Media Misinformation

AI Journalism / Ghost Books

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Article in Slashdot by Anonymous, 6/2/25

Headline:  “Business Insider Recommended Nonexistent Books To Staff As It Leans Into AI”

“Business Insider announced this week that it wants staff to better incorporate AI into its journalism. But less than a year ago, the company had to quietly apologize to some staff for accidentally recommending that they read books that did not appear to exist but instead may have been generated by AI. . .”

“. . .But a few were unfamiliar to staff. Simply Target: A CEO’s Lessons in a Turbulent Time and Transforming an Iconic Brand by former Target CEO Gregg Steinhafel was nowhere to be found. Neither was Jensen Huang: the Founder of Nvidia, which was supposedly published by the company Charles River Editors in 2019. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://news.slashdot.org/story/25/06/02/1537210/business-insider-recommended-nonexistent-books-to-staff-as-it-leans-into-ai

Planted Media Falsehoods on Fire?

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Article in Media Matters by Jane Lee & Isabella Corrao, 5/28/25

Headline:  “An intelligence report debunked MAGA media claims about Tren de Aragua and Venezuela. A Trump official is now under fire for reportedly ordering the report be redone.”

“The New York Times reported that Trump intel official Joe Kent ordered the assessment to be edited to protect Donald Trump and Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard”

“Intelligence community assessments rejected the Trump administration’s claim that the Venezuela-based gang Tren de Aragua is being directed by Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro’s administration to infiltrate the United States.

“In response, the Trump administration dismissed the head of the National Intelligence Council and his deputy, making claims about the pair that an observer noted are ‘extremely difficult to believe’ given that they served the country ‘faithfully’ for decades. Administration official Joe Kent — a former fixture in far-right media and currently top aide to Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard — also ordered analysts to revise the intelligence assessment, reportedly in order to protect President Donald Trump and Gabbard. . .”

Read the full story here:

https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/intelligence-report-debunked-maga-media-claims-about-tren-de-aragua-and-venezuela-trump

Rt. Wing Media Missing Truth

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Article in Media Matters by John Knefel, 5/22/25

Headline:  “Contrary to right-wing media claims, the GOP’s Medicaid cuts are for far more than ‘able-bodied men’ “

Subhead:  “While right-wing media yell about ‘able-bodied men,’ in truth Medicaid work requirements would hit caregivers the most — and they are disproportionately women”

“Right-wing media figures are telling their audiences that proposed work requirements for Medicaid will be targeted at men who are unwilling to look for a job, when the actual population most likely to be affected is poor, rural women who are taking care of elderly parents or adult children.

“The discussion comes as congressional Republicans negotiate a budget bill that is widely predicted to deliver massive tax cuts to the wealthy and corporations while gutting social safety net programs like Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, formerly known as food stamps. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.mediamatters.org/health-care/contrary-right-wing-media-claims-gops-medicaid-cuts-are-far-more-able-bodied-men

Read this book. . .Re ths book . . .R th buk. .

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Article in Poynter by Tom Jones, 5/21/25

Headline: “Opinion | How two major newspapers published a summer reading list with books that don’t exist”

Subhead: “Of the 15 books in a list published by the Chicago Sun-Times and Philadelphia Inquirer, only five were real. The culprit? AI, of course.”

“A popular feature that you’re likely to see in a major metropolitan newspaper this time of year is a summer reading list. . .”

“And if you are a reader of the Chicago Sun-Times or The Philadelphia Inquirer, you recently saw such a syndicated list of new books by famous authors, including Percival Everett, who won the 2025 Pulitzer Prize for fiction, and Andy Weir, who wrote “The Martian.”

One problem: The authors are real, but the books they supposedly wrote are not. Turns out, the list was generated by artificial intelligence. Of the 15 books, only five are real. The rest? Made up by AI. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.poynter.org/commentary/2025/chicago-sun-times-summer-reading-list-ai/

 

Journalism or Propaganda?

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Article in Status by Oliver Darcy, 5/21/25

Headline:  “The Right’s Biden Revisionism”

Subhead:  “For years, right-wing media pushed a warped narrative of Joe Biden as a brain-dead puppet controlled by sinister, shadowy forces. Now they’re demanding vindication—but they do not deserve it.”

“. . .Tuesday, Tapper declared that “conservative media was right and conservative media was correct” about Joe Biden’s mental state.

“But that’s not quite true. Or rather, it simplifies a much more nuanced media and political reality. While it’s fair to argue that the press should have covered Biden’s age with greater urgency—and to acknowledge that Biden clearly lost a step during his presidency—that’s a far cry from validating the deeply irresponsible narrative right-wing media spun for years: that the president of the United States was a mentally incapacitated puppet with dementia, unaware of his own surroundings, and propped up by a “shadow government” running the country in his name.

“That was never journalism. It was propaganda. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.status.news/p/biden-health-media-journalists

Look for News Behind the Curtain

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Article in Daily Kos by Egberto Willies, 5/19/25

Headline:  “Media fixation on Biden is a distraction. Why they fear AOC. Frum blasts tariffs like no other.”

“The Biden tapes, sadly, along with his cancer diagnosis, are creating a mainstream media distraction again. Why do they hate AOC? Conservative David Frum nails tariffs for the attack on the poor. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2025/5/19/2323223/-Media-fixation-on-Biden-is-a-distraction-Why-they-fear-AOC-Frum-blasts-tariffs-like-no-other?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=more_community&pm_medium=web

 

Missing Coverage?

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Article in The Guardian by Margaret Sullivan, 5/17/25

Headline:  “Yes, the media’s Biden coverage was flawed. But its reporting on Trump was far worse”

Subhead:  “A new book has fueled controversy over press handling of the ex-president’s decline. But that distracts from a bigger problem”

“With a new book out about Joe Biden’s failed re-election campaign, a media reckoning is in full swing. . .”

It goes something like this: mainstream journalism failed the voters. Reporters were complicit; they didn’t tell us how much the elderly president had declined. . .”

“. . .As a media critic, I’m always happy to see a good reckoning for the mainstream press.

“But this one makes me wonder. When is the reckoning coming for the failures to cover Trump effectively? . . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/may/17/trump-biden-election-media-coverage

Media Medicaid

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Article in Daily Kos by Blue Tuesday. 5/15/25

Headline:  “Medicaid ‘work requirements’ have nothing to do with work — the media must stop using GOP propaganda”

“After weeks of negotiations and in-fighting over how exactly they would slash Medicaid to pay for their enormous tax cuts, Republicans this week settled on what has become colloquially known as ‘work requirements.’ ”

“But the phrase ‘work requirements’ is both deeply misleading — and unfortunately almost universally used by the political media. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2025/5/15/2322546/-Medicaid-work-requirements-have-nothing-to-do-with-work-and-media-needs-to-stop-using-the-term

Shocking! AI Journalism Fake?

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Article in Columbia Journalism Review by Betsy Moraism 5/15/25

Headline:  “The PSAi”

Subhead:   “Introducing our campaign to stop the spread of fake media.”

“I has already begun to transform the environment for news and information. Several months ago, CJR embarked on a project with TBWA\Chiat\Day, the ad agency, to use AI as a tool to spot AI visuals as fakes—and to highlight the role everyone plays in making them go viral. Since 1961, CJR has advocated for best practices in the journalism community, and we believe in strong standards for verification, transparency, and media literacy. With this campaign, we are also recognizing that if the press once had a singular power to document and publish news, versions of that work are now also visible across the vast expanse of the internet—populated by disinformation agents, synthetic-media hobbyists, and all of us who share what we see when we scroll. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.cjr.org/analysis/the-psai-ai-fake-images-music-video.php

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Article in Columbia Journalism Review by Klaudia Jaźwińska, 5/15/25

Headline:  “A New Report Takes On the Future of News and Search”

Subhead:  “The Tow Center for Digital Journalism interviewed news and tech industry representatives about AI’s impact on platforms and publishers. They expressed some hope and a lot of trepidation.”

“All this week, CJR is running a series of pieces, on our website and in this newsletter, about how AI is transforming the news media ecosystem. Today we debut a campaign in collaboration with TBWA\Chiat\Day: the PSAi, which we hope you’ll check out here. . .”

Read the full article at:

https://www.cjr.org/the_media_today/new-report-future-ai-search-google-openai-altman-perplexity-gemini-apple-llm-artificial.php

Kitsch in the Media Now?

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Article in The Guardian by David Smith, 5/10/25

Headline:  “Crass, flashy, outrageous: Trump media blitz redefines meaning of presidential”

Subhead:   “White House communications have adopted a Trumpian air that’s ‘either completely malevolent or completely brilliant’ “

“. . .Over the past three-and-a-half months, the US president and his team have launched a relentless media offensive based on crass language, flashy tactics, shock-value videos and social media memes and posts that are outrageous by design. They have used platforms and personalities to bypass traditional outlets and directly engage the Maga (Make America great again) base. They have found new ways to drown out critics, goad opponents and antagonise the world.

“The embrace of viral far-right culture has nurtured a parallel information ecosystem through pro-Trump outlets enjoying a significant growth in influence, access to power and financial investment. . .”

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/may/10/trump-media-white-house-communications