Weekly journalism news update: Future News Fund, audience growth and fact-checking the US 2020 election

Every Friday, Journalism.co.uk brings you a round-up of our week’s top stories, giving you all the information you need to know, wherever you are.

Here is the latest journalism news from this week:

Local news: Following the recommendations of the Cairncross Review, innovation charity Nesta has launched its £2m government-funded Future News Fund.

This will give UK-based public interest journalism a means to prototype and fast-track new approaches to audience engagement and business models, in the hope of securing a more sustainable future for local news. Read more

Business models: Almost a year ago, the Medill Local News Initiative set out to understand how US local news publishers could survive at a time of falling ad revenue and increasingly fickle readers.

At the halfway stage of the project, three researchers reflected on the trends they have seen so far in a podcast with Journalism.co.uk - and what awaits regional newsrooms in the year ahead. Listen now

Media jobs: The Freelance Reporting Initiative, set up by the Save Journalism Project, will pay recently laid-off US reporters to report on job cuts in the media industry - if it meets its crowdfunding target of $10,000.

If reached, it will pay journalists to produce two stories on the affect losing local titles has on a community, while Facebook and Google continue to thrive in the digital era. Read more

Audience growth: Earlier this year, US business publisher Forbes bought UK publication The Memo in a bid to grow its European readership.

At a time when many UK titles are trying to break into the US market, it shows the reverse also works. In the space of a year, readership at Forbes shot up from 500k to 80m. Read more

WhatsApp: The Telegraph and The Washington Post are two publishers that are using WhatsApp for a range of editorial purposes.

Want to join them? We offer a step-by-step guide for setting up your news organisation on the private messaging platform. Read more

Fact-checking: With one eye on the 2020 US presidential election, non-profit organisation First Draft is training journalists to verify information using masterclasses and simulation days.

CrossCheck follows on from similar collaborative efforts in France, Brazil and Nigeria, to help reporters understand how false claims manifest themselves online today and the best ways to address them. Read more

Election reporting: British press regulator IMPRESS has released new guidance for quality reporting around election polls and surveys.

Among the advice, the guide encourages journalists to be cautious about results based on samples that are not representative of a given audience. Read more

Newsrewired: This week, we announced the keynote speaker for our digital journalism Newsrewired conference: Dmitry Shiskin, chief content officer of Culture Trip.

Join us on the 27 November as Shiskin discusses his favourite subject – the intersection of product, content and data – and will share findings around Culture Trip’s full-funnel commissioning process, automation and machine learning. Read more

Hurry! Spaces are running out. To see the full agenda and book your ticket now, visit newsrewired.com.

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