Anyone know of any big stories happening today?

Oh, look. Election interference news. What a surprise.

2024 is 2016 all over again

Eight years on from Brexit and Trump’s first win, what have we learned about forge in disinformation interference in elections? Very little, it appears:

“Video has come out from Bucks County, Pennsylvania showing a ballot counter destroying ballots for Donald Trump and keeping Kamala Harris's ballots for counting,” an account called “Dan from Ohio” wrote in the comment section of the far-right website Gateway Pundit. “Why hasn't this man been arrested?”
But Dan is not from Ohio, and the video he mentioned is fake. He is in fact one of hundreds of inauthentic accounts posting in the unmoderated spaces of right-wing news site comment sections as part of a Russian disinformation campaign.

The WIRED piece by David Gilbert points out that neglect of comment sections by publishers is a major weakness:

“Comment sections designed to foster reader engagement lack robust security measures, allowing bad actors to post freely, change identities, and create the illusion of genuine grassroots campaigns rather than orchestrated propaganda.”

There are only two valid choices about comments:

1. Have a well-managed comment section
2. Don’t have comments

Everything else is just harming your brand reputation — and quite possibly democracy.

Stop it with the keywords, already

Another indie site is quitting the publishing game:

After relaunching GIANT FREAKIN ROBOT in 2019, the site grew to a readership of more than 20 million a month, through 2021 and 2022. Then Google decided they didn’t want independent publishers around anymore. Most entertainment keywords have now been given to one big company, whose numerous sites own the top slots for nearly every entertainment-related query of any substance.

Here’s the thing, if you’re still targeting keywords in organic search, over half a decade into the age of intent-based search, and on the threshold of a (possible) AI age, you are deeply and fundamentally doing SEO wrong. Not only are you working on outdated SEO knowledge, so no wonder it’s not working, but you’re also playing the SEO game, rather than focusing on reader need and doing optimisation on top of that.

My site is the definition of a tiny independent publisher, and search remains my top referrer, and is much the same as it’s been for years. SEO is all about balance. Do too little, you miss out on traffic. Do too much, and you slip into writing for the spiders, not the people. And that will eventually cost you.

More to the point, you need to always regard search traffic as transitory. If you’re not finding someway of connecting with readers in a way you own and control — like newsletters — you leave yourself constantly vulnerable to algorithmic shifts.

Quickies

• 🗳️ The Telegraph’s covering the US election — on Reddit. Many conversations about Reddit right now, for the first time in a decade. It’s worth paying attention to.
• 👩🏽‍💻 NYT tech staff threaten to strike on election day. Sure, it’s a point of maximum pressure, but don’t you run the risk of harming the public more than the paper? (Also, some of the demands are… interesting.)
• ⛓️‍💥 Meanwhile, actually on the NYT, there’s a masterclass on how the web allows rich information density. Look at the links on that.
• 🧵 Why does Threads feel so deserted — or like a wasteland haunted by engagement farming attention vampires?
• 🎧 Podtrac is bringing its podcast tracker to the UK. But, be aware, its methodology means it’s giving unusual results.