For the Record

Wuhan Citizen Journalist Restrained, Fed by Tube:

A citizen journalist who has been "detained for more than six months after reporting on the Wuhan coronavirus outbreak has had a feeding tube forcibly inserted and her arms restrained to stop her pulling it out, her lawyer has claimed," according to Helen Davidson of The Guardian. Former attorney Zhang Zhan "has been on a hunger strike at a detention facility near Shanghai" following her arrest in May on charges of "picking quarrels and stirring up trouble," an accusation frequently used against dissidents in China. Zhang "is among several Chinese journalists to have been arrested this year after travelling to Wuhan to report on the virus outbreak and response," including fellow former attorney Chen Qiushi.

Denver's Tattered Cover Becomes Nation's Largest Black-Owned Indie Bookstore:

Following financial problems, Denver's Tattered Cover bookstore chain has been sold to Bended Page LLC, a group of investors led by local businessmen David Back and Kwame Spearman, Petra Mayer of NPR reported Thursday. Spearman, who is Black, will serve as its chief executive, "making the Tattered Cover the country's largest Black-owned independent bookstore," Mayer added. Last June, former owners Len Vlahos and Kristen Gilligan said that the store would not take a public stance on Black Lives Matter, citing a history of silence on local and national issues. "It's kind of a cool twist of events and something that we obviously hope to add to the dialogue that BLM and some of the other movements have begun," Spearman said of his ownership.

40 Years of Breathed:

1987 Editorial Cartooning winner Berkeley Breathed spoke to George Gene Gustines of The New York Times about the 40th anniversary of his comic strip Bloom County, which was revived on Facebook after a 26-year hiatus in 2015. Breathed singled out his longstanding difficulty with deadlines, as its digital incarnation has been contingent on him working at his own pace. "Bloom County had a weekly deadline for 10 years. I missed 100%. Each of those 500 weeks, I had to drive 40 miles at 4:30 a.m. to the airport at whatever city I lived in to put the strips on a plane as cargo, delivered by a cabdriver in Washington, D.C., a few hours later. Every. One." He noted that the creation of Opus, the strip's most enduring character, largely was inspired by his boredom of "drawing people standing in profile" after penning the strip for a year. "Saddled with vertical boxes," he continued, "I needed an animal that could stand and fit in the damn rectangles that wasn't a beagle nor a fat orange cat."

Substack's Best on Defender Program:

In an interview with Nilay Patel of The Verge, Substack CEO Chris Best discussed the newsletter platform's Substack Defender program, which aims to support threatened writers with legal assistance. "[S]omething we noticed was a lot of local — especially local — journalists were getting bogus legal threats where it’s like, 'I'm doing some critical reporting of a local politician and because I'm the only one covering them, they figure if they can shut me up, they actually won’t have critical press. And so I get this scary looking letter from a fancy lawyer that says, 'you’re not allowed to write about this.'" However, Best cautioned that the platform is "going to have to find a scalable way to pay for that stuff" due to its current lack of profitability. 

IFJ: 42 Journalists Killed in 2020:

Forty-two journalists and media workers "have been killed while doing their jobs this year, according to the International Federation of Journalists’ annual tally," the Associated Press reported Wednesday. An additional 235 remain imprisoned due to their work. "The decrease of journalists' killings in recent years cannot disguise the deadly danger and threats journalists continue to face for doing their work," said Anthony Bellanger, the global union federation's general secretary. Since the organization began tracking deaths three decades ago, 2,658 journalists have been killed. "These are not just statistics," he continued. "They are our friends and colleagues who have dedicated their lives to, and paid the ultimate price for, their work as journalists."

Report for America Announces Hundreds of Positions:

The Report for America initiative will offer more than 300 positions in 2021 following the addition of 64 local news organizations as partners and the doubling of Black and Hispanic-owned media participation, according to Marketing and Public Relations Manage Sam Kille. Newly selected newsrooms and beats include a healthcare-oriented position at the Tampa Bay Times and a photojournalism position at the Bozeman Daily Chronicle in rural Montana. Applications for the two-year program will be accepted until January 31. "Report for America provides a unique opportunity for journalists to really sink their teeth into local, issue-oriented reporting that is missing from so many newsrooms today," said Norman Parish, the organization's recruitment director. "Beyond talented reporters and photojournalists, we are looking for individuals who see journalism as a public service and want to make a difference within their communities."

Pew: American Public Shows 'Mixed Familiarity' With Evolving Forms of News:

A new Pew Research Center study on digital media consumption highlights ongoing challenges in the field, with only "roughly one-in-10 U.S. adults" using Google News (currently the most popular digital news aggregator) often and 42% of respondents unsure as to whether Facebook does its own reporting in a manner analogous to traditional media organizations. Finally, the difference in listening habits between listeners of radio (50%) and radio and podcast users (57%) appears to be negligible, with podcast usage ultimately "[overlapping] far more strongly with the use of digital devices than with radio." 

State, Federal Authorities Expected to File Facebook Lawsuits:

More than 40 attorneys general and the Department of Justice are preparing to file antitrust lawsuits against Facebook Wednesday, "alleging that the tech giant engaged in unlawful, anticompetitive tactics to buy or kill off its rivals and solidify its dominance in social networking," according to Tony Romm of The Washington Post. The state-based lawsuit "is expected to allege that Facebook’s purchase of Instagram, a photo-sharing app, and WhatsApp, a messaging service, marked a pattern of behavior to neutralize competitive threats — allowing Facebook to become a market leader while depriving users of privacy-protective alternatives." The plaintiffs, led by New York Attorney General Letitia James (D), "are expected to ask a judge as part of the legal salvos to consider a wide array of potential redress — including forcing Facebook to sell off some of its business to address competition concerns."

Brooklyn Magazine Relaunches as Newsletter/Website:

Brooklyn magazine has relaunched as a newsletter and website under the ownership of former Ad Age Editor-in-Chief Brian Braiker, who also will serve as its editor, the publication announced Tuesday. "We're going to be improvising as we go," Braiker added. "But the through-line will remain constant: By celebrating the communities, culture and commerce of Brooklyn, we aim to give voice and inspiration to a borough that's had the wind knocked out of it, but will come back bigger than ever." The launch is accompanied by the inaugural episode of the publication's podcast, which will feature interviews with figures such as Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams and Brooklyn Brewery founder Steve Hindy. Brooklyn magazine was launched as a glossy quarterly in 2011 before ceasing publication in February 2019.

British Launch of Bookshop.org Leads to 'Great Unease':

The recent British launch of independent bookstore-oriented ecommerce platform Bookshop.org has elicited skepticism among independent booksellers, who maintain that they earn "less through sales on Bookshop.org than they would from selling their books direct to customers," according to Ellen Peirson-Hagger of the New Statesman. One independent bookseller, who asked not to be named, believes that "their shop makes 13-20% less than if the customer had bought the same book at the same cover price directly from the shop," while the publishing director of an independent press asserts that "they earn 5% less than if they had sold that book on Amazon" due to a preexisting agreement with the platform's exclusive wholesaler, Gardners. In a statement, Bookshop.org UK Managing Director Nicole Vanderbilt reiterated that "several shops on our platform [...] believe their take on Bookshop.org comparable to selling directly," while the platform has concluded that most publisher agreements with Gardners "are competitive with Amazon."