March 20, 2024

• New Washington Post CEO accused of Murdoch tabloid hacking cover-up (NPR) 

• Like Gannett, McClatchy plans to stop using AP’s news feed; McClatchy will still use AP election results data (New York Times) / Gannett and McClatchy to drop The Associated Press. What does that mean? (Poynter) 

• Law360 editorial workers stage one-day strike (Talking Biz News) 

• Fortune expanding its European footprint, planning unique print covers in London, Paris, Zurich, and Milan and to add 35 staff (Digiday) 

• LA Times to expand El Segundo campus after historic layoffs (The Wrap) 

• ‘Some personal news: The Intercept laid me off, so I'm now in the job market! My current title is Director of Information Security’ (Micah Lee) / ICYMI: The Intercept lays off 15 staffers, including editor in chief (Nieman Journalism Lab) 

• The Intercept charts a new legal strategy for digital publishers suing OpenAI (Nieman Journalism Lab)  

• Google fined €250 million in French clash with news outlets (Bloomberg)

• Chasing clicks in the jungle: Right-wing influencers descend on the Darién Gap (New York Times) / The viral ‘bloodbath’ clip and the rise of the liberal video influencer (Semafor) 

• Gan Jing World, a 'wholesome' video platform linked to a Chinese spiritual movement and right-wing newspapers looks a lot like YouTube (Columbia Journalism Review)

• CBS News hires Rhona Tarrant as executive editor of new verification and fact-checking initiative (Deadline) / Gizmodo names Rose Pastore as executive editor (Talking Biz News) 

• SportsCenter's Hannah Storm shares her journey after recent early stage breast cancer detection (ESPN) 

• NPR Fresh Air’s Terry Gross offers a video tour of her office (NPR Fresh Air)

Press Freedom

• ‘The Israeli military is evading questions and calls for accountability over the killing of journalists tasked with covering the country’s brutal and protracted war with Hamas’ (Oliver Darcy)

• Journalists talk about the one-year anniversary of Evan Gershkovich’s imprisonment in Russia (WNYC) / Evan Gershkovich case: Where do we stand at one year? March 21, 10 a.m. ET (National Press Club)

• India will fact-check online posts about government matters (TechCrunch)

How one enterprise reporter engagers readers

“I think people get really tired of hearing and reading about bad news. So whenever I am telling stories, I think about how to humanize my writing in a way that would make someone pay attention for just a sentence longer, a paragraph longer. I want to make them interrogate why they think what they think or make them feel something — to remember that this war still matters, even though it’s been going on for so long. Those are the things I’m always looking for when I’m on scene. I’m not only looking at the building that just got bombed but looking around it. What’s in the park? How are the local businesses reacting? How does it feel to be there in that moment? If I can make a reader feel something the way that I felt it, I consider that a success.”

-- Lizzie Johnson, enterprise reporter at The Washington Post, excerpt from Nieman Storyboard Q&A, “A first-time war correspondent finds human stories in a devastated Ukraine” 

Resources

• Best practices for working with mass shootings data (Global Investigative Journalism Network) / Video: Covering Firearm Violence — How journalists can reframe their reporting (NPCJI)
• Story ideas from the Federal Reserve’s Beige Book: March 2024 (The Journalist's Resource)
• Learn how to use Google Analytics 4 (ONA)

This newsletter is written & edited by the National Press Club Journalism Institute staff: Beth Francesco, Bara Vaida, and Holly Butcher Grant. Send us your questions and suggestions for topics to cover.

Get this from a friend? Subscribe, and view the archives.