Nieman Lab daily news digest

The Daily Digest: October 19, 2026 Legal experts warn Meta’s new terms still grant broad scraping permissions, despite language changes Allowing scraped content to be used for all “advertising and business products” is a substantial expansion of Meta’s permissions. By Andrew Deck and Hanaa' Tameez. “Convenings” for CEOs will help Semafor reach a second profitable year What we’re reading Axel Springer / Jan Bauer Axel Springer debuts its own creator platform → Bild deputy editor-in-chief Paul Ronzheimer will step down to become the first Axel Springer Creator. Last month, his podcast “Ronzheimer.” recorded more than 12 million views and streams across platforms. CEO Mathias Döpfner previously said he plans to pivot the German publishing giant into a “creator platform” over the next several years. Associated Press / Justin Spike Hungarian journalists feel the pressure lifting after Orbán’s defeat → “The political pressure is gone. It’s not all happy and shiny yet. But I believe we’re in a much, much better place than we were before April.” The Guardian The Guardian launches “extra accounts” to allow members to share paid benefits → “Extra account users gain access to ad-free reading across all devices, including full access to the Guardian News, Guardian Feast and Guardian Editions apps, the digital archive, and an exclusive supporter newsletter.” CNN / Brian Stelter Christiane Amanpour announces she will leave CNN after 43 years → The iconic chief international anchor “looks forward to interesting new projects down the line, and will always be rooting for CNN and maintaining its history of independent journalism,” she said in a statement. “Remember: always be truthful, not neutral.” The Times / Alex Farber BBC pauses civil service fact-checking program over impartiality concerns → “It is a common misconception that the BBC is the government, when in fact BBC News is entirely independent of, and heavily scrutinises, the government. We as BBC staff regularly have to tell our friends this,” [one BBC news staffer] said. “The overpaid managers who signed this off for years have damaged that crucial boundary by indulging in a clear conflict of interest.” ⁂ “The harm is imminent and irreversible once content has been ingested into models. Timing matters.” → —James Rosewell, director of Movement for an Open Web, who is preparing a legal challenge to Meta's new commercial terms (Press Gazette / Dominic Ponsford) ⁂ Semafor / Max Tani Bari Weiss has repeatedly asked CBS News journalists to find links between Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed and the Muslim Brotherhood → “In recent weeks, Weiss has personally advocated for CBS News journalists to pursue numerous story angles related to El-Sayed’s supposed sympathy towards the Muslim Brotherhood, and was directly involved in a controversial story about his previous posts comparing the COVID-19 death toll to 9/11. She has discussed the topic on editorial calls, and tasked CBS News’ investigative unit with combing through El-Sayed’s background for a potential link to the organization.” Press Gazette / Charlotte Tobitt CNN launches website paywall in U.K. and Canada → “Since launching the U.S. subscription last year, CNN is no longer focusing on growing its pure online reach. In September, global monthly visits to CNN.com were down 44% compared to three years earlier, and they dropped 49% in the past two years, according to Similarweb, to 289 million.” Digiday / Sara Guaglione How The Verge switched up its audience team to prepare for Google Zero → “The Verge is tailoring its audience strategy to three segments: anonymous visitors, registered users and paying subscribers. In practice, that means finding tactics that encourage repeat visits through its homepage to drive registrations with personalized feeds and community features, and retain subscribers through exclusive content and perks. The goal is to give readers at every stage of the funnel a reason t