Monthly Archives: May 2020

For years, Google and Facebook wanted to have it both ways. They wanted publishers content to attract and retain users, but they didnt want to pay for it. They wanted to publishers to create content and test new products they were trying, but they didnt want them to build businesses that relied on those products.

At one point early last year, Facebooks point person on the news industry, Campbell Brown, gave publishers some tough talk: Facebook cannot be the entire solution to your problems, she told a room full of magazine publishers.

But today, in the middle of a shared economic downturn, Facebook and Google are playing a larger role in the future of news publishers. Over the next few months, Google and Facebook will, combined, spend close to a quarter billion dollars supporting local news, through a combination of emergency relief grants, extra marketing dollars earmarked for ads on publishers sites, and the waiving of fees Google normally collects from its ad server. Google said it expects its relief funds will reach at least 4,000 different publishers. Facebook has already dispersed $16 million across 200 different newsrooms.

On top of that, Google and Facebook are both large advertisers for news publishers, which are seeing tech as one dependable category for growing ad spending when most categories are down to wiped out.

The money we make with our advertising tools is entirely dependent on the success of publishers, said Richard Gingras, vp of news at Google.

Google and Facebook also face pressure as more foreign governments force them to compensate publishers directly for using their content. In April, the Australian government ruled that both companies would have to pay Australias publishers for using their content; earlier that same month, the French governments competition authority ruled that Google was obligated to pay publishers for reusing their content in its search results.

While American antitrust laws prohibit U.S. publishers fromworking together on similar concessions, some are interested in buildingsupport around a similar initiative: Two weeks ago, The New York Timess BenSmith tweetedout a letter that Heath Freeman, the CEO of Alden Global Capital, a hedgefund that owns newspapers including the Denver Post, sent to several Americannewspaper CEOs trying to build support for a campaign requiring Google andFacebook to pay up.

Though Google and Facebook in many cases represent news publishers most important business and distribution partners, most publishers are still unhappy with this situation, said Rasmus Kleis Nielsen, director of the Reuters Institute. Earlier this month, the Google News Initiative announced it was supporting an independent news emergency relief effort led by the Reuters Institute. They feel that this is unsatisfying and unfair.

The emergency funds, which Facebook began doling out lastweek, were needed because news media has become even more precarious. The LosAngeles Times, for example, told staffers in April that the spread ofcoronavirus had nearly eliminated the papers advertising revenues.

We had over 2,000 applications, said Nancy Lane, thepresident of the Local Media Association, which helped select recipients forthe first round of grants Facebook meted out. And a lot of them were, If wedont get this money, were going to go out of business.

That would have undone a lot of work and money that Facebook and Google have invested already. Both companies have separately pledged to spend $300 million to help publishers figure out a sustainable business model. That money has gone to subscription labs, programs to help local publishers create branded content; it funded Facebook Watch shows and publishers trying Subscribe with Google.

I still believe that subscriptions and building on the work weve done is the direction we want to go but its impossible to have these conversations when youre just trying to keep the lights on, said Brown in an interview.

That investment in a new business model, and the programs those dollars have funded, have drawn high marks from their participants. But progress for some publishers does not help all of them. Many local news publishers, particularly smaller ones, remain heavily reliant on print advertising.

[The past few weeks], Ive had many meetings with local news associations, and one of them said, This has been a wake up call for us to focus on our digital strategies, Gingras said. That was such a sad statement to hear.

With things in such a precarious place, the Duopoly may not be able to avoid calls for them to directly support news publishers. The industry is going to perilous places, said David Chavern, the president of the News Media Alliance, a trade group. Therell be more and increasing calls where theyre going to have to create a compensation regime.

And for publishers that have managed to diversify their businesses and create balanced relationships with the platforms, the continued support suits them just fine.

People want to debate whether this is an offensive move or a defensive move, and I dont care, said Evan Smith, the CEO of the Texas Tribune, which has applied for money from both Facebook and Google. My job, our job, is to get as much money as we can to pay for serious journalism.

This story has been updated. An earlier version story said Facebook and Google each pledged $300 million in 2017. Google made its pledge in 2018; Facebook in 2019.

https://digiday.com/?p=366708

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Like it or not, Google and Facebook are becoming the leading patrons of the news industry - Digiday

My late colleague, Neil Postman, used to ask about any new proposal or technology, What problem does it propose to solve?

When it comes to Facebook, that problem was maintaining relationships over vast time and space. And the company has solved it, spectacularly. Along the way, as Postman would have predicted, it created many more problems.

Last week, Facebook revealed the leaders and first 20 members of its new review board. They are an august collection of some of the sharpest minds who have considered questions of free expression, human rights, and legal processes.

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They represent a stratum of cosmopolitan intelligentsia quite well, while appearing to generate some semblance of global diversity. These distinguished scholars, lawyers, and activists are charged with generating high-minded deliberation about what is fit and proper for Facebook to host. Its a good look for Facebookas long as no one looks too closely.

What problems does the new Facebook review board propose to solve?

In an op-ed in The New York Times, the boards new leadership declared: The oversight board will focus on the most challenging content issues for Facebook, including in areas such as hate speech, harassment, and protecting peoples safety and privacy. It will make final and binding decisions on whether specific content should be allowed or removed from Facebook and Instagram (which Facebook owns).

Only in the narrowest and most trivial of ways does this board have any such power. The new Facebook review board will have no influence over anything that really matters in the world.

It will hear only individual appeals about specific content that the company has removed from the serviceand only a fraction of those appeals. The board cant say anything about the toxic content that Facebook allows and promotes on the site. It will have no authority over advertising or the massive surveillance that makes Facebook ads so valuable. It wont curb disinformation campaigns or dangerous conspiracies. It has no influence on the sorts of harassment that regularly occur on Facebook or (Facebook-owned) WhatsApp. It wont dictate policy for Facebook Groups, where much of the most dangerous content thrives. And most importantly, the board will have no say over how the algorithms work and thus what gets amplified or muffled by the real power of Facebook.

This board has been hailed as a grand experiment in creative corporate governance. St. Johns University law professor Kate Klonick, the scholar most familiar with the process that generated this board, said, This is the first time a private transnational company has voluntarily assigned a part of its policies to an external body like this.

Thats not exactly the case. Industry groups have long practiced such self-regulation through outside bodies, with infamously mixed results. But there is no industry group to set standards and rules for Facebook. One-third of humanity uses the platform regularly. No other company has ever come close to having that level of power and influence. Facebook is an industryand thus an industry groupunto itself. This is unprecedented, though, because Facebook ultimately controls the board, not the other way around.

We have seen this movie before. In the 1930s the Motion Picture Association of America, under the leadership of former US postmaster general Will Hays, instituted a strict code that prohibited major Hollywood studios from showing, among other things, dances which emphasize indecent movements. The code also ensured that the use of the [US] flag shall be consistently respected. By the 1960s, American cultural mores had broadened, and directors demanded more freedom to display sex and violence. So the MPAA abandoned the Hays code and adopted the ratings system familiar to American moviegoers (G, PG, PG-13, R, NC-17).

Its a good look for Facebookas long as no one looks too closely.

One reason the MPAA moved from strict prohibitions to consumer warnings was that American courts had expanded First Amendment protection for films, limiting how local governments could censor them. But all along, the MPAA practiced an explicit form of self-regulation, using a cartel that represented the interests of the most powerful studios to police behavior and represent the industry as a whole to regulators and the public.

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Facebook and the Folly of Self-Regulation - WIRED

Facebook's new homepage in dark mode

Todd Haselton | CNBC

Facebook on Friday launched its brand new desktop website. The new site will soon be available to everyone by default it's rolling out now but, if you don't see it yet, I'll show you how to check it out.

The new design, announced last year during Facebook's annual F8 conference, introduces a new dark mode with lower brightness it's easier on your eyes at night and I think it looks cooler.

Facebook was starting to feel a bit cluttered. The new design has more space and bigger fonts in the columns on each side of the news feed. This makes it easier to find things like the pages you follow (such as stores you shop at, local restaurants, bands you like), groups you participate in (like your neighborhood or a fan club), and events (like birthdays and upcoming cocktail parties).

Facebook said it's also easier for people to create all of these things.

However, one setting appears to be gone: the ability to arrange your News Feed posts in reverse-chronological order. Facebook has been deemphasizing this capability, guiding users to rely on its algorithms for how posts are arranged, but in this revamp the option to organize by "most recent" is gone (or so deeply buried that we couldn't find it). You can prioritize which friends or pages you follow.

You may already have switched to the new design over the past few months, when Facebook began to ask some of its users to participate in the beta.

But, if you didn't, here's how to switch.

You may also see a pop up at the top of the screen that looks like this, which you can tap to switch to the new Facebook:

You may see this pop up, which also lets you switch.

Annie Palmer | CNBC

Facebook said soon you won't see those options and you'll just see the new version.

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Facebook just launched its brand new site here's how to check it out if you don't see it yet - CNBC

Facebook has publicly promised not to discriminate against its employees based on their ideology or viewpoint as it battles continuing claims of political bias.

The social media giant quietly added language to its recruitment website late last year saying that it does not discriminate on the basis of "political views or activity".

The National Centre for Public Policy Research (NCPPR), a conservative think tank based in Washington DC, took credit for the change, saying it had threatened to put public pressure on the company.

Justin Danhof, the NCPPR's general counsel, said he had told Facebook he would bring a shareholder motion similar to those it has already filed at Twitter, demanding board-level probes into political discrimination. He added that he withdrew the plan after Facebook updated its site.

A spokeswoman for Facebook said that it had merely updated its website to reflect a longstanding policy, but declined to say why or when the language had changed.

The change comes after the company was criticised by Conservative MPs for appointing Alan Rusbridger, the former editor of the Guardian,to its experimental new "supreme court".

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Facebook claims it will not discriminate based on politics - Telegraph.co.uk

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In the Before Times, Jody Kanikula and a half dozen fellow Democratic women activists would gather for drinks each Thursday after the weekly Kane County Democrats meeting in Geneva, Illinois. These days, they settle for Saturday morning Zoom calls to reimagine what their political organizing looks like now that their preferred tools of the tradedoor knocking and mail dropsare off the table.

I met Kanikula and her friends in October 2018, a high season of political activity. The group was trying to elect Democrat Lauren Underwood, then a 32-year-old nurse whod guided the implementation of the Affordable Care Act, to Congress. The women were mostly new to politics, having dipped their toes into activism in the wake of Donald Trumps election.They spent the 2018 cycle rebuilding Democratic infrastructure in their cluster of exurbs 50 miles west of Chicago, an area where Republicans had long ruled by default. That year, they focused their energies on ginning up excitement for a small slate of Democratic candidates. This time around, a Democrat is challenging a GOP officeholder in the county for every elected position but coroner.

In recent weeks, Tara Reades sexual assault allegations against Joe Biden have rippled through the group, setting off a flurry of notifications in their text chain with each new development. Reades claims are disheartening, Kanikula tells me. But like the 10 other resistance women I spoke with, shes sticking with the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee regardless. If it was a different kind of election, Id give it more weight, she says. But the No. 1 goal is to get Trump out of there.

Kanikula and her friends seem yanked from research conducted by Harvard sociologist Theda Skopcol and University of Pittsburgh historian Lara Putnam in the wake of the 2016 election. The scholars had identified a new brand of Democratic activist: white, college-educated women who live in suburban and exurban communities where country club Republicans had long reigned. In the wake of Trumps victory, these women flocked to their nearest city for the Womens March, formed Indivisible groups, and, eventually, worked with their local Democratic parties to unseat Republicans at every level of government.

This is not the usual picture of the resurgent activist left. Many accounts of thesuburban womans political awakening are fond of anathematizing these activists as wine moms or MSNBC moms or the yoga vote. The Resistance was the new brunch, the new book club. For proof this was wrong one need only look at the 2018 midterms, when suburban women around the country retired teachers, librarians, health care people, some businesswomen, as Skocpol put ithelped power the Blue Wave that swept Democrats into control of the House. Health care was at the heart of their organizing efforts, a big reason its at the heart of the Democratic agenda today. This cycle, Biden not only needs these women to votehes relying on them to keep Democratic enthusiasm alive in their communities through November. The campaigns online strategy is shaped around appealing to what its digital director recently called, not a little cringingly, the suburban Facebook empathy moms.

These activists had been forged in no small part by Trumps chronic degradation of women; as it stands, roughly two dozen have accused him of sexual assault. But as an allegation concerning their partys presidential candidate captures national headlines, the women I spoke with remain committed to their political activism. Thats not because they believe Bidenthough many do. Its because their ultimate goal is limiting Trump to one term. If that requires some compromises along the way, so be it.

Do they think that sexual assault is okay? No, Putnam says. Do they think that being a woman involved in politics, where there are still lots of male politicians, means a lot of compromises all the time in order to get things done? Yes.

Reades claims against Biden have taken a muddled route to the national spotlight. In April 2019, Reade came forward to claim the former vice president had touched her neck and shoulders inappropriately when she had been an aide in his Senate office in the early 1990s; that claim had been corroborated by several of her contemporaries and more than half a dozen women whod made similar allegations.

But this spring, Reade leveled a more serious accusation at the former vice president: that he had shoved her against the wall of a Senate office building, reached under her skirt, and digitally penetrated her.Biden outright denies these claims. Reporters, lacking the copious documentation or clear pattern of predation on which much of #MeToo reporting is built, have thus far been unable to move the story onto the sturdier footing. The circumstances are best summarized by Voxs Laura McGann, who spent more than a year investigating Reades allegations: None of this means Reade is lying, but it leaves us in a limbo of Me Too: a story that may be true but that we cant prove.

A new Monmouth poll found that only 20 percent of Democrats think Reade is telling the truth, a sentiment mirrored by the activists I spoke with who say many are still processing the allegations. I dont think anyones rushing to judgment now, Kierstyn Zolfo, the Pennsylvania statewide legislative chair for Indivisible, tells me. Barb Kaplan, who leads an Indivisible group in the Cleveland suburbs, says fellow activists shes spoken with want to see some hard evidence, adding that most see it as a distraction.

But Putnam suggests another force is at work, and she points to the presidential primary as evidence. Biden had never been these activists favorite candidatemost of them preferred Elizabeth Warren or one of the other two dozen Democrats who sought the presidency this cycle. But these women got into politics, Putnam explains, with a vision of building Democratic political power above all else. Just as choosing one candidate over another is antithetical to their mission, so too would be calling for the removal of a candidate who most Democrats think did nothing wrong.

They have put a lot of energy into making politics be about more than just a single savior candidatewhether thats a candidate who they really loved or really disliked, Putnam says. They have been girding themselves for living with an outcome they knew they were not going to be personally excited about at the top of the ticket.

Coming out of 2016, most people have been unified in driving Trump out of the White House, Kaplan says. Its going to be really hard to dissuade them from that position.

This shouldnt be mistaken for blind party loyaltyindeed, a number of these activists, some of them former Republicans, identify as independents. Nor are these women turning a blind eye to the claims. In fact, quite the opposite: For many, Bidens history of behavior toward women has already been factored into their dim view of the candidate. Besides the allegations raised last spring, many activistsin particular, the older, professional women who make of up the bulk of the cohorthavent forgiven Biden for the way he treated Anita Hill, the law professor who accused Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas of sexual harassment. As chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Biden presided over Thomas confirmation hearing and failed to seriously investigate Hills accusations or call corroborating witnesses to testify against Thomas. Last year, Hill accused Biden of having set the stage for Brett Kavanaughs Supreme Court confirmation in 2018, when claims of sexual misconduct made against the judge were also poorly handled.

Such realpolitik can seem at odds with the revulsion that pushed many of the activists into politics in the first place. But to hear Lark Cowart tell it, that moral energy hasnt dissipated; it was merely channeled elsewhere once the womens preferred candidates began to exit the presidential race. When you lose your grand motivation, youre finding other races and things to focus on, says Cowart, a member of the Kane County group. Ill pour my energies behind the women who are running.

Melissa Rodriguez, who runs an Indivisible group near Dayton, Ohio, said her members had come to a similar agreement when Biden became the nominee. If you want to spend your energy on a local race or voter registration, go for it, she recalls saying. Were just pushing toward a great Democratic turnout.

The suburbs helped deliver the Democratic nomination to Biden, and hell rely on them to unseat Trump come November. His nascent digital operation has set its sights on those empathy moms whom the campaign believes can be won over with appeals to human decencythe premise of much of Bidens relatively non-ideological campaign. In the midst of the pandemic, paid family leave, health care, and related domestic issues are top of mind for swing voters. As for sexual assault, its way down the list, says Tresa Undem, a pollster who specializes in surveys on gender issues.

Undem is keeping a close eye on independent women voters. Theyre less likely to view the allegations through a politicized lensand in general they tend toward nihilistic doubts about their ability to change anything. Whether these voters see a difference between the parties on issues related to women could be an indicator of their apathy, Undem says. Could this dampen their vote? Yes.

And a lot of voter opinion, she says, will hinge on how much airtime the allegations receive in the coming weeks and months. That doesnt just mean news stories with new informationattack ads, Undem says, could play that role, something the Trump campaign already seems to have realized. Ultimately, she says, it could create the impression that neither candidate, and neither party, is good.

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For Some Facebook Empathy Moms, Joe Biden Is Just Another Compromise - Mother Jones

Facebook on Wednesday announced the first 20 members of its Oversight Board, an independent body that can overturn the company's own content moderation decisions.

The oversight board will govern appeals from Facebook and Instagram users and questions from Facebook itself,although it admitted it will have to pick and choose which content moderation cases to take due to the sheer volume of them.

The board will receive cases through a content management system that is linked to Facebook's own platforms. They will then discuss the case as a group before issuing a final decision on whether the content should be allowed to stay up or not.

Facebook announced it was creating the independent board in November 2018, just after a report was published in The New York Times that detailed how the company avoided and deflected blame in the public conversation around its handling of Russian interference and other social network misuses.

The members are a globally diverse group with lawyers, journalists, human rights advocates and other academics. Between them, they are said to have expertise in areas such as digital rights, religious freedom, conflicts between rights, content moderation, internet censorship and civil rights.

Notable members include Alan Rusbridger, former editor in chief of The Guardian newspaper, and Andras Sajo, a former judge and VP of the European Court of Human Rights.

Helle Thorning-Schmidt, a former Prime Minister of Denmark, is one of the board'sfour co-chairs."Up until now some of the most difficult decisions about content have been made by Facebook and you could say Mark Zuckerberg," she said on a call with the press Wednesday."Facebook has decided to change that."

The board will begin hearing cases in the coming months.Itwill eventually have around 40 members, which Facebook will help pick, it said.

"It's one thing to complain about content moderation and challenges involved, it's another thing to actually do something about it," said Jamal Greene, co-chair of the board. "These problems of content moderation really have been with us since the dawn of social media, and this really is a novel approach."

The move could help Facebook avoid accusations of bias as it removes content deemed problematic. Some lawmakers and conservative speakers have said that Facebook censors politically conservative points of view, a claim the company rejects.

"It is our ambition and goal that Facebook not decide elections, not be a force for one point of view over another, but the same rules will apply to people of left, right and center," Michael McConnell, another co-chair of the board, told reporters Wednesday.

Facebook pledged to give the board $130 million in funding last December, with the money expected to cover operational costs for at least six years. The board will be compensated an undisclosed amount for their time.

Facebook in January outlined the board's bylaws, making it clear that the social media giant is still in control. The board's decisions do not necessarily set any precedents that Facebook has to follow in the future, and the board is limited when it comes to content it can address.

The board said it will publish transparency reports each year and monitor what Facebook has done with its recommendations.

"It will be very embarrassing to Facebook if they don't live up to their end of this,"Thorning-Schmidt, a co-chair, said.

Brent Harris, Facebook's director of global affairs, said Facebook will implement the board's decisions "unless they violate the law."

The full list of members includes:

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These are the people Facebook put in charge of deciding whether to delete controversial posts - CNBC

A partnership between Charlottesville Tomorrow, journalist Jordy Yager, and Vinegar Hill Magazine has received $35,000 from the Facebook Journalism Projects COVID-19 Local News Relief Fund Grant for a new series, Determined: Stories of Resilience in a Broken Ecosystem, that examines the disproportionate impacts of COVID-19 on African American communities through the lens of the Social Determinants of Health (SDoH).

News isnt black and white, and neither is our community, Giles Morris said. In partnering together, Charlottesville Tomorrow and Vinegar Hill Magazine are honoring our shared values and together creating a new model for local reporting that prioritizes inclusion.

Charlottesville Tomorrow was selected from over 2,200 entries alongside 200 other local news organizations (including three in Virginia) who together will receive $16 million in grants as part of Facebooks $100 million global investment in local news.

I think covering health in a local community right now is a really important thing to be doing, said Josh Mabry, Local News Partnerships lead for Facebook. So the fact that you guys are building out comprehensive COVID-19 resources and making sure that the most critical information can be free, thats really important work that I think is very worthy of funding at this moment.

Vinegar Hill Magazine, founded in 2011 by Eddie Harris to support and project a more inclusive social narrative, focuses on lifting up stories of innovation, community activism, and culture in Charlottesvilles African American communities.

With this partnership we hope to further Eddies original mission of creating a more inclusive social narrative in Charlottesville, said Vinegar Hill Magazine Content Manager and Digital Strategist Sarad Davenport. The stars have finally aligned.

In creating Determined, independent journalist Jordy Yager seeks to offer an intimate portrait of people struggling to survive the COVID-19 crisis but also to shine a light on the brokenness of the systems designed to serve our communitys most vulnerable populations.

The pandemic has brought lots of talk and acts of togetherness, and yet, as we see now more than ever, our communities are also filled with injustices that often occur in segregated and isolating realities, Yager said. With this series, we aim to bring you detailed accounts of these long-standing and interconnected systems and the stories of community members waging daily battles, on micro and macro levels, to change and overthrow them.

Digital Humanities Fellow at the Jefferson School African American Heritage Center and founder of the Mapping Cville project, Yager recently won a first place for multimedia features from the Virginia Press Association for his Charlottesville Tomorrow story The Reimagining of Friendship Court. His work has been published by National Public Radio, The New Yorker, the Columbia Journalism Review, and many state and regional news outlets.

Jordy has embodied our principles of truth, equity, and community as a local journalist throughout his career, added Charlottesville Tomorrow Editor Elliott Robinson. We are so proud to publish his work again.

Art for the series is the work of Sahara Clemons a multimedia artist, designer and activist born in Washington, D.C., and based in Charlottesville, Virginia. Her work has been shown at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Second Street Gallery, The Bridge Progressive Arts Institute and McGuffey Art Center.

The project, which is being co-produced by Charlottesville Tomorrow and Vinegar Hill Magazine, will appear on both organizations platforms with the goal of reaching the largest, most diverse audience possible.

Follow the project at cvilletomorrow.org and vinegarhillmagazine.com or on social channels with #DeterminedCville.

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From the Newsroom - Charlottesville Tomorrow

MASSENA The show must go on COVID-19 or no COVID-19.

Local musicians are unable to play public concerts because of the coronavirus, so theyve taken their music to social media, like Facebook.

Its a family affair for Ben Todd and his family, Alisah, Catie, Jillian and Shannon. They can be found at 6 p.m. Fridays, gathered at their home for Couchfest, an effort that raises money for local organizations. Each Facebook Live performance lasts about an hour, and can be found at https://www.facebook.com/benjamin.todd.58.

Mr. Todd said the original plan by musician Andy Van Duyne was to hold Coronafest at Brick & Mortar Music in Potsdam. But then, as the coronavirus continued to spread, nonessential businesses like Brick & Mortar Music closed their doors to the public.

Because of the way things played out, it didnt come to fruition. So we just changed the name of our series to Couchfest. It just kind of stuck. It gives us something to look forward to, Mr. Todd said.

Couchfest Volume 1 raised money for the Potsdam Rescue Squad. That event did so well that they raised money for the Helping Hands food pantry the following week.

Those two brought in over $2,000 each, Mr. Todd said.

The Todd family followed up with a concert for the Snack Pack program in Potsdam, Theyve also used one of their performances to encourage people to support local restaurants, many of which are still offering takeout service.

They just held Volume 8 on Friday, raising money for support pets for the Office for the Aging.

All in all, I think were up to $8,500 thats been raised. When I say we, its really the people who tune in and click on the donate button. Were giving our time and everybody else is actually donating. There have been some significant contributions in there, Mr. Todd said.

As I contact people who operate these charities or these organizations, I get to hear stories about ways this is impacting other parts of the population. It solidifies the need and the reason for doing this, he said.

Singer-songwriter Shawn Stoddard also takes to the Facebook Live airways from 8 to 10 p.m. Saturdays at https://www.facebook.com/shawn.d.stoddard/. He calls his performances Quarantinepalooza: Streaming Live From the Shed. Session 7 will be held this Saturday.

Until the coronavirus hit, Mr. Stoddard had been booked for performances until mid-December. Once the pandemic hit and businesses closed, the doors were also closed on his income.

My last gig was out in the Carthage area, Great Bend at the Whistle Stop Tavern on March 15. Ive been out of this for six weeks now, he said.

His Facebook Live concerts are free. However, donations are appreciated and can be made at http://www.paypal.me/ninadennypr.

With every donation, the donor will receive a thank you package delivered to their doorstep via the U.S. Postal Service. If someone gave a donation and their child was watching the live stream, they can note that in the comments along with the sex of the child and a gift will be sent to the child.

Donors are also added to a drawing for a chance to win a free two-hour gig once the COVID-19 restrictions are lifted. Christine Tupper from Colton was the first winner.

Mr. Stoddard recalled how the Black Crowes had performed online at the beginning of the COVID-19 shutdown, and that gave him the inspiration to follow suit.

I decided, What the heck, well come up with a good name for it, he said.

Hell never be at a loss for music. Mr. Stoddard said he has 286 songs to date.

Ive been kind of saving them up over the years, he said.

Viewers will hear music that varies from classic rock to blues. In addition, viewers can make requests during the performance.

Well put up a live feed. Anyone can join the live feed. They can also hit the Share button and start their own Watch Party, he said.

Mr. Stoddard said the plan is to stream Quarantinepalooza live every Saturday until the state reopens for business. Since the stream is live, the posts will be deleted the next morning, along with everyones comments.

Andy Van Duyne was hoping to do live concerts with different artists each week at Brick & Mortar Music, until businesses closed because of the coronavirus. The plan was to find a charity and connect with it.

However, the music went on. While there are no live performances, Mr. Van Duyne had acquired software and video equipment that allowed him to broadcast concert videos by local musicians on Facebook Live. North Country Musicians TV can be found at 7 p.m. Wednesdays at https://www.facebook.com/NCM-TV-107828064193040.

He said the programming allows musicians to reach new listeners for exposure, and serves as a platform to highlight and support programs and charities that assist area residents.

I said, What if I grab a performance from several people... and put together a little package and start doing the show, Mr. Van Duyne said.

The music viewers will see varies. There are fiddlers, classical guitarists, rock bands and more. Some have recorded their music using video on their phone. Others have more elaborate setups with a camera and sound system. And yet others have supplied past concert footage.

Its basically a local music sampler. Theres just an amazing amount of music available. Any style is fair game, so you never know what youre going to hear. Seventy-five percent of the people I use are doing this actively on their own. Most of these people are doing online videos already. Everybody I play has got a Facebook presence, Mr. Van Duyne said.

He highlighted 21 different artists last Wednesday.

It went about an hour and 20 minutes, he said.

As the music plays, a crawler at the bottom of the screen lists organizations that are available for assistance, like food pantries, as well as restaurants that are still open for take-out.

Its ways people can help others or help themselves, he said.

Mr. Van Duyne said when life returns to normal, viewers who enjoyed the musicians can seek them out to hear more.

Whatever bar, whatever restaurant, whatever concert stage, be looking for these people, he said.

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Local musicians take to Facebook Live for music sessions - NNY360