A news agency begun in 2009 is filling a greatly needed service in identifying and authenticating news content and distributing it to their clients, digital journalists. The agency, Storyful, has been effective in providing reliable news in news fronts such as the Islamic State incursions in Iraq. Murdock’s News Corp. bought Storyful in 2013. (NPR, October 29, 014, by David Folkenflik)
Blogger Buzz Ryan, Buzz Ryan, October 1, 2014, writes that there is great incentive to put colorful stories out on the social network. A video, “David After Dentist” garnered $150,000, a cut of advertising revenue, for a family that posted it on YouTube. Ryan urges people to check for bogus content by checking on its source. Pipl allows you to check on people online and there are ways to check the authenticity of photos by doing reverse image searches and by examining their metadata.
Tumblr’s reputation for upholding the First Amendment took a hit when the Electronic Frontier Foundation gave the company its lowest grade of zero on resisting copyright bullies. “Major online platforms are essential to online expression, so their policy decisions can have a huge impact on public discourse. As users choose which platforms will host their updates, writing, images, and videos, they ought to know which of these services have publicly committed to treating their speech fairly and even helping them fight back against bullies that would try to take it down,” said Corynne McSherry of EFF. (iDigital Times, October 28, 2014, by Sana Chu)
Twitter earned four stars in the EFF ratings and Word Press and NameCheap received the top rating of five stars. (MediaBistro, October 28, 2014, by Shea Bennett)
Google, Facebook and Twitter warned in a court brief that removing anonymity from Yelp reviewers would damage Internet free speech. The owner of a Virginia carpet cleaning business claimed that negative reviews hurt his business and demanded in a defamation suit that Yelp reveal the identities of the reviewers. (The Wall Street Journal, October 29, 2014, by Jacob Gershman)