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.

Press Gazette / Charlotte Tobitt

Online overtakes TV as biggest source of news in UK for first time →

“More people are getting news online than they are from TV for the first time, according to Ofcom’s annual survey of news consumption habits in the UK. And within that online segment, publisher websites are falling in influence and social media (which includes publisher accounts) dominates.” —SC

What else we were reading on September 10

The Guardian / Mark Sweney

GB News investor Paul Marshall seals £100m deal to buy Spectator →

“Marshall, the hedge fund tycoon who already owns the UnHerd website, is also in the running to buy The Daily and Sunday Telegraph with the second round of bids by prospective buyers due by 27 September.”

Variety / Brian Steinberg

Jorge Ramos, Univision news legend, will exit at year-end →

“Ramos has pressed for better representation of Spanish-language media when it comes to access to major U.S. politicians. He has grilled lawmakers on immigration policy — a top issue among his viewership — and saw his profile gain a different sort of traction in 2015 as he sought an interview with then-candidate Donald Trump. Trump, who had put Ramos’ cell-phone number on social media, famously had Ramos pushed out of a room during a press conference in Iowa, and then allowed the journalist to return.”

The Atlantic / Arash Azizi

The dangerous rise of the podcast historians →

“‘I think the podcast media is intrinsically tough because a lot of people go to podcasts for what I call ‘shortcut learning,’ and that lends itself to the charlatans and self-styled non-PC ‘truth tellers,’ from [Joe] Rogan to Tucker,’ [said] Joseph Stieb, a historian at the U.S. Naval War College and an avid user of X.” —LO

Wired / Will Knight

Why is AI so bad at generating images of Kamala Harris? →

“Despite being a prominent figure, Harris hasn’t been as widely photographed as Trump. Wired’s search of photo supplier Getty Images bears this out; it returned 63,295 images of Harris compared to 561,778 of Trump. Given her relatively recent entry into the presidential race, Harris is ‘a new celebrity,’ as far as AI image makers are concerned, according to Cuenca Abela…That Harris is a Black woman, of Jamaican and Indian descent, also may be a factor. Irene Solaiman, head of global policy at AI company Hugging Face, says that ‘poorer facial recognition for darker skin tones and femme features’ may affect the sorting of images of Harris for automated labeling.”

Platformer / Casey Newton

Telegram changes its tune →

“‘You could have just Googled it’ seems unlikely to succeed as a legal defense, as the issue is not that police couldn’t find an email address but that no one at Telegram responded to their messages after they did.”

Baekdal / Thomas Baekdal

The affiliate revenue market for publishers has changed a lot →

“If all you are doing as a publisher is to post low-effort product recommendations, you are chasing a model that both the search engines and the ecommerce platforms are devaluing.”

TechCrunch / Sarah Perez

Apple partners with third parties, like Google, on iPhone 16’s visual search →

“What’s interesting about this feature is that it presents a new paradigm for interacting with software and services beyond those that Apple ships with the iPhone. And it arrives at a time when the concept of an App Store has begun to feel dated.”

CJR / Meghnad Bose and Dhrumil Mehta

Can Kamala Harris use the debate to keep her media momentum? →

“From the point President Biden announced that he would not be running to the end of the DNC, a period of one month, Harris was mentioned in about 8 percent more clips than Trump. In the two and a half weeks since, Trump has been mentioned in about 46 percent more clips than Harris. While Harris’s bump might not seem like much, she was able to wrest a bigger share of cable news coverage from Trump than either Hillary Clinton or Biden was able to at this point in the previous two election cycles.”

Talking Biz News / Chris Roush

Law360 editorial workers go on strike →

“The Law360 Union — which is represented by The NewsGuild of New York — has been preparing to strike since taking a formal authorization vote in February. The union said ‘significant barriers remain.'” —SC

The New Yorker / Gideon Lewis-Kraus

The angst and sorrow of Jewish Currents →

“In the past ten months, even without a paywall, Currents’ subscriber base has nearly doubled, though it’s still only about ten thousand—a circulation close to half that of the right-wing Jewish magazine Commentary, and in line with that of n+1. The magazine’s only authority derives from its commitment to substance and clarity, qualities that have attracted an ardent readership.” (Nieman Lab wrote about Jewish Currents here.)

The Verge / Lauren Feiner

Google and DOJ’s ad tech fight is all about control →

“To the government, Google exerts too much control over every step of the way publishers sell advertising space online and how advertisers buy it, resulting in a system that benefits Google at the expense of nearly everyone else. To Google, the government is seeking control over a successful business by making it deal with rivals on more favorable terms, disregarding the value of its investments in technology and the unique efficiencies of its integrated tools.” —SC

Financial Times / Alex Rogers

Conservative activist launches $1 billion crusade to “crush liberal dominance” in news and entertainment →

Leonard Leo says he “intends to invest in a US local media company in the next 12 months, although he has not decided which.” —SC

Los Angeles Times / Jenny Jarvie

Philanthropists invest $15 million in L.A. County local news →

“Funded by organizations including the American Journalism Project, the Eli and Edythe Broad Foundation and the Spiegel Family Fund, the initiative will support a network of community-first media outlets to report across digital, print and radio platforms for L.A. County’s 10 million residents. Those hyperlocal outlets will work in partnership with CalMatters, a nonprofit newsroom that focuses on explaining California politics and policy, and LAist, part of the Southern California Public Radio group, to deliver enhanced regional accountability journalism that fills news gaps.” —SC