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Monday, July 20, 2020
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Covid-19 has ravaged American newsrooms. Here's why that matters.The irony is that while battering journalism, the pandemic has also underlined the need for reliable local news. By Damian Radcliffe. |
What We’re Reading
AP / John Daniszewski
AP style will continue to lowercase “white” in racial, ethnic, and cultural senses →
Last month, the Associated Press announced it would capitalize Black and Indigenous in similar circumstances. “We agree that white people's skin color plays into systemic inequalities and injustices, and we want our journalism to robustly explore those problems. But capitalizing the term white, as is done by white supremacists, risks subtly conveying legitimacy to such beliefs.”
Challenger, Gray & Christmas, Inc.
2020 is looking like the worst year for newsroom layoffs — ever →
Through June, newsroom cuts are at their highest point since Challenger, Gray & Christmas — a global outplacement and coaching firm — began tracking them in 2003.
Columbia Journalism Review / Jon Allsop
What John Lewis can teach the press →
“Lewis's life was a lesson in moral clarity. If his death teaches members of the press anything, it should be that such clarity does not demand a subjective free-for-all, but rather the understanding that democratic rights — the right of free association; the right to protest without being beaten by the police; the right to vote — are fundamental, and that fighting for them is not playing politics, but what is right.”
Dallas News Guild
The Dallas Morning News and Al Día Dallas are unionizing →
“We understand that our industry is in turmoil. This tumult has resulted in no-raise promotions, increased work without increased income, staffing cut to the bone and, most recently, an across-the-board reduction in pay. The current situation is untenable. By uniting, the employees of The Dallas Morning News seek to work with management to build a more stable and secure environment so that local journalism can thrive.”
The New Yorker / David Remnick
The New Yorker’s next issue will pull reporting, essays, and fiction on dissent from its archive →
“Dissent is an essential component of the American story and the American future,” wrote David Remnick, editor of The New Yorker, in a note in the July 27 issue.
Associated Press / Michael Balsamo
A longtime criminal justice reporter on covering executions during a pandemic →
“I glanced over at his spiritual adviser — a Zen Buddhist priest who had sued the Bureau of Prisons to try to stop the execution because of fears over the coronavirus. He was wearing a mask under a face shield and appeared to be praying. I wondered if he was afraid he'd get the virus. I wondered if I would get the virus.”
Washington Post / Ben Strauss and Kim Bellware
For women in sports media, the allegations of sexual and verbal harassment at Washington’s NFL team come as no surprise →
“Jane McManus, a longtime writer at ESPN who now runs Marist College's Center for Sports Communication, said she often pulled young female reporters aside when she was covering the NFL and warned them about certain agents and team employees who could be dangerous. A team source, she said, once called to tell her he was wearing nothing but a bathrobe.”
The Oregonian/OregonLive / Eder Campuzano
National media, particularly right-wing outlets, are painting Portland as a “city under siege.” Local media tells a different story. →
“A Fox News headline blares ‘Portland protesters flood police precinct, chant about burning it down.’ The New York Post reported Saturday that Portland ‘descended into violence.’ … The images that populate national media feeds, however, come almost exclusively from a tiny point of the city: a 12-block area surrounding the Justice Center and federal courthouse. And they occur exclusively during late-night hours in which only a couple hundred or fewer protesters and scores of police officers are out in the city’s coronavirus-hollowed downtown. Those events are hardly representative of daily life.”
The Verge / Adi Robertson
Google will demonetize pages that spread coronavirus conspiracies →
“It's unclear how much content currently violates Google's new rules and whether specific sites would be demonetized under them. For instance, The Epoch Times — a newspaper that has widely spread COVID-19 conspiracies — currently hosts Google ads.”
Popular / Judd Legum
Fact-check of climate misinformation quietly removed from Facebook →
One of Facebook’s fact-checking partners determined The Daily Wire piece was “partly false” so its distribution was reduced and users who attempted to post the article were warned they were about to share false information. But then, without explanation, the fact-check was removed. What happened?