, the web, journalism, strategy, and more.

Poynter / Daniel Funke

What’s the difference between @financialtimes and @financialtimess? An Instagram marketing scam →

“The network of accounts Poynter found on Instagram seem to be run by a Los Angeles-based company that promises to boost followers and interactions for Instagram users. Plans range between $16 and $90 per week and include everything from automated liking and audience targeting to content strategy and marketing reports.”

What else we were reading on August 24

Reynolds Journalism Institute / Judd Slivka

Are either of these new drone models right for journalism? →

“The Mavic Pro 2 is selling for $1,449. The Mavic Zoom is selling for $1,249. It’s a marginal price difference, but I can’t see why you’d spend the extra $200 if you’re doing daily journalism.”

MotherBoard / Jason Koebler and Joseph Cox

Inside Facebook’s struggle to moderate 2 billion people →

“The dinners demonstrated a commitment from Zuckerberg to solve the hard problems that Facebook has created for itself through its relentless quest for growth. But several people who attended the dinners said they believe that they were starting the conversation on fundamentally different ground: Zuckerberg believes that Facebook’s problems can be solved. Many experts do not.”

BuzzFeed News / Kevin Collier

Tech companies are gathering today for a secret meeting to prepare a 2018 election strategy →

“Last week, Facebook’s head of cybersecurity policy, Nathaniel Gleicher, invited employees from a dozen companies, including Google, Microsoft, and Snapchat, to gather at Twitter’s headquarters in downtown San Francisco, according to an email obtained by BuzzFeed News.”

Poynter / David Beard

Voters from 426 out of 435 U.S. Congressional districts have signed up for ProPublica’s “User’s Guide to Democracy” →

“The newsletter was actually conceived just a few weeks ago. As we looked ahead at the upcoming midterms, we saw an opportunity to tie together many threads from our reporting on voting access, election security, Congressional activity and political advertising. When we pulled all this information together, we realized it could help voters at different stages of the voting process, as well as after the election.”

Deadspin / Laura Wagner

The Athletic is struggling to recruit writers for its Washington, D.C. publication →

“A variety of reporters at the Washington Post and in the D.C. area, who spoke to Deadspin about The Athletic’s efforts, described a failure to execute an audacious plan to pillage one of the last good sports desks at an American newspaper (even as the newsroom within which that desk is situated goes to war with its cartoon plutocrat owner), an inability to entice other notable reporters with roots in the area, and a failure to either notice or care that a ready-made operation with deep local connections was right there, ready to be absorbed.” —SW

The Kansas City Star / Jeff Rosen

The Miami Herald and Kansas City Star are now offering sports-only digital subscriptions →

“For $30 a year — just $2.50 a month — Sports Pass is your ticket to everything sports-related on Kansascity.com. As a subscriber, you will have unlimited digital access to every sports story The Star publishes, with no limits.” Same goes for the Miami Herald: “If you value this good work, subscribe to our sports-only digital plan. At $30 per year, it’s the best value for the most robust sports coverage in South Florida.”