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James Bennet and the rewriting of 2020

“Desperate to undo the social movement that threatened their place atop the social hierarchy, the right and its handmaidens in the squeamish center have fought obsessively to recast the protest summer as the aborted dawn of a new, terrifying tyranny — of “cancel culture,” anti-racism, and the most feared of them all, “wokism” — in which revolutionary mobs working with the Hollywood elite and the mandarins of the Democratic Party (don’t think too hard about it) will … well, do something bad.”

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Publishing Prejudice: The Oregonian's Racist Legacy

“The newspaper helped create the Oregon of today: A majority white state, with the West Coast’s smallest proportion of Black residents, anchored by Portland, America’s whitest big city. Despite Oregon’s progressive reputation and growing population of color, its major institutions — lawmakers, schools, police, housing systems and health care providers — have failed to erase deep-rooted inequities.”

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News in America: Public Good or Private Enterprise?

“Most Americans believe news organizations prioritize their own business needs – over serving the public interest: More than three in four say news organizations are first and foremost motivated by their own financial interests, while just 12% of Americans say news outlets act as civic institutions first.”

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The BBC at one hundred

“Its relationship with the British state has been fraught, a function of its peculiar dual status as both a news organization and a nominally unifying cultural service, and of its funding status.”

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Tucker Carlson’s strange rant about Fetterman shows how media fails

“Asking objective news reporters to be aware that a massive apparatus of disinformation is out there waiting to pounce on and exploit hazy reporting seems like the absolute minimum to expect.”

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When spyware turns phones into weapons

“In the long-term, journalists who feel threatened by an invisible enemy that could expose their sources and their private lives to public scrutiny may start to shy away from controversial investigations, curtailing their publications’ coverage, and dealing a blow to press freedom.”

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If Trump Runs Again, Do Not Cover Him the Same Way: A Journalist’s Manifesto

“We should be resolutely objective in the sense of seeking evidence and approaching subjects with an open mind. We should not, however, resort to taking everything down the middle, no matter what.”

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What is Dovetail from PRX?

“From a birds-eye view, Dovetail does three main things: podcast distribution, data collection, and ad inventory management.”

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Most people on Twitter don’t live in political echo chambers — but mostly because they don’t care enough to bother building one

“Most people don’t follow a bunch of political “elites” on Twitter — a group that, for these authors’ purposes, also includes news organizations. But those who do typically follow many more people they agree with politically than people who they don’t.”

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The Sun-Times’ new chapter: Our digital content is now free for everyone

“So today, we are dropping our paywall and making it possible for anyone to read our website for free by providing nothing more than an email address. Instead of a paywall, we are launching a donation-based digital membership program that will allow readers to pay what they can to help us deliver the news you rely on.”

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In Grief and In Anger, Welcome to Peste Magazine

“Peste Magazine believes health is a human right. We believe in naming the names of the powerful who believe others do not deserve that right, because of who they are, where they live, what they do, how they fuck, or how much money they don’t have.”

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Wikipedia has once again debated whether Fox News is a reliable source.

“The final result: Li found consensus that Fox be deemed a “marginally reliable” source for information about politics and science. This means that its use as a reference in Wikipedia articles will not be permitted for “exceptional claims” that require heightened scrutiny, but that its reliability will be evaluated on a case-by-case basis for other claims.”

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Axios's 'Smart Brevity' and Questionable Book-Selling Tactics

“The intrigue: An internal Axios memo encouraged each employee to buy six copies of the trio’s new book. Workers could then get those purchases expensed by the company—a practice that could cost Axios more than $70,000, according to Defector.” Savage.

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Inside Podcasters' Explosive Audience Growth

“Each time a player taps on one of these fleeting in-game ads—and wins some virtual loot for doing so—a podcast episode begins downloading on their device. The podcast company, in turn, can claim the gamer as a new listener to its program and add another coveted download to its overall tally.”

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Americans see media as critical to democracy, 19th News/SurveyMonkey poll says

“An increasingly diverse country does not see itself reflected in the media. Communities of color, LGBTQ+ people and marginalized groups are still underrepresented in both who covers the news and what news is covered.”

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How we know journalism is good for democracy

“When respondents have the least information, candidates of color—particularly Black candidates—are disadvantaged, among respondents across party, ideological, and racial attitude lines.”

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Welcome to the new Verge

“We also thought about where we came from and how we built The Verge into what it is today. And we landed on: well shit, we just need to blog more.” Love.

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Make Your Voter Guide ICONIC

“This kind of user-friendly experience is something we keep dreaming that more newsroom voter guides will feature.”

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Person-Centered Terms Encourage Stigmatized Groups’ Trust in News

“Participants trusted articles that used person-centered terms for their group more than articles that used stigmatizing terms.” Understandably.

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People of color at 'New York Times' get lower ratings in job reviews, union says

“While there were some fluctuation — on average, the performance of Black employees rose over the intervening years, while it declined for Latinos at the organization — white workers were consistently assessed as outperforming their peers.”

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Healing Polarized Communities

“We cannot begin bridging communities beyond our newsrooms without building — and supporting — more diverse communities within our newsrooms.” So proud to work here.

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Choose Your Own Literary Adventure

“The colorful recommendation chart, one of many that have rippled through the Twitter and Instagram feeds of book lovers, came from a small bookstore in Madison, Wis., called A Room of One’s Own. […] The charts seem to speak the internet’s language, one that meets people where they are by acknowledging that literature can be overwhelming, and people often don’t know where to start.”

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A luxury magazine photo hid relics Cambodia says could be stolen

For me the lede here is: Architectural Digest appears to have deliberately run a photo altered to hide the fact that an article's subject owns stolen Cambodian artifacts.

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After Roe v. Wade Reversal, Readers Flock to Publications Aimed at Women

“Alexandra Smith, the audience director of The 19th, which was founded in 2020, said growth in traffic had been “exponential.” She said an increase in search traffic had continued well after the June 24 court decision, with readers now looking for information on how the decision could impact access to Plan B and IUDs. They were also looking to read about the impacts on other civil rights, such as marriage equality.” Hey, I get to work there!

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Alex Jones must pay $50m for Sandy Hook hoax claim

“Despite retracting his claims about Sandy Hook, Jones has continued to use his media platform to argue the case was rigged against him and claimed that members of the jury pool "don't know what planet they're on". His Infowars website depicted the judge being consumed by flames.”

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