Gasoline, meet fire
The Muck Rack Weekly newsletter includes some of the most talked about stories in the journalism and public relations communities over the past week, and does not necessarily reflect the editorial opinion of Muck Rack.
Media statistic of the week
Bad news about book bans.?
“Book bans in public schools continued to surge in the first half of this school year, according to a report released on Tuesday by PEN America,” reports Alexandra Alter for the New York Times.??
“From July to December 2023, PEN found that more than 4,300 books were removed from schools across 23 states — a figure that surpassed the number of bans from the entire previous academic year.”
A few facts from the study:
This past week in the media industry
2020 election settlement
CNN broke some big news yesterday on the ongoing Smartmatic/One America News case.
“Voting technology company Smartmatic and the far-right network One America News said Tuesday that they had settled a defamation lawsuit stemming from the outlet’s lies about the 2020 election,” report Marshall Cohen and Oliver Darcy for CNN.?
Here are a few more details:?
“Smartmatic filed its lawsuit against OAN in 2021, alleging that the right-wing conspiracy network “victimized” the company and spread lies about its role in the 2020 election to “increase viewership and revenue.
Both parties declined to share details about the settlement.”
“Another right-wing media outlet settles charges that it lied to viewers about 2020 election,” tweets David Lazarus.?
‘Democracy dies behind paywalls’
The Atlantic’s Richard Stengel has an interesting idea: make journalism completely free for the 2024 election.
Here’s what Stengel had to say on the topic, which sparked an interesting discussion on X/Twitter:?
“Simply put, paywalls get in the way of informing the public, which is the mission of journalism. And they get in the way of the public being informed, which is the foundation of democracy. It is a terrible time for the press to be failing at reaching people, during an election in which democracy is on the line. There’s a simple, temporary solution: Publications should suspend their paywalls for all 2024 election coverage and all information that is beneficial to voters. Democracy does not die in darkness—it dies behind paywalls.”
领英推荐
An interesting stat about paywalls from the piece:?
“According to the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, more than 75 percent of America’s leading newspapers, magazines, and journals are behind online paywalls. And how do American news consumers react to that? Almost 80 percent of Americans steer around those paywalls and seek out a free option.”
“Really think The Atlantic should have made this “Democracy dies behind paywalls” story free bc I’m not subscribing,” tweets Kate Maxwell.
“This story is.. behind a paywall,” added Jennifer Elias.?
(A gift link was later made available for those who couldn’t access the piece.)?
Turmoil at NPR: ‘Gasoline, meet fire’
“NPR has formally punished Uri Berliner, the senior editor who publicly argued a week ago that the network had ‘lost America's trust’ by approaching news stories with a rigidly progressive mindset,” reports NPR’s David Folkenflik.
Here’s the piece in question, which Berliner published on The Free Press: I’ve Been at NPR for 25 Years. Here’s How We Lost America’s Trust.
Berliner has been suspended for five days without pay, according to Folkenflik.?
“Could NPR possibly make their image problems worse? Gasoline, meet fire,” tweets Ed Morrissey.?
“What a shameful way for NPR to deal with thoughtful criticism by a long time insider. A news organization that responds to criticism by firing the heretic should wonder whether the orthodoxy it worships has led it to dark places,” adds Jay Bhattacharya.?
A bit more about what’s going on now at NPR in the wake of the essay and suspension:?
“His essay and subsequent public remarks stirred deep anger and dismay within NPR. Colleagues contend Berliner cherry-picked examples to fit his arguments and challenge the accuracy of his accounts. They also note he did not seek comment from the journalists involved in the work he cited,” writes Folkenflik.
A few more
From the Muck Rack team
Happy 15th birthday, Muck Rack!?
What started as a free website for journalists to set up profiles and find each other online is now a 250-person company that serves thousands of communications and PR teams around the globe through our public relations management platform.
Hear from our founder and CEO Greg Galant to learn more about our story + milestones we’ve reached along the way.