I'm going to keep it short and sweet today. The Russian invasion of Ukraine is one of those historical pivots that reorders things in such a fundamental way that there is before and after. The post-World War II order hangs in the balance, and democratic societies seem to be responding . But this is reordering the economic order of things too and digital media and social media are affected in several ways.

One thing I would add is that this is uncovering the extent to which disinformation campaigns have been trying to destabilise democracies. And it seems to be shining a light on how extremist political players that have entered the mainstream are closely aligned with these efforts. Look at the voices in the US and Australia that are supportive of Putin, and look at the misinformation that they continue to amplify. In some cases, these are not just political commentators but also elected officials. It shows the extent that Putin's disinformation campaign over the last decade has been successful in remaking the political landscape. It is utterly shocking to me as an Anglo-American that members of the party of Ronald Reagan are supportive of an autocrat like Putin. I bring this up not to shift this newsletter to foreign policy but to say that media cannot be ignorant of attempts to manipulate public opinion by foreign actors. To simply cover this with a false sense of balance completely misunderstands the situation and the threat that Putin's disinformation ops pose to the freedom of the press and trust in journalism.

Right, back to the media business. I've included a couple of interesting Twitter threads too. One is from Taylor Lorenz who writes about the online abuse that she suffered while working at the New York Times and the lack of support from management there. The other Twitter thread is about the use of one-on-one meetings with your team. It's not just about status updates. Managers should use them for personal development of their staff.

Ukrainian publishers increasingly using secure app Telegram to reach readers — pressgazette.co.uk

Press Gazette has been reporting on British journalism without fear or favour since 1965. Our mission is to provide a news and information service which helps the UK journalism.

Meta Uncovers Coordinated Misinformation Initiatives Targeting Ukrainian Users | Social Media Today — www.socialmediatoday.com

Social Media Today

Twitter’s fact-checking project, Birdwatch, is MIA as Ukraine rumors swirl - The Washington Post — www.washingtonpost.com

A year after it launched, a crowdsourced fact-checking platform called Birdwatch is still in pilot mode, invisible to most users.

Snap Suspends Advertising in Russia, Belarus and Ukraine – The Hollywood Reporter — www.hollywoodreporter.com

Snap has halted all advertising in Russia, Belarus and Ukraine to comply with sanctions placed against Russian businesses and individuals.

Taylor Lorenz Describes Dealing with Online Abuse

This is a thread worth reading, particularly if you're an editorial leader. The online abuse that female journalists in general and women of colour in particular deal with in the course of doing their job is nothing short of criminal. I applaud companies like Reach in the UK for actually trying to tackle this and supporting their journalists from the trolls and serial online abusers. No one should have to put up with this, and it's long overdue that we say no as a profession and as societies.

The Importance of 1on1 meetings for individual development