Media News

News about the media.

Social Media “Free Expression” or Outright lies?

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Article in The Washington Post by Heather Kelley 1/8/25

Headline:  “Meta ends fact-checking. Here’s how to find the truth on social media.”

“Facebook, Instagram and Threads will no longer have fact-checking in the United States. Here’s what that means for your feeds and how you can avoid falling for misinformation.”

“A massive reversal on fact-checking could soon change what you see on social media. Meta on Tuesday announced that it is discontinuing its fact-checking program in the United States to allow for more “free expression.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2025/01/08/meta-fact-checking-facebook-instagram-users/

Millionaires and Press Freedom

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Article in Columbia Journalism Review by Norman Pearlstine, 1/6/25

Headline:  “Trump, the Public, and the Press”

Subhead:  “The billionaire class has proved itself a poor steward of media. Journalists must redouble their efforts to expose the threat to democracy.”

“. . .Even before taking office, the prospect of Trump’s controlling the White House, Congress, and Supreme Court frightened owners of once-proud news organizations. Some seem willing to undermine editorial independence to curry favor with the incoming president.

“Billionaires, once thought to be the saviors of journalism, are proving themselves poor stewards of media companies. It is always dangerous to generalize, but several billionaires who have purchased media companies treat their acquisitions as sidelines they can run without much hands-on attention. They believe that running a media company must be easier than whatever business made them rich and that their talent and training are easily transferable from their primary business to media. They also trust their instincts more than others’ experience.”

https://www.cjr.org/analysis/trump-public-press-bezos-soon-shiong-billionaire-owners-endorsements-scandal-los-angeles-times-washington-post.php

“Conservative” Media Rebrand January 6

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Article in Mediaite by Sarah Rumpf, 1/6/25

Headline: ” ‘Destroying His Legacy’: Remembering Trump’s Media Boosters Who Condemned Him Over Jan. 6″

“. . .On Jan. 6 and the days that followed, numerous conservative media personalities were clear and unflinching in condemning the violence, placing blame directly on Trump for inciting the rioters, and calling for the rioters to be criminally prosecuted. Their unvarnished critiques were issued while the adrenaline was still pumping through their veins and before they had the chance to conduct the cynical calculus of how speaking the truth might impede their career ambitions. As Trump spent the past four years both evading criminal accountability for his actions and mounting a stunning political comeback, many of these erstwhile critics have engaged in an aggressive retconning of their own words.”

https://www.mediaite.com/opinion/destroying-his-legacy-remembering-trumps-media-boosters-who-condemned-him-over-jan-6/

On Cartoonist Resignation by WAPO Media Critic

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Article from The Washington Post by Eric Wemple, media critic, 1/6/25

Question answered:  Resignation of WAPO Cartoonist

“Okay, let’s dig into the facts first: Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial cartoonist Ann Telnaes, a staple of this section, announced her resignation from The Post in a Substack piece on Friday. Her resignation followed the spiking of a cartoon depicting Post owner and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, alongside other billionaires, genuflecting before a statue of President-elect Donald Trump. “As an editorial cartoonist, my job is to hold powerful people and institutions accountable. For the first time, my editor prevented me from doing that critical job,” Telnaes wrote in a post that prompted much critical commentary of The Post. David Shipley, who leads The Post’s Opinions section, issued a statement saying, “Not every editorial judgment is a reflection of a malign force. My decision was guided by the fact that we had just published a column on the same topic as the cartoon and had already scheduled another column — this one a satire — for publication. The only bias was against repetition.” Without context, Shipley’s explanation sounds as if it comes from left field. But actually: Reducing the duplication of opinions in column after column, video after video, cartoon after cartoon *has* been a steady emphasis of Shipley’s since he took over Post Opinions in September 2022. The section that he inherited was more of a freewheeling place where columnists often wrote off the news, with the frequent result being a number of pieces pegged to a single event and often expressing similar sentiments. He set out to fashion a more curated assortment of opinions with greater topical breadth. Also: Shipley told me last night that he made the decision on the Telnaes cartoon without consulting Bezos or Post Publisher Will Lewis. All that said, I find the explanation for killing the cartoon unconvincing and the decision demoralizing.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2025/01/06/erik-wemple-media-live-chat/

WAPO – Going No-Po?

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Article in The Guardian by Michael Sainto, 1/6/25

Headline:  “Washington Post expected to lay off dozens of staffers in coming week – report”

Subhead:  ” ‘Cuts will be deep’, media reporter writes, after paper faced scrutiny for halting endorsement of Harris in October”

“Dozens of employees are expected to be laid off at the Washington Post in the coming week in what is another of several tumultuous episodes in recent months for the storied title, according to a report by the media reporter Oliver Darcy.

“The layoffs are slated to hit the Jeff Bezos-owned … newspaper’s business division, I’m told. One person familiar with the matter said that the cuts will be deep, impacting many dozens of employees,” Darcy, the former CNN reporter, wrote in his newsletter Status.”

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2025/jan/06/washington-post-layoffs

The Law vs. The Media

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Article in Axios by Felix Salmon, 1/3/25

Headline:  “The hot new publishing platform is a legal filing”

“Filing a legal complaint is rapidly becoming the self-publishing option of choice for individuals looking to make explosive public allegations — regardless of whether they actually care about a judge finding in their favor.

“Why it matters: In an era of steadily declining trust in media, the dry formalities of a legal template provide not only an imprimatur of institutional credibility, but also the freedom to go into extreme amounts of detail without seeming petty, tedious or self-indulgent.”

https://www.axios.com/2025/01/02/lawsuits-publishing-platform-lively-baldoni

Snake Oil in the Media

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Article in Raw Story by Carl Gibson, 1/4/25

Headline: ” ‘Failing to tell the central story’: Reporter reveals what media misses in Trump coverage”

“n a recent post to his blog, veteran journalist Dan Froomkin argued that mainstream media outlets’ coverage of President-elect Donald Trump has been dismal in its grasp of who Trump is on a fundamental level. He then relayed advice from another experienced reporter on how journalists can more accurately cover the incoming administration over the next four years.

“On his website Press Watch, Froomkin argued that Trump should be viewed not merely as a politician, but as a ‘proverbial snake-oil salesman.” He opined that media outlets that failed to ‘situate Trump’s words and actions in the context of an ongoing con” were engaging in ‘deception’ by ‘failing to tell the central story.’ Froomkin cited Pulitzer Prize winner David Cay Johnston, who referred to the 45th and 47th president of the United States as ‘the greatest con artist in the history of the world.’ ”

https://www.rawstory.com/trump-media-coverage/

What’s Ahead for the Media, 2025?

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Article in The Columbia Journalism Review by Editors, 1/2/25

Headline:  “What We’re Watching in 2025”

Subhead:  “CJR’s staff on the trends they’ll be following in the year ahead.”

“New year, new me-dia? As 2025 dawns, familiar challenges are heaving into view for the press: how to cover an administration led by Donald Trump; how to meet news consumers where they are; whether we’re even relevant anymore. And yet the contours of such challenges are new, or greater in scope than before—or, at least, hard to predict going forward. Trump could graduate from (mostly) rhetorical media-bashing and use the hard power of the state to curb newsgathering in novel and chilling ways; questions of media relevance, meanwhile, have reached a fever pitch since the election, when new media, in the literal sense, was widely credited with facilitating Trump’s victory. To kick off the new year, CJR staffers and contributors outline the trends they’ll be watching in 2025—in old and new media venues alike, as well as across the worlds of tech, the right-wing ‘griftosphere,’ and, well, the world.

https://www.cjr.org/the_media_today/2025_what_watching_journalism_media.php

 

Ministry of Truth vs. Internet

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Article in The Guardian by Sam Levin, 1/5/25

Headline: “US newspapers are deleting old crime stories, offering subjects a ‘clean slate’

Subhead:  “A wave of local publications are considering requests to wipe or edit old articles to give their subjects a fresh start”

“Civil rights advocates across the US have long fought to free people from their criminal records, with campaigns to expunge old cases and keep people’s past arrests private when they apply for jobs and housing.

“The efforts are critical, as more than 70 million Americans have prior convictions or arrests – roughly one in three adults. But the policies haven’t addressed one of the most damaging ways past run-ins with police can derail people’s lives: old media coverage.

“Some newsrooms are working to fill that gap.

“A handful of local newspapers across the US have in recent years launched programs to review their archives and consider requests to remove names or delete old stories to protect the privacy of subjects involved in minor crimes.. .”

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jan/04/newspaper-crime-stories

 

Disinformation & Hate, Free-Speech?

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Article in New York Times by Cecilia King and Adam Satariano, 12/30/24

Headline:  “Social Media Companies Face Global Tug-of-War Over Free Speech”

Subhead:  “President-elect Donald J. Trump’s picks for the F.C.C. and F.T.C. have vowed to remove censorship online. That conflicts with European regulators who are pushing for stricter moderation.”

“President-elect Donald J. Trump and his allies have vowed to squash an online ‘censorship cartel’ of social media firms that they say targets conservatives.

“Already, the president-elect’s newly chosen regulators at the Federal Communications Commission and the Federal Trade Commission have outlined plans to stop social media platforms like Facebook and YouTube from removing content the companies deem offensive — and punish advertisers that leave less restrictive platforms like X in protest of the lack of moderation.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/30/technology/trump-administration-speech-policy.html