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Chances are you've noticed that Newsroom Magazine is a very different publication.

We care about journalism -- and we're well aware many other organizations do it far better than we.

Our editorial standards, rules of custody, and skeptical editing for everything we produce, disseminate or expose to public viewing reflects a seriousness of purpose.

Six years after our founding, Newsroom Magazine continues to evolve the online publishing and preservation model we pioneered.

There is good news to share: Newsroom Magazine is is thriving.

And some less good news: Our limited resources, both journalistically and financially, are limiting our expansion of content.

Online News Preservation

In the six years since its founding, Newsroom Magazine has extended the field of news publishing into previously uncharted areas.

We take a long range view of news -- one that considers both timeliness and historical merit.

What we do, and how we do it, was not possible in the print media era -- for our content is both timely and timeless in the sense that we share the power of immediacy with all online media plus the perseverance of an encyclopedia.

Newsroom Magazine's publishing model goes beyond immediacy -- for unlike the newspaper era -- what we publish is permanently preserved. And tagged, indexed, and constantly updated by automated sitemap sharing with Google, Yahoo, Bing, Yandex, Baidu, Sogou, Ewatch, Alexa, Facebook, and others at home and far away.

All of our content, is meant to be preserved. Thanks to the capture and storage of our content at Google, including all updates and changes, and full collection archiving by the U.S. Internet Archives, everything we say, write, opine -- whether wise, foolish, or inconsequential-- is preserved.

Newsroom Magazine content remains forever online, searchable and accessible 24 hours a day worldwide.

What's Hot Is Rarely What Matters

What we publish today is rarely as timely as the more traditional publications and online newspapers. What we choose to publish, sometimes days or months after a story first breaks, or on a subject neglected by most commercial media, is chosen to reflect one aspect of an ongoing reality for long term preservation.

From a handful of English-only readers when we published our first article -- the 1958 Edward R. Murrow speech before the Radio Television Directors Association in Chicago -- we have grown and wizened about our responsibilities to our readers and our own limitations and shortfalls.

Our most read article so far this year, The Adventures Of Bernie In Wonderland, was published November 23rd, 2009. The article consists of the unexpurgated SEC interview of Harry Markopolos in the Bernie Madoff Ponzi swindle case. It is not very interesting reading and it is very long -- but we published it in the belief that what it revealed was important and unlikely to remain online in its original format.

Newsroom Magazine's Storehouse Grows Every Day

The number of publications who devote themselves to publishing credible, responsible and probative content for posterity has dwindled.

Today Newsroom Magazine publishes a storehouse of credible, probative and relevant content -- well over 5000 articles including commentaries, essays, definitions, photographs, stories, reviews, discussions, tutorials, and logical explanations.

Our readership is nearly three times was it was only last year. Few might come to our content for entertainment -- for our purpose is otherwise.

If You Publish, They Will Come

We are read on Capitol Hill, along K Street, and in the halls of government inside the beltway and around the world.

We are read daily on college campuses at home and abroad. We're visited from military ships at sea. We serve law-firms, major corporations, Wall Street the UK Parliament, state governments and cities with credible useful information.

Some of the world's most prestigious news organizations use Newsroom Magazine for fact-checking.

Government Information Unfiltered, Sometimes Imperfect

The amount of official news proffered each day by government, whether at home or abroad, is accelerating. Some of it newsworthy, most of it not.

Our job is to thoughtfully choose what's worthy of the attention of our readers.

About 1% of government issued news we receive each day qualifies as newsworthy. Only the most relevant, or reflective of government at its best, or at its worst, or evidence of overreach, or ineptitude makes it newsworthy.

We leave the issue of deciding which if any of these qualifications applies to what we publish up to the reader.

Formatted For People On The Go, Or On The Hunt

All of our government news content includes above the headline call out meant to convey the principal facts, action or information for those with little time to read a long document.

Our job is to carefully and skeptically choose relevant governmental content for our readers -- and to include the unexpurgated original source material, whose chain of custody we control.

Online Editorial Standards, Ethics And Purpose

Our commitment to time-honored journalistic standards and a clear statement about the ethics to which we agree to be held today and tomorrow, Newsroom Magazine began publication when the Internet was young -- 2006.

Our prime mission then, as now, is to publish non political ideas, definitions, essays and editorials.

To speak to the state of this honorable calling.

And to inform the public about those things, events and ideas that matter most to us all.

Today, tomorrow, forever.



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Federal Trade Commission Section
FTC Settlement Shuts Down ‘Acai Berry’ Fake News Operations

Published: Monday October 22, 2012 10:00 am EDT
Article Length: 558 Words
Reading Time: 2 Minutes

Under the settlement, Circa Direct and Davidson are required to make clear when their commercial messages are advertisements rather than objective journalism. They are also required to disclose any financial connections they have with merchants.

Washington

Federal Trade Commission

Court Orders Fake News Site Operator To Surrender Assets Totaling More Than $2 Million

Defendants Settle FTC Charges that They Made Fake Endorsements and Deceptive Acai Berry Weight Loss Claims

October 19, 2012

An operation that allegedly used fake news websites to deceptively market acai berry weight-loss products will pay more than $2 million to settle Federal Trade Commission charges.

Last year, the FTC charged defendants Circa Direct LLC and Andrew Davidson with running internet advertisements designed to look like news websites, with misleading titles such as “News 6” and “New Jersey Job Report.” The websites purported to provide investigative journalists’ reports on weight-loss products, work-at-home schemes, and penny auctions, but, according to the FTC, the sites were actually deceptive ads. The FTC accused Circa Direct and Davidson, the company’s owner, of making false and unsupported claims about acai berry products and failing to disclose their financial relationship to the sellers of the products and services promoted on the fake news sites. In one fake news story, for example, a “reporter” claimed to have lost 25 pounds in four weeks using a supplement.

The settlement imposes a judgment of nearly $11.5 million.  The monetary judgment will be suspended when the FTC receives assets worth more than $2 million from the defendants’ personal and corporate bank accounts, investment and retirement accounts, and proceeds from the sale of a home in Margate, New Jersey, and a 2010 Nissan Maxima.

Under the settlement, Circa Direct and Davidson are required to make clear when their commercial messages are advertisements rather than objective journalism. They are also required to disclose any financial connections they have with merchants.  The defendants are further barred from making deceptive claims about health-related products, such as the acai berry weight-loss supplements they marketed, and from making deceptive claims about other products, such as work-at-home schemes or penny auctions.

In approving the settlement order, U.S. District Court Judge Renee Marie Bumb cited the fact that the order does not contain an admission of liability, and required the FTC to create and host a webpage that provides a notice from the court, a detailed summary of the factual allegations, and links to supporting documents.

The FTC sued Circa and Davidson as part of a law enforcement sweep against 10 affiliate marketing operations accused of using fake news websites to market acai berry weight-loss products. The FTC has reached similar settlements with eight of the other operations.
For more information about recognizing and avoiding deceptive claims made by fake news sites that market acai berries for weight loss, see THIS JUST IN: Fake News Sites Promote Bogus Weight Loss Benefits of Acai Berry Supplements.

The Commission vote to approve the proposed settlement in February 2012, prior to the arrival of Commissioner Maureen Ohlhausen, was 4-0.  The U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey entered the settlement on October 17, 2012.

Source: Federal Trade Commission

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