The proof that Facebook is broken is obvious from its very modus operandi | John Naughton

Despite employing a small army of contractors to monitor posts, it’s clear the company is no longer fit for purposeWay back in the 1950s, a pioneering British cybernetician, W Ross Ashby, proposed a fundamental law of dynamic systems. In his book An Introduction to Cybernetics, he formulated his law of requisite variety, which defines “the minimum number of states necessary for a controller to control a system of a given number of states”. In plain English, it boils down to this: for a system to be viable, it has to be able to absorb or cope with the complexity of its environment. And there are basically only two ways of achieving viability in those terms: either the system manages to control (or reduce) the variety of its environment, or it has to increase its internal capacity (its “variety”) to match what is being thrown at it from the environment.Sounds abstruse, I know, but it has a contemporary resonance. Specifically, it provides a way of understanding some of the current internal turmoil in Facebook as it grapples with the problem of keeping unacceptable, hateful or psychotic content off its platform. Two weeks ago, the New York Times was leaked 1,400 pages from the rulebooks that the company’s moderators are trying to follow as they police the stuff that flows through its servers. According to the paper, the leak came from an employee who said he “feared that the company was exercising too much power, with too little oversight – and making too many mistakes”.... Continue reading at 'The Guardian'

[ The Guardian | 2019-01-06 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Illumination as Innovation: The New Saint John’s Bible

When it comes to print books, sometimes innovation means returning to ancient methodologies. To wit: the creation of the new, Illuminated St. John's Bible. The post Illumination as Innovation: The New Saint John’s Bible appeared first on Publishing Perspectives. Continue reading at Publishing Perspectives

[ Publishing Perspectives | 2015-07-27 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Bodley Head buys book by John Murray's Philipps

The Bodley Head has acquired a biography of spy Donald Maclean, written by John Murray publisher Roland Philipps. Publishing director Stuart Williams bought UK and Commonwealth rights, excluding Canada, to A Spy Named Orphan: The Lives of Donald Maclean, from Natasha Fairweather at United... Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2015-07-24 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Booksellers get free access to digital proofs

Booksellers will get “quicker and wider access” to book proofs from across the publishing industry through a partnership with the Booksellers Association and NetGalley. UK booksellers will get access to digital proofs from over 50 publishers – including Bonnier, Hachette, HarperCollins, Penguin... Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2015-07-24 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Police: Woman lured by man on Facebook lived in a closet, held as sex slave

A woman was held captive in a closet and sexually abused by a Richmond, Calif., man she met on Facebook a year ago, police said. Continue reading at Los Angeles Times

[ Los Angeles Times | 2015-07-23 00:00:00 UTC ]
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New Facebook video controls let you be sexist, ageist or secretive

Videos on Facebook are big business. As well as drugged up post-dentist footage, there is also huge advertising potential. Now Facebook has announced a new set of options for video publishers -- including the ability to limit who is able to see videos based on their age and gender. A social... Continue reading at Betanews

[ Betanews | 2015-07-22 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Facebook Introduces New Tools for Video Publishers

We’re building tools to help video publishers grow their businesses on Facebook, and we’re excited to announce two new updates that give publishers more control over how their videos are organized and shared. Continue reading at Editor & Publisher

[ Editor & Publisher | 2015-07-22 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Food publishers are early winners of Facebook video

Publishers trying to make heads or tails of Facebook video can learn a thing or two from food sites. Two of the most popular Facebook video publishers cover food: BuzzFeed food got 390 million Facebook video views in June, while video network Tastemade's output was watched 165 million views... Continue reading at Digiday

[ Digiday | 2015-07-20 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Philosophy via Facebook? Why not?

Academic philosophers tend to have a narrow view of what is valuable philosophical work. Hiring, tenure, promotion and prestige depend mainly on one's ability to produce journal articles in a particular theoretical, abstract style, mostly in reaction to a small group of canonical and 20th century... Continue reading at Los Angeles Times

[ Los Angeles Times | 2015-07-19 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Brands Start Hosting Real-Time Video Chats on Facebook

Media brands were quick to adopt video apps Periscope and Meerkat to broadcast live streams, and now Facebook marketers want in on that action. Social platform BumeBox started hosting live Facebook chats for brands like VH1 and Discovery Channel back in October, as an alternative to the Twitter... Continue reading at AdWeek

[ AdWeek | 2015-07-17 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Facebook Instant Articles Appear in (Some) Feeds, but All the Same Questions Await

If you're wondering what ever happened to those Facebook Instant articles you were promised back in May, now there's word. Facebook has been testing instantly-loaded articles, hosted within Facebook instead of on publishers' sites, for the past couple of weeks, according to a report in The Wall... Continue reading at Advertising Age

[ Advertising Age | 2015-07-16 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Facebook’s growing influence on news consumption, in 5 charts

When it comes to news, it's Facebook's world -- publishers are just living in it. As Facebook continues to court publishers and hold onto users, more people are using the site to keep up on news. According to Pew, 63 percent of Facebook and Twitter users said that they they get their news from... Continue reading at Digiday

[ Digiday | 2015-07-15 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Here’s Why Facebook’s Instant Articles Probably Aren’t Popping Into Your Feed

Where are the Facebook Instant Articles?     That has been one of the social media mysteries of the summer.  The program was announced with much fanfare in early May, and several big publishers have said they’ve been putting ... Continue reading at Editor & Publisher

[ Editor & Publisher | 2015-07-15 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Facebook Instant Articles Just Don’t Add Up for Publishers

Here are some key numbers for content licensors in digital media: Netflix will pay approximately $3 billion in licensing and production fees this year to the television and film industry; Hulu is paying $192 million to license South Park; Spotify pay ... Continue reading at Editor & Publisher

[ Editor & Publisher | 2015-07-10 00:00:00 UTC ]
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How Lad Bible’s fans fuel its Facebook video boom

65twenty, the publisher behind bro-culture sites The Lad Bible and The Sport Bible, is generating more than 750 million views each month on Facebook. But unlike most publishers, a lot of those views are happening on content not created by 65twenty but shot and submitted by its highly engaged... Continue reading at Digiday

[ Digiday | 2015-07-08 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Facebook steps up competition with YouTube with ad-supported videos

Social network already has 4bn views a day of its native clips, but helping their creators to make money is its next ambitionVideos uploaded directly to Facebook are watched more than 4bn times a day according to the social network. Now it wants their uploaders to be able to make money from... Continue reading at The Guardian

[ The Guardian | 2015-07-02 00:00:00 UTC ]
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How The New York Times finds new subscribers on Facebook

Facebook can drive a lot of traffic to publishers, but the knock is that a lot of it is fly-by traffic. The Times is using a startup, KeyWee, to find subscribers among the casual readers, though. KeyWee comes up with keywords for articles and then targets the articles to Facebook users who are... Continue reading at Digiday

[ Digiday | 2015-07-02 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Facebook is sharing more ad dollars with its video creators

Facebook's shiny logo isn't all that's new for the social network today: The outfit's also announced how it plans to split video ad revenue with publishers. Like YouTube, Facebook will give content creators 55 percent of ad revenue and keep the rest,... Continue reading at Engadget

[ Engadget | 2015-07-02 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Facebook To Start Sharing Ad Revenue With Video Partners

The tech giant is targeting YouTube's clients with a new ad revenue sharing program for video publishers.Facebook has just made another change to its burgeoning video advertising business. Effective today, Facebook is testing out sharing video ad revenue with video partners. The move is similar... Continue reading at Fast Company

[ Fast Company | 2015-07-02 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Facebook's Immersive Mobile Ads Finally Give Brands the Creative They Want

After Facebook convinced publishers to go all-in on exclusive content with Instant Articles, it hopes advertisers will do the same. In a presentation at Cannes Lions this week, Facebook's chief product officer Chris Cox showed ad buyers mock-ups of a new mobile format that takes over a screen... Continue reading at AdWeek

[ AdWeek | 2015-06-26 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Tracking Facebook’s Book Challenge

On January 2, Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced he would be challenging himself to read a new book every other week in 2015. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2015-06-26 00:00:00 UTC ]
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