Good morning! Today's newsletter is brought to you by Chris.

As of today we are back with the weekly podcast, and this season we'll be digging deep into the topics we're exploring for this year's Media Moments 2022 report. You can pre-register for the report here, or scroll down to listen to our first special episode, looking at the year in broadcast.

"A brand new way to shop": The Independent launches service that keeps readers on site — whatsnewinpublishing.com

It's no surprise that ecommerce is hiiiigh up publishers' priority lists. Future has gone from strength to strength to slightly less strength on the back of its ecommerce strategy. That, and the vast leap forward in online purchasing habits over the pandemic years, means that we have another little gold rush on our hands.

The Independent, through a new partnership, is trying to maximise its success round ecommerce: "The Independent has invested significantly in its ecommerce operations recently. According to the publisher, sponsored deals with partner brands including Amazon Prime, Samsung and Sky, resulted in growth of 43% from transactional revenues last year, with forecast revenue growth of 41% for FY21/22."

Unsurprisingly, much of that investment is predicated on the Independent's storytelling chops. But - as mentioned in our new episode below - for a long time now the Independent hasn't launched products unless it knows there's a commercial benefit. Watch this space.

Where online hate speech can bring the police to your door — www.nytimes.com

With far-right extremism on the rise, Germany has gone further than any other Western democracy to prosecute individuals for what they say online, testing the limits of free speech on the internet. I imagine there'll be quite the firestorm of retaliation if anything similar ever emerges elsewhere.

Local media is seeing more investment. But not in enough places — www.washingtonpost.com

This is a very well argued op-ed looking at the need for investment in local news: "We are in the middle of a sustained response to the decline in local news. This newfound support just needs to reach more communities, such as mine."

How Ted Lasso changed the game for Apple TV+ — theaddition.substack.com

And before you immediately dive in to listen to our newest episode - a special looking at the past year in broadcast media - why not read this excellent exploration of the minutiae of streaming rights from our guest Charlotte Henry.

We’ve been testing a number of podcast editing tools recently and have settled for Hindenburg, a professional-grade audio editing system made for simplicity, speed and agility. It’s built for podcasts and audio storytelling, with lots of features like auto levelling which help streamline the process. But don’t take our word for it: try it out for yourself! This link will get you an extended three month trial of Hindenburg PRO for business.

[#Ad, but genuinely, we love Hindenburg]

New episode:

As the streaming wars heat up, a reckoning is coming for traditional TV — voices.media

For this next season of the Media Voices Podcast, kindly sponsored by Poool, we’ll be publishing ten episodes exploring the biggest trends of 2022 and how they affect publishers. For this first episode, we're joined by The Addition's Charlotte Henry to explore how key moments in broadcast, streaming and TV have shaped the media landscape this year.

Lend me your ears! The power of podcasts to connect and serve — voices.media

There are few people I know more passionate about the power of podcasts than Chris Phin. Until recently he was Head of Podcasts for DC Thomson. He's also leading a workshop on what kit publishers need to get started at our upcoming Publisher Podcast Summit. Here he's penned a piece for us on why podcasting is such a powerful format for publishers.