July 2017

COMMUNICATIONS & DEMOCRACY

CNN AGAINST LEADER OF THE FREE WORLD
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Michael Grynbaum]
CNN and its president, Jeff Zucker, are in the middle of their most intense bout yet: an unlikely public fight with the leader of the free world. It is rare that a single news organization attracts the level of ire mustered by President Donald Trump, who over the weekend posted on Twitter a video that portrayed him wrestling a figure with the logo of CNN for a head. But the president’s denunciations — in stinging tweets and slashing speeches, in phrases like “fraud news” and “garbage journalism” — have far outstripped his criticisms of other prominent news outlets, like The New York Times or The Washington Post. And his attacks have spawned a cottage industry of Trump supporters who have declared a digital war of sorts against CNN, including gotcha videos of network employees and threatening messages sent to anchors’ cellphones. White House advisers have discussed a potential point of leverage over their adversary, a senior administration official said: a pending merger between CNN’s parent company, Time Warner, and AT&T. President Trump’s Justice Department will decide whether to approve the merger, and while analysts say there is little to stop the deal from moving forward, the president’s animus toward CNN remains a wild card.
benton.org/headlines/cnn-network-against-leader-free-world | New York Times | The Hill | ars technica
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TRUMP WAR WITH MEDIA GOES GLOBAL
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Jonathan Easley]
President Donald Trump took his fight with the news media to the world stage on July 6, hammering CNN and his political enemies in the press as “fake news” at a press conference with Polish President Andrzej Duda in Warsaw. President Trump gave the first question of the press conference to Daily Mail editor David Martosko, a Trump ally who has been considered for various administration posts. That led CNN White House reporter Jim Acosta to allege a set-up. Martosko asked President Trump about the controversy that exploded around CNN July 5, when the network published a story claiming to know the identity of the man who created a video the President tweeted, which showed him tackling a wrestler with the CNN logo emblazoned over his face. President Trump didn’t miss a beat, saying that the network “has some pretty serious problems.” “They have been fake news for a long time,” President Trump said. “They’ve been covering me in a very dishonest way.” At the press conference, President Trump also slammed NBC, noting that he once pulled big ratings for the network, which aired his program “The Apprentice." Then-NBC president Jeff Zucker now heads CNN. “NBC is equally as bad, despite the fact that I made them a fortune, they forgot about that,” President Trump said. “But I will say that CNN has really taken it too seriously and I think has hurt themselves very badly. Very, very badly. What we want to see in the United States is honest, beautiful, free, but honest press. We want fair press. We don’t want fake news, and by the way, not everybody is fake news. Bad thing. Very bad for our country.”
benton.org/headlines/president-trump-war-media-goes-global | Hill, The | Washington Post
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CNNBLACKMAIL STORY
[SOURCE: Washington Post, AUTHOR: Abby Ohlheiser]
The Reddit user said he never intended his anti-CNN meme — you know, the one tweeted by President Donald Trump in which the now-president beats up CNN in a wrestling match — to become a call for violence against journalists. #CNNBlackmail was the top trending Twitter topic July 5, thanks to the efforts of a furious Trump Internet, who had concluded that the user’s apology was forced by a “threat” from CNN. Their evidence? A story CNN itself published, detailing its attempts to contact and identify the anonymous Reddit user ahead of their apology, whose offensive posting history suddenly became part of a national news story. The part of the article that infuriated the Trump Internet — and people on both sides of the political spectrum, who questioned the ethical standards of the network’s decision — had to do with how CNN described its reasoning for not identifying the Redditor by name. Reporter Andrew Kaczynski wrote that CNN had spoken with the person behind the account, and would not identify the user because “he is a private citizen who has issued an extensive statement of apology,” who had promised not to continue flooding the Internet with offensive memes. But, he wrote, “CNN reserves the right to publish his identity should any of that change.”
benton.org/headlines/reddit-user-behind-trumps-cnn-meme-apologized-cnnblackmail-story-taking-hold | Washington Post | ars technica
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INTERNET/BROADBAND

YOUTUBE STARS URGE FCC TO SAVE NN
[SOURCE: The Hill, AUTHOR: Harper Neidig]
A group of more than 100 YouTube stars is calling on the Federal Communications Commission to preserve its network neutrality rules, which are currently in the process of being repealed. In an open letter, 132 internet entertainers said that eliminating the rules could imperil their industry. “Online video traffic already represents over 70% of all global web traffic and is estimated to grow to over 80% of all traffic by 2020,” the letter reads. “Our rapidly growing industry employs hundreds of thousands of people and yet it barely existed more than a decade ago. As creators in this fast-moving industry, changes to the existing Net Neutrality rules would have an outsized impact on our field and jeopardize our livelihood.” Among the acts signing the letter are Benny Fine of Fine Brothers Entertainment, a group that runs a popular comedy video channel on YouTube and other platforms. The Fine Brothers have 15.7 million subscribers on YouTube alone. Also signing on to the letter is Dane Boedigheimer, whose web series the Annoying Orange has nearly 6 million Youtube subscribers.
benton.org/headlines/youtube-stars-urge-fcc-save-net-neutrality | Hill, The | read the letter
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VINT CERF ON INTERNETS FUTURE
[SOURCE: Fast Company, AUTHOR: Sean Captain]
An interview with Vint Cerf, the co-creator of tech that makes the internet work.
Cerf said, "My biggest concern is to equip the online netizen with tools to protect himself or herself, to detect attempts to attack or otherwise harm someone. The term 'digital literacy' is often referred to as if you can use a spreadsheet or a text editor. But I think digital literacy is closer to looking both ways before you cross the street. It’s a warning to think about what you’re seeing, what you’re hearing, what you’re doing, and thinking critically about what to accept and reject...Because in the absence of this kind of critical thinking, it’s easy to see how the phenomena that we’re just now labeling fake news, alternative facts [can come about]. These [problems] are showing up, and they’re reinforced in social media."
benton.org/headlines/internets-future-more-fragile-ever-says-one-its-inventors | Fast Company
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IMAGINING MORE FROM BROADBAND: HIGH-SPEED ACCESS DELIVERS IMPACT, NOT JUST DATA
[SOURCE: Daily Yonder, AUTHOR: Craig Settles]
[Commentary] Combine broadband with a 3-D printer, and you transform data into objects that can fix a tractor or help a child thrive. Rural communities are showing that high-speed access isn’t just a theoretical benefit – it has measurable results in the physical world.
[Craig Settles is a broadband industry analyst, consultant to local governments]
benton.org/headlines/imagining-more-broadband-high-speed-access-delivers-impact-not-just-data | Daily Yonder
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JOURNALISM

WHAT WE MISS WHEN WE OBSESS OVER TRUMPS TWEETS
[SOURCE: Columbia Journalism Review, AUTHOR: Kyle Pope]
[Commentary] Remember when we used to obsess about every presidential tweet? When every story was about us? When Donald Trump’s war with the media was, really, the only thing that mattered? We need to stop. Stop reporting on every tweet with the volume of a declaration of war; stop letting the president and his staff frame every misstep and scandal as a media story; stop treating Trump’s war with the press as if it’s the most important thing happening in this country. It’s not. Our response to each of Trump’s media-bashing episodes comes off as if we’re hearing them for the first time. Can you believe he said that? Could this be the thing that finally does him in? Does he have no respect for the First Amendment? The answer, of course, is that he doesn’t respect the Constitution’s guarantee of free speech. The media’s impulse, which is understandable, is to keep the focus on his threats to the press, and not to let them become normalized. But we have reached the point at which the media response has become counterproductive and even beneficial to the president and his lackeys in the White House, who have turned the West Wing into a megaphone for Trump’s faux media war and reporters in the White House briefing room into photo-op foils. It’s amazing, and absurd, that we turn over live television to the press secretary to air the administration’s latest broadside against the press, and let senior administration officials go off the record to attack our own outlets. Every time President Trump fires a shot in his war against the media, there’s an opportunity for a more serious, nuanced argument about why everyone benefits from a free and vigorous press: Airing a president and his policies to open discussion and scrutiny results in better government.
benton.org/headlines/what-we-miss-when-we-obsess-over-president-trumps-tweets | Columbia Journalism Review
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CONVENTIONAL THINKING RULES OP/ED PAGES
[SOURCE: Columbia Journalism Review, AUTHOR: Ross Barkan]
[Commentary] News organizations are still struggling to diversify their ranks. Minority groups only accounted for about 13 percent of newspaper jobs in 2015, according to one industry survey. Tied into that equation is a socioeconomic component that anyone who works in today’s precarious news industry is well aware of: holding a newspaper job often means coming from an affluent household, especially as both undergraduate and graduate degrees, along with a slew of prestigious internships, become the price of admission for scant openings. Despite all the upheaval over the past year, the unchanging nature of newspaper op-ed pages doesn’t surprise Jack Shafer, a Politico media columnist. “A newspaper is not a Twitter feed. It’s not skywriting,” Shafer says. The editorial status quo will remain as long as the people who control the pages hail from the same classes and ideological backgrounds they’ve always known. “We can argue whether Bret Stephens or Paul Krugman’s ideas are worthy of placement in The New York Times,” Shafer says. “but [A.J.] Liebling said it best. The freedom of the press is guaranteed only to those who own one.”
benton.org/headlines/right-or-left-either-way-conventional-thinking-rules-oped-pages | Columbia Journalism Review
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OWNERSHIP

QVC-HOME SHOPPING
[SOURCE: New York Times, AUTHOR: Chad Bray, Michael de la Merced]
John Malone is solidifying his hold on home-shopping channels — in his own particular way. His Liberty Interactive, which owns QVC, will combine with its longtime rival, the Home Shopping Network, in a $2.1 billion deal. The deal will put together the two home-shopping television networks at a time of upheaval in the retail world. Amazon’s dominance in selling online has grown seemingly nonstop, while Walmart has made e-commerce a big priority with the purchases of start-ups like Jet and the clothing brand Bonobos. Combining QVC and HSN, which also have substantial e-commerce operations, is meant to help them gain scale, combine resources and cut costs. QVC and HSN would remain stand-alone brands under a new QVC Group structure after the merger.
benton.org/headlines/qvc-merge-home-shopping-network-21-billion-deal | New York Times | Wall Street Journal | Washington Post
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AMAZON AND DISH
[SOURCE: Wall Street Journal, AUTHOR: Shalini Ramachandran, Laura Stevens, Ryan Knutson]
For years Dish Network Chief Executive Charlie Ergen has sought out deals and partnerships with just about every major telecommunications company, from Sprint to T-Mobile to AT&T —so far, to no avail. Now, the satellite-television mogul is turning his attention to the technology world and a new—and somewhat surprising—potential partner has emerged: Amazon.com CEO Jeff Bezos. The two men—eccentric billionaires with geek tendencies and shared interest in space and robotics—have gotten to know each other better over the past year and have discussed a partnership to enter the wireless business, apparently. Among the ideas: Amazon could help finance a network Dish is building focused on the “Internet of Things”—the idea that everything from bikes to Amazon’s drones can have web connectivity everywhere. Another idea is that Amazon, as a founding partner of Dish’s new wireless network, could offer an option for Prime members to pay a little more a month for a connectivity or phone plan, one of the people said. No deal is imminent and it is unclear if the companies will move forward with a partnership.
benton.org/headlines/amazon-and-dish-network-match-making | Wall Street Journal | The Hill
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SECURITY/PRIVACY

BLACKBURN PRIVACY BILL HITS DEMOCRATIC WALL
[SOURCE: Politico, AUTHOR: Ashley Gold, John Hendel]
Democrats aren't feeling the love for Rep Marsha Blackburn 's (R-TN) privacy bill, the BROWSER Act. "Despite her goal of bipartisan support, [Chairman] Blackburn has so far failed to attract a single Democratic co-sponsor a month and a half after the bill's introduction. And Democrats are pledging to follow through on their plans to make the privacy issue a campaign talking point in the 2018 congressional elections, seeking to punish GOP lawmakers for their 'creepy' and 'indefensible' move to axe the Federal Communications Commission's landmark rules shielding consumer data," they write. "Bottom line is, Republicans made every effort to get rid of the FCC privacy provisions, and at this point, I don't think that their efforts are credible," said House Commerce Committee Ranking Member Frank Pallone (D-NJ). Added Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-CA): "All I know is that she led the charge on ripping privacy protections away from every single American on the internet. I think that's the reason she introduced another bill. This is CYA [cover your ass]." Chairman Blackburn, for her part, had this retort: "The failure of Democratic leadership to substantively engage on this issue is revealing and belies other motives."
benton.org/headlines/blackburn-privacy-bill-hits-democratic-wall | Politico
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July 2017

Extraterritorial mischief: Internet regulation by trial court

Become a #CitizenSleuth and uncover Trump administration mysteries

danah boyd Discusses the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly of the Internet

Charter, Fox News End Carriage Fee Suit

The World May Be Headed for a Fragmented 'Splinternet'

Alt-weeklies look for lifeline from nonprofits

CommLawBlog: Sinclair-Tribune Merger Open for Comments

Fox suspends business news host Charles Payne amid sexual harassment allegations

July 7, 2017 (Sheila Michaels)

Is there room for both Amazon and Walmart?