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Memo: BuzzFeed News is shutting down, and BuzzFeed is cutting jobs by ~15%; Jonah Peretti: “We will have a single news brand in HuffPost, which is profitable” — BuzzFeed News, which won a Pulitzer Prize but never made money, is “beginning the process of closing,” the company's founder …
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Discussion:
Oliver Darcy / @oliverdarcy: NEWS: BuzzFeed News is being shut down.
Laura Hazard Owen / Nieman Lab: A history of BuzzFeed News, Part I: 2011-2017
Stephen Battaglio / Los Angeles Times: BuzzFeed News shutting down as company cuts staff. Journalists ‘heartsick.’
Justin Baragona / The Daily Beast: BuzzFeed News Is Shutting Down
Rob Wile / NBC News: BuzzFeed News is shutting down
Alexandra Bruell / Wall Street Journal: BuzzFeed Moves to Close BuzzFeed News, Lays Off 15% of Staff
Marisa Guthrie / WWD: BuzzFeed News Shutters as Part of Broader Reduction at the Media Company
Colin Kirkland / MediaPost: BuzzFeed Shutters Its News Division, Cuts 15% Of Jobs
Lucia Moses / Insider: BuzzFeed is shutting down its news arm and laying off 15% of staff as CEO Jonah Peretti concedes mistakes and some insiders complain of ‘brutal’ mismanagement
Ben Mullin / @benmullin: Memo: BuzzFeed News is shutting down, and BuzzFeed is cutting jobs by ~15%; Jonah Peretti: “We will have a single news brand in HuffPost, which is profitable”
Matt Weinberger / @gamoid: I'll have more to say later, but I was affected by these layoffs. For now, please spare a thought for all the excellent journalists who are now out of a job. https://twitter.com/...
David Mack / @davidmackau: what a ride!!! 8.5 years!!!
Gene Park / @genepark: journalism is unique in that winning the most prestigious, hard-to-win award does not at all guarantee any kind of job security. WaPo laid off two Pulitzer winners in the last 6 months too. none of that history mattered. https://twitter.com/...
Jay Peters / The Verge: BuzzFeed News is being shut down
Addy Baird / @addysbaird: i don't even know what to say. @peretti broke his promises to staff over and over and over again, and there's a reason we fought tooth and nail for the strongest contract possible. i am heartbroken.
Ben Smith / PenguinRandomhouse.com: Traffic — Buy the Audiobook Download: — Apple- Audible- downpour- eMusic- audiobooks.com
Max Seddon / @maxseddon: My most BuzzFeed-y story is about “the greatest day on the internet,” where people went absolutely wild about what color that dress is and some escaped llamas. It was probably the peak day in the history of the website, or even more, as @cwarzel argues. https://www.buzzfeednews.com/ ...
Amaris Castillo / Poynter: As BuzzFeed cuts its newsroom, journalists react with shock, sadness
Fox News: BuzzFeed News, which famously published Steele dossier, shutting down as company slashes headcount
Max Seddon / @maxseddon: Very sad news. @semaforben and @MiriamElder hired me to cover Russia when I was 25, with less than a year of professional experience and even less clue what I was doing. Months later I wound up covering a revolution and a war. At its best it was an incredible place to work. https://twitter.com/...
Oliver Darcy / CNN: BuzzFeed News will shut down
Liam Stack / @liamstack: Today's media environment feels about a million miles away from the days when The Awl (a website that no longer exists) published a piece called “I Hate Myself Because I Don't Work For BuzzFeed” (a website that just killed its news division) https://www.theawl.com/...
Peter Aldhous / @paldhous: Well, well ... look who paid for Twitter (but not other things) https://twitter.com/...
Kate Nocera / @katenocera: EVERY. TIME. https://twitter.com/...
James Grebey / @jgrebes: when I got laid off from a digital media company years ago, I made the managing editor who did the axing cry when i asked her how many times the business plan needed to fail before the people in charge of making the plan suffered instead of the journalists. thinking about that...
Brian Penny / @thebrianpenny: @bcmerchant Buzzfeed and HuffPost largely grew on the backs of free human content. It's heartwarming to know they're still willing to exploit “creators” alongside their AI...
Brian Merchant / @bcmerchant: @petersterne This is my theory of generative AI and labor pretty much across the board!
Peter Sterne / @petersterne: @bcmerchant My theory of journalism and generative AI is that AI tools cannot and will not replace actual journalists *but* will still be used as an excuse for laying off journalists.
Isaac Schorr / Mediaite: JUST IN: BuzzFeed News to Shut Down
Simon Ateba / @simonateba: ATTACKING ME: This guy @mattmittenthal who claims to be VP, Communications for BuzzFeed, Inc came to attack me in a DM, he's so mad I tweeted @BuzzFeedNews is closing. He wanted me to retweet that while Buzzfeed News is shutting down but the parent company is still standing... https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/...
Lou Carlozzo / Talking Biz News: BuzzFeed shuts down — BuzzFeed has shut down. — The head-turning website that brandished …
Eileen AJ Connelly / The Wrap: BuzzFeed News Shuttering Amid 15% Company-Wide Layoffs
Sahil Patel / @sizpatel: BuzzFeed's business continues to be in bad shape. While CEO Jonah Peretti has decided to shut down BuzzFeed News, some investors and shareholders would like to see him sell the whole company. https://www.theinformation.com/ ...
Katie Notopoulos / @katienotopoulos: RIP BuzzFeed News. I know a lot of my wonderful current and former colleagues are proud of the important and powerful work they did here, and rightfully so. But for me, I got to fuck around and post stupid shit with my buddies - literally my only life dream - for 11 years.
Aaron Rupar / @atrupar: SCOOP: Elon Musk is no longer removing legacy blue checks, but instead will require all users to post at least one tweet a week discussing a quality of his they admire in order to maintain active accounts on the platform.
Tess / @tess_townsend: This is so tragic. Buzzfeed news did so much amazing work. Just crazy. Win a Pulitzer as a very young news company, get shut down just six years later. https://twitter.com/...
Rahawa Haile / @rahawahaile: In 2014, BuzzFeed/Vice/DB were reporting DEEPLY on African refugees in Israel and the Mediterranean when trad US media refused to. I'm not just mourning the talented journalists who will lose their jobs from mismanagement but the scope of reporting made possible because of them. https://twitter.com/...
Matthew Sitman / @matthewsitman: Shouldn't he be the one to lose his job then? https://twitter.com/...
Ian Sherr / @iansherr: Feeling for my friends at BuzzFeed, Insider and elsewhere. What a terrible few months this has been for everyone.
David Ruddock / @rdrv3: Everyone in media knows the revenue model is broken. Direct ads are incredibly volatile and go through prolonged droughts. Programmatic ads are a race to the bottom on operational costs. Paywall is the only solution. But we all know something else: Most people will never pay.
That Michael Caputo / @michaelrcaputo: .@BuzzFeedNews helped create the Russian Collusion Hoax and a key hoaxer there told a woman I know that the publication would bury me. One of us didn't get buried. The other died today. Cheers. https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/...
Todd Spangler / Variety: BuzzFeed News Is Shutting Down, Company Laying Off 180 Staffers
Shannon Liao / @shannon_liao: buzzfeed news is shutting down. CEO points to challenges including the pandemic, admits that he could have done better but he doesn't mention stepping down while 15% of staff is cut https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/...
Christina Warren / @film_girl@mastodon.social: #BuzzFeed News mattered. I worked for one of BuzzFeed's top competitors in the peak era and competing with them was so tough because they raised all this money (Mashable didn't raise until 2014 …
Christina Warren / @film_girl@mastodon.social: Like, watching the decline of digital media, a thing I gave so much of my life to, is just depressing. I used to say to people at Mashable (and this was very early, maybe 2010 when I first said this) that we had to become the New York Times before the Times became us. …
Christina Warren / @film_girl@mastodon.social: Fun fact: I had drinks with Jon and Jonah (CEO and then COO of BuzzFeed) in January or Feb of 2011 in the East Village b/c they wanted to see if Mashable would be willing to partner with BuzzFeed. …
Nikki Main / Gizmodo: BuzzFeed News Is Shutting Down
Kevin Collier / @kevincollier@mastodon.social: Unbelievable bummer that BuzzFeed News is closing. I spent fewer than 2 years there but it was pivotal for me. The vast majority of people I befriended and most admired there have since moved on, but still, what a loss and and end of an era.
Edmund Lee / @edmundlee: .@BuzzFeedNews was a two-time Pulitzer finalist ... RIP https://twitter.com/...
Davey Alba / @daveyalba: what the actual fuck https://twitter.com/...
Evette Dionne / @freeblackgirl: It always we're reducing the workforce and never the CEO is being nixed for having to continually lay off employees every other quarter and still not turning the profit shareholders desire. https://twitter.com/...
Laura Walubengo / @lwalubengo: Oh maaaan... https://twitter.com/...
Casey Newton / @caseynewton@mastodon.social: RIP BuzzFeed News :(
Nick Summers / @ncksmmrs: BuzzFeed News has had some killer scoops over the years. This is a real shame. https://twitter.com/...
Joe Bernstein / @bernstein: This was a great newsroom, which produced great stories and nurtured great talent. https://twitter.com/...
Ben Mullin / @benmullin: BuzzFeed News won a Pulitzer Prize and minted some of the great journalists of its generation, but never made any money. The media business is hard, pt. 1,248,8495 https://www.nytimes.com/... https://twitter.com/...
David Ruddock / @rdrv3: The silver lining? I'm confident a new wave of media layoffs will accelerate the trend toward specialized, independent outlets and creators building on a *paid access* (paywall) model. It's a model that rewards what people make, not whether readers can be convinced to click it.
Manisha Pande / @mnshap: BuzzFeed Shuts Down Its News Division - The New York Times In his memo, Mr. Peretti said... he was slow to accept that social-media platforms would not provide financial support required to make [news] profitable. https://www.nytimes.com/...
Fortesa Latifi / @fortesalatifi: this is terrible. media is a heartbreaking business https://twitter.com/...
Karl Bode / @karlbode: we throw countless billions at everything from nazi influencers to obvious crypto scams, but developing creative funding models for independent journalism is always somehow a bridge too far https://twitter.com/...
John Paczkowski / @johnpaczkowski: 👇THIS👇 https://twitter.com/...
Kelsey Weekman / @kelsaywhat: Just lost my job I think! Please hire me. Reporting on internet culture has been my dream. kelseyweekman@gmail.com https://twitter.com/...
Oliver Darcy / @oliverdarcy: “HuffPost and BuzzFeed Dot Com have signaled that they will open a number of select roles for members of BuzzFeed News,” @peretti says. “Moving forward, we will have a single news brand in HuffPost, which is profitable, with a loyal direct front page audience.”
Eric Newcomer / @ericnewcomer: Very sad to see the demise of BuzzFeed News. While the business model was deeply flawed, the stories were excellent!
Ben Collins / @oneunderscore__: I will miss Buzzfeed News, in part because I'm not sure anywhere else that got a Pulitzer is going to publish stuff like this again. https://www.buzzfeednews.com/ ...
Harry Khachatrian / @harry1t6: So it begins. ChatGPT claims its first scalp https://twitter.com/...
Brian Merchant / @bcmerchant: Annnnnnd there it is — it's subtle, but unmistakable. In the same memo in which he dispatches the News team, Buzzfeed's boss heralds the company's future as being “creators...” and “AI.” Even if he's not replacing jobs outright, the calculus of mentioning it here is clear. https://twitter.com/...
Hamed Aleaziz / @haleaziz: Just awful, awful news. BuzzFeed had a Pulitzer-prize winning newsroom full of dedicated reporters at one point — that's all gone now. https://twitter.com/...
Alexander Kaufman / @alexckaufman: BuzzFeed News funneled venture capital into something genuinely very useful and necessary: High-quality reporting freely available for anyone to read. It was the envy of every reporter who entered journalism in the chaotic 2010s and didn't work there. What a loss.
Sarah Weinman / @sarahw: So depressing. BuzzFeed News did incredible work and was thoroughly run into the ground by its owners. https://www.nytimes.com/...
Tom Gara / @tomgara: Taking the internet as seriously as “real life” meant BF was way ahead of the curve on the biggest stories of the last decade. It's good that other news orgs, including the big winners of the last few years, eventually caught up—in large part by hiring many of BF's best people
Caleb Hull / @calebjhull: Alternative headline: BuzzFeed, which published a fake dossier, is shutting down. https://twitter.com/...
Kate Aurthur / @kateaurthur: These screenshots are completely out of order, but add up to completely devastating news. https://twitter.com/...
Lucas Shaw / @lucas_shaw: “No jobs are being replaced by AI.” — @peretti
Jeff Jarvis / @jeffjarvis: I HATE to say this but I have said from the start that BuzzFeed News never had a sustaining business model. The cross-subsidy from BuzzFeed itself was generous but I knew that investors (whether VC or the public market now) would insist on getting rid of the drag on profits. https://twitter.com/...
Stephanie M. Lee / @stephaniemlee: This is devastating and enraging. Being part of this brilliant team from 2015-2022 was a dream. We broke news — and the internet — constantly, won a PULITZER, and did the most ambitious stories we could dream up. Now it's just being thrown away. Solidarity with @bfnewsunion. https://twitter.com/...
Sarah Kendzior / @sarahkendzior: BuzzFeed News was one of few outlets to report in depth about transnational organized crime and its ties to government. The type of reporting they were doing a few years ago has essentially vanished, despite the topic's popularity. I wonder what will happen to their archives. https://twitter.com/...
Kristin Chirico / @lolacoaster: Sometimes I wonder if the only thing p*reti is actually exceptional at is making a lot of talented and wonderful people have absolutely terrible days https://twitter.com/...
Meech / @mediumsizemeech: Also—putting out a press release before you tell your employees they've been sacked is so vile https://twitter.com/...
@pfpicardi: Devastated for all the hard-working journalists and other talent (past and present) who made Buzzfeed News such an important, distinctive voice in our increasingly embattled media landscape. Your work is very much respected, and you deserved better than this. https://twitter.com/...
Hans Mahncke / @hansmahncke: For all the schadenfreude, let's not forget that it was thanks to Buzzfeed that those of us with a functioning brain knew on Jan 10, 2017 that the Steele dossier was a bunch of obvious fabrications. https://twitter.com/...
Lucas Shaw / @lucas_shaw: This is confirmed. BuzzFeed is firing about 180 people and shutting down BuzzFeed News. The company's COO and CRO are both leaving. https://twitter.com/...
Mark Seibel / @markseibel: So sorry to read this. There was a time BuzzFeed News was very competitive. https://twitter.com/...
@medinamora: One day I will write an essay about how, between 2014 and 2017, BuzzFeed News was low-key one of the best writing schools in the US. It'd be a matter of listing the books, TV shows, movies that BF people went on to write. Today, tho? Today I'm just bummed. https://www.nytimes.com/...
Ehsanullah Amiri / @euamiri: BuzzFeed News is shutting down, the once-iconic media brand's founder and CEO Jonah Peretti announced in a company-wide memo on Thursday. https://www.thedailybeast.com/ ...
Katie Notopoulos / @katienotopoulos: this stunt marketing for ben smith's new book is really in poor taste imo
Christina Bellantoni / @cbellantoni: Awful news as our journalism students are about to graduate into an even tougher job market. So sorry to see this hit such a talented newsroom. https://twitter.com/...
Ken Bensinger / @kenbensinger: Absolutely heartbroken that @BuzzFeedNews is going to be shut down. Truly a remarkable & unique place that produced hugely important journalism & many of the world's best reporters & editors. If you can, please help all the BFN journalists land a new gig. You won't regret it.
Aisha Harris / @craftingmystyle: Wild how when companies announce layoffs, the CEOs often apologize for managing poorly ... and yet it's the ones who didn't make any mistakes (and who don't make anything close to the amount of $$ the C-suite folks do) who pay the price 🫠 https://twitter.com/...
Stephanie K. Baer / @skbaer: Heartbroken isn't strong enough of a word to describe how I'm feeling right now. I'm 34 weeks pregnant with my first child and was about to go on leave. I'm not sure what's next, but I am so proud to have been a part of this newsroom these past 5+ years.
David Mack / @davidmackau: i'm obviously sad, but i'm immensely proud of the work i did here — even the stuff that seemed stupid! i had such freedom & it was indescribably fun! if anyone in this industry is hiring (lol) or wants me to write or edit, my email is davidmackau@gmail.com! https://twitter.com/...
Katie Spalding / @supermathskid: Oh man, this sucks. BuzzFeed News has been responsible for some genuinely amazing and important journalism, and if you never noticed it's just because you got it confused with BuzzFeed dot com https://twitter.com/...
Emily Wilder / @vv1lder: so many good people getting shafted by this industry yet again. @AlbertSamaha gave me my first big opportunity to take on an ambitious freelance project for bn when i was v green and recovering from an awful journalism experience myself. this sucks so bad https://twitter.com/...
Christina Warren / @film_girl: Holy shit, Jonah just basically calls the investment in news “mistake,” if I'm reading this right. That's probably not objectively wrong, but man is it cold as hell. https://www.nytimes.com/...
Marcus Gilmer / @marcusgilmer: God this is awful. The news division there had amazing journos doing amazing work https://twitter.com/...
Jon Christian / @jon_christian: wild that Peretti doubles down on AI in the same memo where he kills the award-winning BuzzFeed News https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/...
Sara Fischer / @sarafischer: 🚨Major changes at @BuzzFeed, per memo from CEO Jonah Peretti — BuzzFeed cutting workforce by 15% — CRO Edgar Hernandez and COO Christian Baesler exiting company — @BuzzFeedNews shutting down — BuzzFeed stock whipsaws on news, now back down 11% https://twitter.com/...
Joanna Robinson / @jowrotethis: Fuuuuuuck. Everyone I knew who worked there left already but my heart goes out to the remaining writers coders etc etc etc etc. This is awful. https://twitter.com/...
Niketa Patel / @niketa: Wow....thinking of the incredible team at @BuzzFeedNews. So many incredible journalists that should be snapped up ASAP. https://twitter.com/...
Alex Kantrowitz / @kantrowitz: I spent five years at BuzzFeed News, and it's hard to explain how great it was to be in that newsroom. The publication opened itself up to people from untraditional backgrounds (I came from ad tech) and let them tackle the world's biggest stories. It reported without fear and... https://twitter.com/...
Paul McLeod / @pdmcleod: I don't even know what to say. BuzzFeed News at its height was an incredible place to work, brimming with great reporters and writers. The greatest newsroom culture I've ever been a part of.
Kevin Beaumont / @GossiTheDog@cyberplace.social: Bummer about Buzzfeed News closing. I know people think of Buzzfeed in a certain way, but they actually evolved into a place that supports some good journalists.. You just know all these outlets are going to end up being AI bots churning out content, and that saddens me.
Mike Solana / @micsolana: kids today will probably not be able to comprehend this, but ten years ago it was close to consensus opinion that buzzfeed was the future of news
Sara Yasin / @sarayasin: I dreamt of working at @BuzzFeedNews the way a lot of you dreamt of a career at @nytimes. The time I spent there rarely ever felt like working because it was always fun, even when it was hard. I am devastated for the people losing their jobs and for our industry
Kathleen McLaughlin / @kemc: Was just talking with a fellow journalist about how it seems there are fewer and fewer news outlets all the time... https://twitter.com/...
Sophia Benoit / @1followernodad: Letting people go while mentioning how you're going to use more AI in the future is truly cruel. https://twitter.com/...
Oliver Darcy / @oliverdarcy: MORE: BuzzFeed boss @peretti just sent out a note to staff, announcing the shuttering of BuzzFeed News is part of layoffs where 15% of staffers are being cut across the company. Peretti says, “For BuzzFeed News, we have begun discussions with the News Guild about these actions.”
Olivia Solon / @oliviasolon: BuzzFeed News produced a lot of brilliant investigations and provided a training ground for many great reporters. Sad to hear it's shutting down.
Joshua Benton / @jbenton: a tip of the cap to whoever is manning the @buzzfeednews socials today https://twitter.com/...
Patrick Howell O'Neill / @howelloneill@infosec.exchange: BuzzFeed News produced a ton of great journalism over the years. For a long time, a good litmus test was to see if someone was dismissive of BF News reporting just because of the content site's silly listicles. …
@radbrowndads: BuzzFeed News closure is so sad. Wonderfully talented people are losing their jobs, but managements inability to pivot is mind boggling. People are STILL connecting the brand with cheese quizzes instead of Pulitzers? They shut down audio when they had a lead on everyone? Shameful
April Wolfe / @awolfeful: “Our industry is hurting so we're going to use more AI and fire the unionized staff and that should fix things.” https://twitter.com/...
Oliver Darcy / @oliverdarcy: BuzzFeed's founding editor-in-chief, @semaforben, tells me he is “heartsick” about the news of his former outlet's death. “I do think it makes really clear the relationship between news publishers and social media is pretty much over.”
John Paczkowski / @johnpaczkowski: What a ferocious travesty and a huge loss to journalism. https://twitter.com/...
@jason: The news business is going through a cataclysmic event... I've witnessed these three or four times as painful as they are the result is the opportunity to build new formats like websites, blogs, apps, email newsletters and podcasts To the folks impacted, consider doing a... https://twitter.com/...
Parker / @pt: @EricNewcomer Buzzfeed couldn't make their news biz work bc you can't sell clickbait and trust at the same time. The news biz requires trust & sells subs as a result. So I'd challenge the idea BF is the future of news even if it's the future of text-based entertainment.
Aaron Reichlin-Melnick / @reichlinmelnick: A big loss. Their immigration coverage was outstanding for years, breaking multiple stories about the Trump administration (and making @Haleaziz a well-deserved star of the beat). https://twitter.com/...
Mike Duncan / @mikeduncan: This not doubling as a letter of resignation is frankly pathetic https://twitter.com/...
Abraham Gutman / @abgutman: Holy...this is terrible news. My heart with all the amazing journalists who are impacted. What a loss. https://twitter.com/...
Jaya Saxena / @jayasax: Once again, it isn't the CEO stepping down after admitting he made a bunch of mistakes. It isn't the people who got the company into an unsustainable place. It's the people who do the work the whole company is built on who get fucked. https://twitter.com/...
Joel D. Anderson / @byjoelanderson: My friends at BuzzFeed News have deserved better for a long time. This is pathetic. https://twitter.com/...
@gregbensinger: Sad! BuzzFeed produced some fantastic, irreverent, probing journalism and filled a needed niche https://twitter.com/...
Alexis Benveniste / @apbenven: Here's a list of talented writers who worked at @BuzzFeedNews. You should hire them. • @elamin88 — writer at large • @juliareinstein — senior reporter • @kelsaywhat — internet culture writer • @katienotopoulos — tech reporter • @ellievhall — senior reporter
Michael Selvidge / @selviano: Such a shame. At its best, BuzzFeed News was an absolute powerhouse overflowing with talent. They broke so many consequential stories. https://twitter.com/...
Andrew Kaczynski / @kfile: As an alumni, this is so sad to see. BuzzFeed News did some great reporting. A scam PAC operator is being sentenced today after pleading guilty after we first exposed his scam at BF News in 2016 in a story. https://twitter.com/...
Russ Bengtson / @russbengtson: “more agile and focused business organization” regarding a media property just gave me PTSD, I need to go take a walk https://twitter.com/...
Eric Newcomer / @ericnewcomer: while I think the BuzzFeed story types were indeed the future of news, the narrative mistake was tracking venture dollars as the best predictor of the future of the media business. look at the hype around buzzfeed news relative to the information. One is still thriving. https://twitter.com/...
Sapna Maheshwari / @sapna: this is so devastating. people told me i was committing “career suicide” when i left Bloomberg for BuzzFeed News in 2013. it ended up being the best decision - the place where I did some of my best work, made lifelong friends, and it helped me get to the NYT. https://twitter.com/...
Jacob Silverman / @silvermanjacob: waiting for an AI to replace Jonah Peretti https://twitter.com/...
@mikeisaac: really awful. BF News produces great journalism and the industry is worse off without it still being around https://twitter.com/...
Caroline Orr Bueno, Ph.D / @rvawonk: Wow. BuzzFeed is shutting down its news division because despite winning a Pulitzer Prize, it “never made money.” And this is why publicly-funded media matters. News is of immense public value, whether or not it's profitable. https://www.nytimes.com/...
@nycsouthpaw: A lot of people worked very hard for very low pay to build an impactful news organization. And starting well before the pandemic or the fading spac market or whatever, BuzzFeed's corporate leadership has made a series of decisions that steadily disassembled it into nothing. https://twitter.com/...
Wesley Yang / @wesyang: All the VC-funded online news sites that were the spearhead of the Awokening have already slipped down the memoryhole; they performed their function, burned through hundreds of millions, and are now redundant in a fully Awokened world https://twitter.com/...
Valerie Bauman / @valeriereports: Really awful news for the industry. Buzzfeed's investigations - particularly on the phenomenon of long-term guardianships and conservatorships - were fantastic. Solid journalists who deserve to be employed. https://twitter.com/...
Ed Zitron / @edzitron: Buzzfeed News had legitimately great journalism and I just find this unimaginably stupid https://twitter.com/...
Katie Robertson / @katie_robertson: BuzzFeed CEO Jonah Peretti apologized to the BuzzFeed News team for the closure in a meeting this morning, saying: “It is clearly a massive failure on my part and I am deeply sorry for it.” https://www.nytimes.com/... from @BenMullin and me
Estelle Tang / @waouwwaouw: not to make this about me but you can't say it's not iconic to have been laid off three times in a row
@cfarivar: I first took notice of @BuzzFeedNews when I heard the @Radiolab version of that BFN story from 2014 on the AUMF. In the ensuing years, I became jealous of many stories that they did — in particular the tech desk — and am honored to work with no less than 5 BFN alumni. RIP.
Lucas Shaw / @lucas_shaw: HuffPost will continue as a news organization. Story on this coming from @gerryfsmith
Sapna Maheshwari / @sapna: fwiw, there are 32 people in the former BuzzFeed slack at the NYT. just thinking of all the awesome people who worked there and those who are dealing with all of this today.
Harry McCracken / @harrymccracken: Terrible news about the part of the business that single-handedly redeemed the whole idea. https://twitter.com/...
Christina Warren / @film_girl: BuzzFeed's SPAC should go down in history as one of media's greatest blunders. In the next few days/hours, you'll see a lot of stories trying to pin this on AI. That's incorrect. This is all b/c of the failure of the SPAC and the fact that BF was not ready to be a public company.
Anna Borges / @annabroges: each day i am more and more disgusted by the state of this industry and the absolute useless fuck nozzles in charge of it https://twitter.com/...
Tom Gara / @tomgara: The consensus was correct, too. A lot of stuff BF News pioneered is now totally embedded in the fabric of the news industry - in particular, reporting on the internet as a real place that really matters, not a peculiar little oddity that exists outside the “real world” https://twitter.com/...
Charlie Kirk / @charliekirk11: 7 Reasons BuzzFeed News is Shutting Down (You Won't Believe #3!) 1. Turns out crummy listicles don't pay in the long run. Who knew? 2. On issues like LGBT insanity and “anti-racism,” BuzzFeed said “there are not two sides” and they wouldn't even pretend to offer objective... https://twitter.com/...
Max Seddon / @maxseddon: @semaforben @MiriamElder I still don't think I've ever had as much fun on a story as our attempt with @RosieGray to work out why Putin and Steven Seagal were friends. It was the kind of weird, anarchic investigative reporting BFN did better than anyone else. https://www.buzzfeednews.com/ ...
Jane Bradley / @jane__bradley: BuzzFeed gave a lot of new journalists their big breaks & the rest of us the resources and backing to do big, important stories that nobody else was doing at the time. Its reporters have deserved a lot better for a long while and many are now available to hire! https://twitter.com/...
Brandon Hardin / @hardin: restore my access so I can send a final tweet from the @BuzzFeedNews account you cowards!!!!!
Christina Warren / @film_girl: Holy shit this is awful. https://twitter.com/...
Brandy Zadrozny / @brandyzadrozny: What a huge loss. https://www.nbcnews.com/...
Staci D Kramer / @sdkstl: Speaking of rapid unscheduled disassembly ... https://twitter.com/...
@agraybee: Not sure if this has been mentioned but note they like HuffPo because it's “not dependent on social platforms.” I wonder what social platform has recently become unreliable. https://twitter.com/...
Caitlin Huston / The Hollywood Reporter: BuzzFeed News Shutting Down Amid Major Layoffs
RELATED:
Ben Smith / Semafor:
The end of BuzzFeed News signals a vast shift in digital media: the old way of thinking about news, based on text and distributed via social media, has passed
The end of BuzzFeed News signals a vast shift in digital media: the old way of thinking about news, based on text and distributed via social media, has passed
Discussion:
Washington Post, Fast Company, The Wrap, Press Gazette, Ad Age, The Guardian, Financial Times, @sonnybunch, @Jonathanglick@mstdn.social, @brooklynmarie@mastodon.social, @Jonathanglick@mstdn.social, @_L1vY_@mstdn.social, @Jonathanglick@mstdn.social, @ledbettercarly, @apbenven, @kaiseratcb, @rklein90, @katie_rayford, The Hill, @jonfriedman, @ciciadams_, @kerrymflynn, @azi, @chaykak, @semaforben, National Review, Newser and @ashleyfeinberg
Discussion:
Connie Lin / Fast Company: BuzzFeed News is closing up shop as the company nurses its bottom line, enlists ChatGPT
The Wrap: BuzzFeed News Closure Unites Journalists in Disgust: ‘The Hardworking Staffers Pay the Price, as Always’
Bron Maher / Press Gazette: Jonah Peretti closes Buzzfeed News bemoaning lack of investment from platforms
Daniel Thomas / Financial Times: BuzzFeed closes news division and cuts jobs to weather digital media downturn
Sonny Bunch / @sonnybunch: I guess this isn't that bold of a take, but: I am increasingly of the opinion that click/ad-based journalism has no future and if you cannot convince a critical mass of people to pay for your reporting/writing you will not make it. https://www.semafor.com/...
Jonathan Glick / @Jonathanglick@mstdn.social: @_L1vY_ @Mediagazer There will always be a next thing. The question is whether you really have anything to communicate. Buzzfeed had the talent — but as an institution, it never had a journalistic purpose.
Brooke Binkowski / @brooklynmarie@mastodon.social: @Jonathanglick @Mediagazer Yep. It's just poor decisions and labor theft all the way down.
Jonathan Glick / @Jonathanglick@mstdn.social: @brooklynmarie You're right. What it really is: a dependency on the latest social distribution trend (facebook! Tiktok) instead of making a direct connection with a community who cares about your work
@_L1vY_@mstdn.social: @Jonathanglick @Mediagazer — How many more decades are they going to try to make video snippets happen? We still want to read the news. I feel like this was a FB thing to begin with and they have just never let go of pushing it.
Jonathan Glick / @Jonathanglick@mstdn.social: @Mediagazer except that the most successful online news business (NYT) is 99% text
Carly Ledbetter / @ledbettercarly: So much solidarity for our Buzzfeed News and Buzzfeed colleagues. Beyond upsetting day today. https://twitter.com/...
Alexis Benveniste / @apbenven: In an email, BuzzFeed founder Jonah Peretti announced the end of BuzzFeed News. “While layoffs are occurring across nearly every division, we've determined that the company can no longer continue to fund BuzzFeed News as a standalone organization.” The end of an era.
Rebecca Klein / @rklein90: There is so much to say about BuzzFeed News. But for reporters entering the industry in the 2010s, it was the gold standard — a beacon of hope. This is a terrible day and the end of an era. If I can help anyone, provide an ear, advice...please reach out.
Katie Rayford / @katie_rayford: been sitting here trying to craft a tweet, but all I got is: I'm proud of what BuzzFeed News built & proud to have been a part of it —truly had the best time growing up in that newsroom w/ so many exceptionally smart, funny & kind people End of an era! (Where are the drinks?) https://twitter.com/...
Dominick Mastrangelo / The Hill: BuzzFeed News shutting down
Jonathan Friedman / @jonfriedman: worthwhile piece from @semaforben (née @buzzfeedben) on the end of his old newsroom, and proclaiming the challenge of the new era: “[building] direct connections with an audience... overwhelmed by the decaying social web” https://www.semafor.com/... https://twitter.com/...
CiCi Adams / @ciciadams_: Buzzfeed News gave us groundbreaking investigations into R. Kelly, money laundering at big banks, & modern Chinese internment camps. Along with 180 people losing their jobs, shuttering Buzzfeed News means journalism will lose a wealth of important reporting. This is terrible.
Kerry Flynn / @kerrymflynn: “My own regret is not aligning a strong business with our news operation from the start, something I knew little about and wasn't particularly good at. Peretti is obviously right that he, and we, could have managed better.” - @semaforben https://www.semafor.com/...
Kyle Chayka / @chaykak: “the new challenge is to build direct connections with an audience that's still overwhelmed by the decaying social web, and eager to find great journalism they can trust.” https://www.semafor.com/...
Jack Crowe / National Review: BuzzFeed News to Shut Down
Kate Seamons / Newser: BuzzFeed News Is Dead
Gerry Smith / Bloomberg:
BuzzFeed CRO Edgar Hernandez and COO Christian Baesler are leaving as part of the company's cutbacks; BZFD is down 20%+
BuzzFeed CRO Edgar Hernandez and COO Christian Baesler are leaving as part of the company's cutbacks; BZFD is down 20%+
Discussion:
Angela Fu / @angelanfu: For decades, The Buffalo News enjoyed the protection that came from being Warren Buffett's only daily, avoiding the worst of the industry's decline. That changed under Lee Enterprises. https://www.poynter.org/...
Tom Gara / @tomgara: “Drudge and Huffington Post, the old portals that propped up the internet of the mid-aughts, will outlive the social media age, along with, of all things, Yahoo!” https://www.semafor.com/...
Matthew Foldi / @matthewfoldi: How it started /// How it's going https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/...
Angela Fu / Poynter:
A deep look at changes at The Buffalo News: print and design outsourcing, employee furloughs, insurance snafus, fewer reporters, and more pay for Lee executives — Lee cut budgets, pushed out veterans and outsourced design and print production at a paper that had been spared the worst of the industry's decline.
Discussion:
@byjonharris, @tompreciousalb, @willcleveland13, @sulliview, @ckrewson, @poynter, @poynter, @byjonharris, @buffaloscribe and @zachreports
Discussion:
Jon Harris / @byjonharris: Thank you to @angelanfu for her thorough reporting on what Lee Enterprises is doing to The Buffalo News, a story of short-sighted cutting and no reinvestment that is also playing out at Lee's other properties. https://www.poynter.org/... https://twitter.com/...
Tom Precious / @tompreciousalb: That @TheBuffaloNews each day still kicks ass, Lee Enterprises notwithstanding, is a testament to the integrity/talent of the best journalists I worked with. Wonder if Warren Buffett might spare 10 mins to read this out today from @Poynter: https://www.poynter.org/...
Will Cleveland / @willcleveland13: shit, this is a depressing read. saddened to see what all my friends at @TheBuffaloNews are going through. hard to see a future with local news. but know that it is so vital to the fabric of wny communities. https://www.poynter.org/...
Margaret Sullivan / @sulliview: The Buffalo News @TheBuffaloNews was the crown jewel of Warren Buffett's news empire. Now it's just another Lee paper. ... Very thorough and utterly heartbreaking from @Poynter https://www.poynter.org/...
Chris Krewson / @ckrewson: The Billionaires Won't Save You, Warren Buffett edition: https://www.poynter.org/...
@poynter: “I tend to have a stiff upper lip when it comes to these things, but I can see it in the faces of some of my colleagues. It's taken a toll. It's taken a human toll,” The Buffalo News reporter Stephen Watson said. 📸: Moaz Elazzazi for Poynter https://www.poynter.org/... https://twitter.com/...
@poynter: Lee, which eliminated more than a thousand jobs after growing from 47 to 77 daily papers in 2020, is not alone in making cuts. It's part of a trend of consolidation and contraction in media across the last three decades, which has now come to Buffalo. https://www.poynter.org/... https://twitter.com/...
Jon Harris / @byjonharris: In my 10-year career, I've worked for Gannett, Tribune, Alden and now Lee. As I told Angela, it's been a decade of “running from bad local news owners.” Why I decided last year to get more involved in @BuffaloGuild? “I'm kind of almost tired of running from it,” I told her.
Bron Maher / Press Gazette:
Insider is laying off about 10% of its US-based staff, affecting editorial and commercial roles; the company employs approximately 950 people globally — The company president emailed staff to inform them at 7am Eastern time on Thursday. — Insider is laying off 10% of its staff in the US …
Discussion:
Corbin Bolies / The Daily Beast: Insider to Lay Off 10 Percent of Staffers, Company Says
Alexandra Steigrad / New York Post: Insider to slash 100 jobs as company battles ‘significant pressure’
Corbin Bolies / @corbinbolies: Insider EIC @nichcarlson read a prepared speech to staffers today about the layoffs. It was a week after he said the newsroom would explore AI, a fact not lost on staffers. “If someone had a transcript, run it through an AI generator,” a staffer wrote. https://www.thedailybeast.com/ ...
Lucia Moses / @lmoses: Heartbroken for these cherished colleagues and those at @BuzzFeed and @BuzzFeedNews who were affected today. If you're hiring, look no further than these talented folks! https://twitter.com/...
David Slotnick / @david_slotnick: This is brutal, especially considering how aggressively Insider hired over the past few years. Sending solidarity to all of my former colleagues today. https://twitter.com/...
Chris Roush / Talking Biz News: Insider is laying off 10 percent of its US staff
@litcapital: Paywalled clickbait journalism was a zero interest rate phenomenon. cc: @stoolpresidente https://twitter.com/...
@pressgazette: Insider's UK bureau chief Spriha Srivastava clarified in a follow-up email to her team that the UK and Singapore teams are not affected by the cuts https://pressgazette.co.uk/...
@pressgazette: Company president Barbara Peng wrote in a memo to staff at 7am Eastern time that Insider hoped to be “as transparent as possible, as quickly as possible”. Staff were told if they were affected they would receive a follow-up email in the next 15 minutes https://pressgazette.co.uk/...
Mariella Moon / Engadget:
Imgur plans to delete “old, unused, and inactive content” that's not tied to a user account, starting on May 15, potentially erasing years of internet history — For years, Imgur has made sharing photos and GIFs on the internet as easy as uploading a file — you don't even need an account to use it.
Discussion:
@sophaskins: man it's almost like offering a product like this for free is essentially “the commons”, and so doesn't end up being a great way to make money! it's almost like we shouldn't build our commons on a foundational assumption of being for profit! https://www.engadget.com/...
Anna Iovine / Mashable: Imgur to remove explicit images and old content
RELATED:
Katherine Le Ruez / The Guardian:
The Guardian signs a licensing deal with British tech company Illuma, letting Illuma use The Guardian API to categorize article pages for contextual ad purposes — The Guardian has signed an agreement with a British technology company, Illuma, to categorise article pages for contextual advertising purposes …
Discussion:
Seb Joseph / Digiday: The Guardian will be paid for permitting the collection of contextual data on its site
@vivaldibrowser: This is good news. 💪 The Guardian moves to contextual advertising. We have always advocated against surveillance-driven practices and good to see such development. #bansurveillanceadvertising. https://twitter.com/...
@accountabletech: Despite what the Big Tech lobby says, companies can still #BanSurveillanceAdvertising and protect user privacy while allowing effective contextual advertising. https://www.theguardian.com/ ...
Miss IG Geek / @missig_geek: Hurrah, it's so encouraging to see organisations moving away from low-yield surveillance advertising, towards something more respectful and worthwhile 👏🏽👏🏽 https://twitter.com/...
Nate Saunders / ESPN.com:
The family of ex-F1 racer Michael Schumacher plans legal action against German magazine Die Aktuelle, which ran an AI-generated fake interview with the driver — Michael Schumacher's family plans to take legal action against a German magazine that ran an AI-generated interview with the Formula One legend.
Discussion:
Reuters, Fox News, The Verge, CBS News, Engadget, The Daily Beast, @edspencer99, @marybschneider, @lavosaurus and Fortune
Discussion:
Jess Weatherbed / The Verge: Family of F1 legend Michael Schumacher plans legal action over fake AI interview
CBS News: Family of Formula One champ Michael Schumacher plans legal action over AI-generated interview
Will Shanklin / Engadget: Michael Schumacher's family plans to sue German tabloid for AI-generated ‘interview’
Dan Ladden-Hall / The Daily Beast: Michael Schumacher's Family Plans to Sue Over Fake AI ‘Interview’
Ed Spencer / @edspencer99: The case will probably go one way and I doubt it will end well for Die Aktuelle. Might make them think twice about producing fake stories https://twitter.com/...
Mary Beth Schneider / @marybschneider: Absolutely weird and cruel. https://twitter.com/...
Lavender Baj / @lavosaurus: Oh my god what an extremely tone deaf and incredibly fucked up thing to do. Glad the family are suing. https://twitter.com/...
Nicholas Gordon / Fortune: Schumacher family plans legal action over tabloid's A.I. interview
Mark Joyella / Forbes:
Fox News host Dan Bongino says he is leaving after unsuccessful contract extension talks, ending his shows Unfiltered with Dan Bongino and Canceled in the USA — Fox News has ended its relationship with Dan Bongino, who hosted the Saturday night show Unfiltered with Dan Bongino.
Discussion:
Mediaite, Los Angeles Times, The Hill, @parkermolloy, @helenkennedy, @jennaellisesq, Deadline, @mattgertz, @justinbaragona, The Daily Beast, @bradmossesq and @jeremymbarr
Discussion:
Ken Meyer / Mediaite: JUST IN: Dan Bongino Parts Ways With Fox News
Stephen Battaglio / Los Angeles Times: Conservative commentator Dan Bongino leaving Fox News. “It's not some big conspiracy.”
Dominick Mastrangelo / The Hill: Dan Bongino out at Fox News
Parker Molloy / @parkermolloy: Strike up the band, @NickLutsko https://twitter.com/...
Helen Kennedy / @helenkennedy: The host of “Canceled in the USA” has been .....let go. https://twitter.com/...
Jenna Ellis / @jennaellisesq: My friend @dbongino and Fox News have parted ways. He was not fired, and publicly explained his departure: contract terms. Watch the clip in this article. Don't believe the twitter trolls on anything. https://trendingpoliticsnews.com/ ...
Ted Johnson / Deadline: Dan Bongino Exits Fox News, Says He And Network Couldn't Come To Terms On Extending Contract
Matthew Gertz / @mattgertz: I trust that Dan Bongino will be able to turn these lemons into lemonade by sticking them, unpeeled, directly into the blender. https://www.forbes.com/...
Justin Baragona / @justinbaragona: “Canceled in the USA” has officially been canceled. https://www.thedailybeast.com/ ...
Justin Baragona / The Daily Beast: Fox News Parts Ways With MAGA Blowhard Dan Bongino
Bradley P. Moss / @bradmossesq: Cancel Culture run amok https://twitter.com/...
Jef Feeley / Bloomberg:
Sources: the prospect of fired Fox News producer Abby Grossberg's secret recordings being played during trial pushed Fox News to its $787.5M Dominion settlement — The prospect of a fired Fox News producer's secret recordings being played during trial helped push the conservative network …
RELATED:
CNN:
Sources and the mediator detail how Fox and Dominion settled, after Dominion notified Fox that Rupert Murdoch and Tucker Carlson were among its first witnesses
Sources and the mediator detail how Fox and Dominion settled, after Dominion notified Fox that Rupert Murdoch and Tucker Carlson were among its first witnesses
Discussion:
Washington Post, TIME, The Wrap, @gc22gc, Newser, Wall Street Journal, Vanity Fair, @katrinanation, @rachelsklar, @asharangappa_, @profpcdoherty, @brianstelter, @jeffjarvis, @newspolitics, The Guardian, @jdawsey1, @ryp__, @mattgertz, @marshallcohen, @kira_lerner, @keitholbermann, @marshallcohen, @brianstelter, @sarah_boxer, @srl, @oliverdarcy, Insider and Associated Press
Discussion:
Lucas Manfredi / The Wrap: Lawrence O'Donnell Blames Fox News Settlement on Rupert Murdoch's ‘Stupidity’: Gave Dominion A ‘Huge Win’ (Video)
Grace Chong / @gc22gc: As I said @ CPAC about this evil old man —his deposition was so bad Fox would never allow him to be torn apart on the witness stand .. Murdoch made Biden look like the Captain of the Oxford Union Debate Team....Fox Sucks , Murdoch's Suck .... https://www.theguardian.com/ ... https://twitter.com/...
Arden Dier / Newser: Despite Settlement, Nightmare May Not Be Over for Fox
Joe Flint / Wall Street Journal: The Man Who Settled the Fox-Dominion Defamation Case From a Romanian Tour Bus
Charlotte Klein / Vanity Fair: Report: Judge “Implored” Fox and Dominion to Settle, With a Vacationing Mediator Stepping in to Close the Deal
@katrinanation: When reality outpaces HBO series/NEWS-Dominion settlement came after mediator swooped in last minute - The Washington Post https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ...
@rachelsklar: “For [Dominion's] executives and even low-level employees, [Fox's false claims] sparked a flood of violent threats that did not abate.” A small detail in a long story. The actual human cost of Fox's unreleting disinfo campaign is real and far-reaching. https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ...
Asha Rangappa / @asharangappa_: Great piece by @JeffSonnenfeld and Steven Tian on the financial fallout for Fox from the Dominion settlement...way more than meets the eye https://time.com/...
Prof. Peter Doherty / @profpcdoherty: Does this impact in anay way on the ‘right to lie’? Fox was resigned to a tough trial. Then, a secret mediator stepped in. https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ...
Brian Stelter / @brianstelter: I expect that one or more Fox personalities ensnared in the case will exit in the coming months, though it will be done delicately, so that no one can definitively say that the dismissals were due to Dominion... https://www.vanityfair.com/...
Jeff Jarvis / @jeffjarvis: Alternative headline: How an unsatisfying resolution was reached for democracy, without necessary apology, leaving Fox viewers ignorant as ever.... Fox was resigned to a tough trial. Then, a secret mediator stepped in. https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ...
Jon Nicosia / @newspolitics: Mediator Jerry Roscoe crafted the $787.5 million settlement in the Fox News-Dominion defamation case, while on vacation in Romania https://www.wsj.com/... via @WSJ
Josh Dawsey / @jdawsey1: How secret mediation talks — driven by a mediator on a boat vacationing on the Danube River — led to a last-minute settlement in the Fox vs. Dominion trial... and why Fox eventually agreed to settle. A dive w/@sarahellison & @postroz: https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ...
Robert Young Pelton / @ryp__: Damned mediators..."I said yes," Roscoe told CNN on Wednesday, recalling advice his father gave him at the age of 16 about accepting work assignments while on vacation. “My dad told me that if someone needs you, they call you, and if they need you, you go."https://www.cnn.com/...
Matthew Gertz / @mattgertz: Breaking away from a luxury cruise to celebrate your 70th birthday to do work is just amazing boomer energy. https://www.cnn.com/...
Marshall Cohen / @marshallcohen: Here's what happened behind the scenes between FOX NEWS and DOMINION, and how they clinched the historic $787 million defamation deal. It involves a European river cruise, frantic Zoom calls, and a Subway sandwich. full story from me & @oliverdarcy —> https://www.cnn.com/... https://twitter.com/...
Kira Lerner / @kira_lerner: CNN spoke with the world-renowned mediator who has resolved wartime disputes in the Balkans, who said that reaching the Fox/Dominion settlement was among the toughest assignments he has ever faced https://www.cnn.com/...
Keith Olbermann / @keitholbermann: FOX DESPERATE TO SETTLE: Murdoch's @WSJ breaks Dominion trial 1-day delay; Fox's planned attack on judge and Dominion last night never happened. Plus: How Nixon forced Fortas to resign. Can it be used against Clarence Thomas? MONDAY COUNTDOWN PODCAST: https://omny.fm/... https://twitter.com/...
Marshall Cohen / @marshallcohen: NEW: Dominion told Fox last week Murdoch + Tucker were lead witnesses. Mediator hired on Sun. night. He was on a river cruise in Europe when he got the call. Feverish talks over Zoom on Mon. Deal clinched after jury was sworn in Tues. w/ @oliverdarcy https://www.cnn.com/...
Brian Stelter / @brianstelter: “A deal wasn't easy to reach. Roscoe, a world-renowned mediator who has even resolved wartime disputes in the Balkans, told CNN that it was among the toughest assignments he has ever faced.” https://www.cnn.com/...
Sarah Boxer / @sarah_boxer: Rupert Murdoch and Tucker Carlson were going to be forced onto the witness stand ASAP. Mediator was on a birthday cruise from Budapest to Bucharest when he got the call. @oliverdarcy & @MarshallCohen scoop how the 11th hour Fox settlement went down: https://www.cnn.com/...
Sam Levine / @srl: New: Dominion was planning on calling Rupert Murdoch as its second witness, placing him on the stand to testify this week. The prospect of a settlement seemed dead Monday night, then a mediator brought it together in final hours https://www.theguardian.com/ ...
Oliver Darcy / @oliverdarcy: HOW IT HAPPENED: Here's a look behind the scenes of that historic settlement between Fox News and Dominion that “went down to the wire.” W/@MarshallCohen https://www.cnn.com/...
Julia Rock / The Lever:
Fox says the company can deduct the cost of its $787.5M settlement with Dominion; writing off the full payment would amount to an estimated $213M in tax savings — Fox's massive settlement with private equity-backed voting machine company Dominion Voting Systems didn't just spare …
Discussion:
David Sirota / @davidsirota: 🚨NEWS: Fox News says it can claim a tax write-off for its defamation settlement with Dominion. The deduction would lower the company's tax rate, effectively forcing taxpayers to provide up to a $200 million subsidy to the company for its election lies. https://www.levernews.com/...
Bess Levin / Vanity Fair: In Comically Evil Twist, Fox Will Receive a Huge Tax Break From Its Dominion Settlement
Eileen AJ Connelly / The Wrap: Fox News May Score $213 Million Tax Write-Off From Dominion Settlement
Prem Thakker / New Republic: Taxpayers Are Subsidizing Fox's Election Lies and Violent Radicalization
David Wilson Brown / @davidwbrown: If you're mad, vote https://twitter.com/...
Hal Marshall / @halmarshall2309: “Alt-right media such as One America News Network and Newsmax are likely facing even greater financial peril as they are facing similar legal challenges as Fox.” [Without Fox's deep pockets and top dollar legal representation.]
Hal Marshall / @halmarshall2309: “Even worse for Fox, unless the company reforms its coverage and corporate governance processes, insurers might recoil from underwriting the insurance of Fox's board directors and officers, ...
Hal Marshall / @halmarshall2309: “ could absolve insurers from having to cover the payout on top of permitting them to charge the company permanently higher insurance premiums.”
Hal Marshall / @halmarshall2309: “While some media commentators have suggested that insurance might cover a large portion of Fox's Dominion settlement, the company's breaches of fiduciary duty ...
RELATED:
Washington Post:
The Fox-Dominion settlement is the largest publicly disclosed one in a US defamation case yet; sources: Fox doesn't have to make an on-air correction or apology
The Fox-Dominion settlement is the largest publicly disclosed one in a US defamation case yet; sources: Fox doesn't have to make an on-air correction or apology
Discussion:
Columbia Journalism Review, Media Matters for America, Insider, New York Magazine, New York Times, @aaronblake, @danprimack, @11tulips, @leonidragozin, @davidsirota, @aaschapiro, @kbandersen, Poynter, @nytopinion, @awelder, @con_carnage, @finnertymike, @espuelasvox, @therealzblog, @ronfilipkowski, @dvillella, @jeffjarvis, American Press Institute, @martinishark, @1414maple, @fabienmajor, @bollywoodhq, @goangelo, @mcfaul, @bbtrashstan, @michellebhasin, @seanstanglanddh, @toddhallidy, @billablog, @ibishblog, @ibishblog, @kennethcolereal, @froomkin, @gibsonradio, @kdeitsch_wx, @famousbl3, @bizballmaury, @niemanlab, @senatormenendez, @tripgabriel, @johncusack, @justinbaragona, @b52malmet, @mattgertz, @goangelo, @maassp, @alexpadilla4ca, @macfarlanenews, @ryanvanvelzer, @jamilsmith, @donmoyn, @mollyjongfast, @steven_strauss, @timobrien, @walshfreedom, @waltisfrozen, @renato_mariotti, @wilkowmajority, @davidaxelrod, @davidfolkenflik, @ron_fournier, @tedlieu, @tomfitton, @nickconfessore, @brianstelter, @bgrueskin, @haldavis3, @lindyli, @erikwemple, @jakeadelstein, @farhip, @farhip, @claremalone, @bgrueskin, @bgrueskin, @erikwemple, @mattiweil, @blowryontv, @brianklaas, @alfranken, @kbandersen, @tripgabriel, @lindyli, @pickardje, @maassp, @aaronblake, @froomkin, Axios, ABC News and Washington Post
Discussion:
Bobby Lewis / Media Matters for America: Mike Lindell trashes Fox News' “dirty deal with Dominion,” says he won't settle with anyone
Warren Rojas / Insider: Senate Republicans who backed Trump's election fraud claims say Fox News settling Dominion case leaves things ‘a little murky’
Ankush Khardori / New York Magazine: ‘Does the Next Case Spell Doom for Fox News?’: Answering the Biggest Questions About the Settlement
David Firestone / New York Times: Fox News Remains an Aberration in American Journalism
Aaron Blake / @aaronblake: The Fox News website's story on the Dominion settlement is only 161 words long. It makes no mention of the dollar amount and little mention of the substance, which it summarizes as involving “coverage of the post-2020 presidential election.” https://www.foxnews.com/...
Dan Primack / @danprimack: Lot of outrage over how Fox News can write off some of the Dominion settlement, but this also would have been true had Fox News gone to trial and lost.
@11tulips: I don't see where Fox News has **publicly** admitted to lying. We shouldn't act as though they have. Dominion says: “Fox has admitted to telling lies about Dominion” Fox says: “We acknowledge the Court's rulings finding certain claims about Dominion to be false” https://twitter.com/...
@leonidragozin: “the Dominion case wasn't so much about Fox telling its audience what to believe. It was about the audience telling Fox what Fox needed to believe” https://www.nytimes.com/...
David Sirota / @davidsirota: Fox News says it can assert that lying about elections and them having to pay a defamation settlement is a tax deductible business expense, which could reap the company a $200 million tax break. Let that sink in. https://www.levernews.com/...
Avi Asher-Schapiro / @aaschapiro: Though it's usually mentioned as an aside —if at all—in most coverage of the $787 million Dominion v Fox deal, it's important to keep in mind that Dominion is controlled by a private equity firm that bought a controlling stake for just $38.3 million. https://theintercept.com/...
Kurt Andersen / @kbandersen: About @foxnews and the lawsuit @poniewozik is his usual smart, correct, excellent-prose-writing self. (Example below.) But the headline, presumably written by an editor, is exactly wrong, of course—"Everybody" doesn't now know. https://www.nytimes.com/... https://twitter.com/...
@nytopinion: “Fox has just shown the world what it's willing to pay to avoid the unmasking. But reality isn't done with Murdoch and the rest of them yet,” writes @michelleinbklyn. https://www.nytimes.com/...
Andrew Elder / @awelder: Journalism reality check: in Australia it's standard practice to sack journalists in response to management errors. Murdoch is imposing #ausmedia values onto the US https://twitter.com/...
Fritz / @con_carnage: Even though Fox News executives and the most popular hosts were communicating about how damaging it was for their fact checkers to check stories because it would drive too many viewers away to Newsmax, brainwashed idiots will still happily tune in to hear lies they like. https://twitter.com/...
Mike Finnerty / @finnertymike: Fox has abandoned news values for something else: “All this, trial or no trial, makes clear what Fox News really is. It's a service provider. That service is the maintenance of a reality bubble and the deference to beliefs that Fox's hosts helped shape.” https://www.nytimes.com/...
Fernando Espuelas / @espuelasvox: “The evidence revealed that the people who run Fox, already anxious about viewer blowback over its election-night call of Arizona for Joe Biden were worried about losing its audience for good. “Getting creamed by CNN!” Mr. Murdoch wrote in an email.” https://www.nytimes.com/...
@therealzblog: This is good example of how the Cloud People live in a separate, manufactured reality. This guy is a content creator at the NYTimes. He genuinely believes this to be true, because the grotesque behavior of his employer does not exist in his reality. https://twitter.com/...
Ron Filipkowski / @ronfilipkowski: The IRS has repeatedly allowed corporations to count lawsuit settlements as a tax deduction for " legal expenses."https://www.levernews.com/ ...
D Villella / @dvillella: Faux Spews will continue to lie and their viewers will continue to believe the lies. https://twitter.com/...
Jeff Jarvis / @jeffjarvis: Well, everybody but Fox viewers.... Everybody Knows What Fox News Is Now https://www.nytimes.com/...
American Press Institute: Need to Know: April 20, 2023 — OFF THE TOP — You might have heard: Fox News …
@martinishark: Curiously @CNN was never so defined following its settling of a defamation case. https://twitter.com/...
@1414maple: This would be amazing if it spread thru all four corners of the USA. Can you help out a friend. https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/...
Fabien Major / @fabienmajor: I hope this story will inspire thousands of victims of Fox slander, defamation and misrepresentation to sue. Dominion's example shows beyond any doubt that Fox is knowingly lying. https://twitter.com/...
@bollywoodhq: Fox News owned by Rupert Murdoch family always settles $$ with victims of their criminal activities. What bothers me is that they never stop being an evil company after lawsuits, for which they pay money, gag orders to silence, & look for the next victim. https://theintercept.com/...
Angelo Carusone / @goangelo: 3/ Remember: Fox is renewing several cable carriage deals right now. Just to put this into context. The increases ... just the increases they are trying to get from cable companies is several times larger than the check they just wrote to Dominion.
Michael McFaul / @mcfaul: To all those who care about the truth, and to those of us who endure defamation every day on this platform, this is a huge victory! Fox News Settles Defamation Suit for $787.5 Million, Dominion Says https://www.nytimes.com/...
Amber / @bbtrashstan: Part of that settlement should include what lying POS's they are and disclaimers on all future airings. If that's not apart of it then there's zero accountability. https://twitter.com/...
Michelle Bhasin / @michellebhasin: Who is going to tell the FoxNews viewers? https://twitter.com/...
Sean / @seanstanglanddh: This sucks. We deserved to see all their lies detailed in court. https://twitter.com/...
Todd Hallidy / @toddhallidy: This is an odd take. It was not Dominion's job to hold out for a show trial to delight Leftists or “save democracy.” Dominion was looking out for it's own interests, as was Fox News. They mutually settled a claim of wrongdoing, period. https://twitter.com/...
Bill / @billablog: It's not that Fox lied this time. It's that Fox has lied for so long about so much, they have now become slaves to the monsters they made. https://www.nytimes.com/...
Hussein Ibish / @ibishblog: I've often written about this “higher truth” per Tucker's logic: You [Fox viewers] are the authentic voice of this country. So you deserve to feel right about your beliefs, You deserve to have the space to keep believing it, without us making that harder. https://www.nytimes.com/...
Hussein Ibish / @ibishblog: Everybody Knows What Fox News Is Now. Ummmm... no. Not the guy I describe here and millions of others like him. They never heard of any of this and insofar as they do, it's all just contemptible “fake news.” https://www.thenationalnews.com/ ... https://www.nytimes.com/...
Kenneth Cole / @kennethcolereal: “Dominion case wasn't so much about Fox telling its audience what to believe. It was about the audience telling Fox what Fox needed to believe — or at least, what it needed to give the appearance of not not believing.” - @poniewozik https://www.nytimes.com/...
@froomkin: I'm a big @poniewozik fan, but I think he gets this wrong. Fox was not forced into lying for fear of its audience. Lying was its business model. https://www.nytimes.com/...
John Gibson / @gibsonradio: Shorter: Fox revenue from January to June for one year. Pffft. https://twitter.com/...
Kevin Deitsch / @kdeitsch_wx: You mean Fox News isn't really “news” and they make all sorts of things up? Shocker! 🤯 https://twitter.com/...
Sir Bryan Lee / @famousbl3: The question I've always had is if we know Fox News is lying...why are they allowed at White House Press Briefings 🤔 https://twitter.com/...
Maury Brown / @bizballmaury: The settlement with St. Louis over the Rams moving to LA was $790 million. Think about that. Dominion settled for less than that. Should have bled FOX for the full amount. Now Smartmatic has that settlement as a marker. https://twitter.com/...
Senator Bob Menendez / @senatormenendez: While being forced to admit their claims were false will hopefully deter such dangerous dishonesty by @FoxNews in the future, the undermining of our democracy by their deceit will cost our country far more than any financial figure they could agree to. https://apnews.com/...
Trip Gabriel / @tripgabriel: Murdoch's history of settling scandalous claims —$139 million in 2013 over phone hacking by London tabloid —$90 million in 2017 over sexual harassment by Roger Ailes and Bill O'Reilly. —$787.5 million to avoid being found guilty of “actual malice” today https://www.nytimes.com/...
John Cusack / @johncusack: The quote says it all https://twitter.com/...
Justin Baragona / @justinbaragona: “I'm sorry. This is going to be difficult to say with a straight face.” Jake Tapper can't help but laugh at Fox News' statement after reaching a $787 million settlement with Dominion. https://twitter.com/...
Barbara Malmet / @b52malmet: I'm not an expert but I am twisted about the defamation deal. As long as Fox doesn't say “sorry” and start truth telling it remains the lowest garbage pile of “journalism.” https://twitter.com/...
Matthew Gertz / @mattgertz: “If Fox wants to get better at getting away with defamation, they will start organizing themselves like a criminal conspiracy where nothing is committed to writing unless it's in code. But that is a very, very difficult way to run a news organization.” https://lawandcrime.com/...
Angelo Carusone / @goangelo: 1/Fox's statement said they acknowledge “certain” statements they made about Dominion were not accurate. But the court found that not a single thing Fox said about Dominion was accurate. Based on this and other things, here's my warning: Fox is about to burn brighter and hotter
Peter Maass / @maassp: Not really a surprise that Dominion Voting Systems, owned by a private equity firm, let Fox News buy its way out of a defamation trial: “One terrible limb of American capitalism was always unlikely to save us from another terrible limb.” https://theintercept.com/...
Alex Padilla / @alexpadilla4ca: The role of Fox News in propagating the Big Lie, and radicalizing MAGA Republicans to the point that they attempt to violently overturn an election, goes far beyond financial damages to a single company. https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ...
Scott MacFarlane / @macfarlanenews: Superior court here in Wilmington, Delaware has posted the judge's order relieving the special master of his duties in Dominion v Fox News civil suit Trial transcript is posted too. Makes it official: settlement was formally announced at 3:55p Tuesday. Ending a landmark case
Ryan Van Velzer / @ryanvanvelzer: “From the top down, the Murdochs and Fox created a network defined by a relentless pursuit of ratings that placed profit above politics, and partisan advantage above any sense of journalistic obligation. The public's right to know the truth rarely earned a hearing.” https://twitter.com/...
@jamilsmith: Dominion may have done a public service, to an extent. But it does not exist to serve the public interest, as @maassp notes here. It is a for-profit company owned by a small private equity firm. Private equity was never going to save American democracy. https://theintercept.com/...
Don Moynihan / @donmoyn: The Murdochs have paid vast amounts of money before to make their problems go away. It does not seem to have made them any more virtuous. https://www.npr.org/... https://twitter.com/...
Molly Jong-Fast / @mollyjongfast: “Fox has admitted to telling lies about Dominion that caused enormous damage to my company, our employees and the customers that we serve. Nothing can ever make up for that. Throughout this process, we have sought accountability,” https://www.npr.org/...
@steven_strauss: O'Reilly to his credit was never a birther - he actual did a segment explaining Obama was born in America and went over the evidence https://twitter.com/...
Tim O'Brien / @timobrien: Bill O'Reilly invokes the AP Stylebook to rewrite the past. https://twitter.com/...
@waltisfrozen: Under the so-called “Fair and Balanced” template, Bill O'Reilly provoked the assassination of George Tiller. https://twitter.com/...
Renato Mariotti / @renato_mariotti: I recently watched some of the old debates between Bill O'Reilly and Jon Stewart on YouTube. At the time, in 2011 and 2012, O'Reilly had the #1 show on Fox News. But in those debates he sounded nothing like the Fox News of today, which has lurched even further to the right. https://twitter.com/...
Andrew Wilkow / @wilkowmajority: Now the path is clear for voting machine companies to engage in future fraud because #Conservative news orgs will be fearful of reporting and it's not like left leaning orgs will expose the truth if the future fraud benefits the #democrats. https://apnews.com/...
David Axelrod / @davidaxelrod: If the Murdocks were willing to part with three-quarters of a billion to keep this suit from going to trial, imagine how devastating they believed the trial would have been! https://apnews.com/...
David Folkenflik / @davidfolkenflik: Although Fox averted trial by settling Dominion's defamation case, what we've learned will define the network for years. My story: https://www.npr.org/...
Ron Fournier / @ron_fournier: It's nothing. It's a pittance. It's a small price to pay for attacking the heart of democracy, a people's faith in elections. https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ...
Ted Lieu / @tedlieu: Based on the historic Fox News settlement we learn, again, that Trump lost Georgia. And Arizona, Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. If you still believe the election was stolen, you're either dumb as rocks or you're an unAmerican sore loser who rejects the will of the voters. https://twitter.com/...
Tom Fitton / @tomfitton: The Dominion shakedown settlement of Fox News doesn't change reality — the 2020 election was rigged six ways to Sunday. https://twitter.com/...
Nick Confessore / @nickconfessore: One way to look at the Fox settlement: Dominion's owners just got 10x what the company was worth when they bought a majority interest in 2018. https://www.nytimes.com/... https://twitter.com/...
Brian Stelter / @brianstelter: Bill O'Reilly: “Since I left FNC, the template changed from ‘Fair and Balanced’ to ‘tell the audience what it wants to hear.’ And millions of Trump voters, to this day, want to believe the 2020 election was rigged.” https://www.billoreilly.com/ ...
Bill Grueskin / @bgrueskin: Astonishing anecdote from the NYT's Fox story, one that showcases the groveling obeisance that Murdoch's lieutenants must pay to their boss, even when Rupert himself knows better https://www.nytimes.com/... https://twitter.com/...
Hal Davis / @haldavis3: .@ErikWemple: the resolution requires a great deal of something that Fox News has in wheelbarrows (money) and very little of something it has in teaspoons (editorial integrity). https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ...
Lindy Li / @lindyli: As always, Murdoch got off easy The line items below are nothing more than the cost of doing business, already baked in and negligible for a company with a market cap of $17 billion Investors don't care and continue to be bullish on Fox Corp and Murdoch's “leadership” https://twitter.com/...
@erikwemple: Don't want to close the books on Dominion v. Fox News without thanking @SeanGOSullivan of the Delaware courts for his assistance with courthouse access/acclimation and answers to endless questions about timelines and schedules and so on. Great work.
@jakeadelstein: And that's a wrap. Rupert Murdoch learns that lying out your ass can cost you $787 million but that's chump change for the man. The settlement would only bother him if he had a conscience. https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ...
Paul Farhi / @farhip: One obvious takeaway from the Fox settlement was that it was predictable. Why? Yes, Fox had a weak case. But it's also because this is what Rupert Murdoch routinely does when his companies are faced with allegations of misconduct. More.... https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ...
Paul Farhi / @farhip: Before the Dominion case, Murdoch had paid out about $750 million in lawsuit settlements to various parties. And that's just the lawsuits that became public.
Clare Malone / @claremalone: Scenes from a Wilmington courtroom—and from cornering lawyers on elevators—my writeup of today's Dominion/Fox settlement. https://www.newyorker.com/...
Bill Grueskin / @bgrueskin: We are sorry to inform you that private-equity firms do not share the same zeal for disclosure of Murdoch misdeeds that many others do. https://twitter.com/...
Bill Grueskin / @bgrueskin: Dominion's pretrial strategy — pushing out a lot of damning excerpts from Fox's internal emails/texts, or from depositions — was brilliant https://twitter.com/...
@erikwemple: One thing: Lots of folks who care about honest media in America will curse Dominion for settling. But consider: This litigation, even tho it didn't got all the way to a jury verdict, exposed Fox News to a strong dose of transparency and accountability.
Matt Weil / @mattiweil: For some perspective, this settlement from Fox News to a voting system vendor is more the 10x the amount of funding Congress appropriated to the states for elections in the FY23 budget @FoxNews is now a bigger funder of elections than the U.S. government https://twitter.com/...
Brian Klaas / @brianklaas: Yeah, this is the issue. Fox reporters try to hide behind the “we're on the news side!” excuse, but their salaries are paid by revenues generated by hosts who knowingly lie night after night to their audiences in ways that severely damage democracy. Can't get away from that. https://twitter.com/...
Al Franken / @alfranken: $787.5 million payment seems like an admission of guilt, doesn't it? https://www.nytimes.com/...
Kurt Andersen / @kbandersen: So in just one week we've had two supposedly unbuyable things priced: knowingly and systematically causing many millions of Americans to believe a profoundly consequential and dangerous lie ($787.5M), and having Harvard rename half of itself after you ($300M). https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/...
Trip Gabriel / @tripgabriel: Journalism reality check: At any mainstream newsroom in the country, TV or print, the revelation that top talent knowingly lied to protect a POTUS, and that top execs condoned it to “respect” the audience while firing actual reporters, would have led to mass resignations. https://twitter.com/...
Lindy Li / @lindyli: Even Fox's statement about the settlement was punctuated with lies, half-truths, and egregious euphemisms https://twitter.com/...
Jim Pickard / @pickardje: “one of the ugliest and most embarrassing moments in the history of journalism” https://twitter.com/...
Peter Maass / @maassp: Actually, if I do something really bad and you penalize me by taking 20 percent of my walking around money, it's not a “sizable hit” on my overall financials (especially if insurance covers some of my loss). https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ... https://twitter.com/...
Aaron Blake / @aaronblake: Bill O'Reilly, deciding to weigh in, cites Fox's “foolish coverage of the 2020 election.” “This is what happens when money becomes more important than honest information.” (O'Reilly, of course, cost Fox a pretty penny himself before he was fired.) https://twitter.com/...
Dan Primack / Axios: Fox News settlement turns Dominion into private equity gold
Jack Shafer / Politico:
For Fox Corp., which ended 2022 with $4.1B in “cash and cash equivalents” on hand, $787.5M is a bargain to avoid more embarrassment and continue its sleazy ways
For Fox Corp., which ended 2022 with $4.1B in “cash and cash equivalents” on hand, $787.5M is a bargain to avoid more embarrassment and continue its sleazy ways
Discussion:
@erikwemple, Vanity Fair, Los Angeles Times, Media Matters for America, @mattgertz, @nola_jt, @jimstewartson, @lfung, @randallfrench14, @jacobin, @mollyjongfast, @sam87963167, @farrukh_shamsi, @juliaioffe, @abc, @washtimes, @bgrueskin, @jaketapper, @oliverdarcy, @brianstelter, @eriqgardner, @svdate, @sykescharlie, @mattgertz, @alyssafarah, @barbmcquade, @hamiltonnolan, @chrisfralic, @nycsouthpaw, @armandondk, @beneltham, @mollyjongfast, @nycjim, @petersagal, @jamespmanley, @ronbrownstein and The Guardian
Discussion:
Erik Wemple / @erikwemple: Here's a statement from Fox Corp.'s 2022 annual report pooh-poohing the ongoing lawsuit from Dominion over Fox News's election lies. It foresaw no “ material adverse effect” on the company. It just agreed to a $787.5 mn payout. https://twitter.com/...
Brian Stelter / Vanity Fair: Fox News, Unapologetic and Unwavering, Steams Ahead After Staggering Dominion Settlement
Matt Pearce / Los Angeles Times: Fox News and the prison of profit
Matt Gertz / Media Matters for America: Eight times Fox Corp. downplayed the Dominion lawsuit in SEC filings
Matthew Gertz / @mattgertz: I found identical language in seven more Fox Corp filings with the SEC, most recently in February: https://www.mediamatters.org/ ... https://twitter.com/...
Nola Jt / @nola_jt: $787 million to continue to have the privilege of destroying our parents' brains https://twitter.com/...
@jimstewartson: Dear @smartmatic: I know you have your own corporate agenda but please do not let @FoxNews off the hook. Either force them to stand trial and make Rupert testify, or have them correct every lie in detail **on the air**. A fine is not accountability. Thanks! https://twitter.com/...
Lisa Fung / @lfung: ‘Dominion won, yes, but Fox won too. The only losing party is the public. All of the court exhibits that Fox fought to keep secret, and thus were redacted before trial, will now stay sealed’ Via @brianstelter @VanityFair https://www.vanityfair.com/...
Randall French / @randallfrench14: FOX NEWS lives to lie again thanks to a judge, mediators, SCOTUS' carveout of wide 1st amendment protections for political speech and the effect of a black majority jury on the FOX legal team Last minute brinkmanship and overseas assist end Fox case https://apnewjurys.com/...
@jacobin: After its hosts repeatedly lied about voting machine company Dominion rigging the 2020 elections, Fox News agreed to pay $787 million to Dominion to settle a defamation lawsuit. Fox can deduct over $200 million in taxes because of the settlement payment. https://jacobin.com/...
Molly Jong-Fast / @mollyjongfast: “What now? I expect that one or more Fox personalities ensnared in the case will exit in the coming months, though it will be done delicately, so that no one can definitively say that the dismissals were due to Dominion.” https://www.vanityfair.com/...
Sam-Wise / @sam87963167: Destroy the Murdochs and ALL their Fox enterprises. https://twitter.com/...
Farrukh Shamsi / @farrukh_shamsi: “Smartmatic is suing Fox for defamation related to its coverage of D. Trump's stolen-election lie... the company's lawsuit has so far attracted only a fraction of the attention... it is demanding... $2.7B compared with Dominion's claim for $1.6B.” 😮 https://www.theguardian.com/ ...
Julia Ioffe / @juliaioffe: “They were going to lose.” The all-knowing, all-seeing @eriqgardner, who has been a must-read on the Dominion lawsuit, on why Fox ended up settling. https://puck.news/...
@abc: A day after Fox News agreed to pay $787.5 million to settle a defamation suit brought by Dominion Voting Systems, a Fox spokesperson said Wednesday the network will be “ready to defend” itself against a similar suit from a second voting machine company. https://abcnews.go.com/...
@washtimes: Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger says the $787.5 million paid by Fox News to settle a defamation lawsuit by Dominion Voting Systems over claims of misinformation about the 2020 election is “absolutely vindication” of his state's ballot... https://www.washingtontimes.com/ ...
Bill Grueskin / @bgrueskin: “Dominion sued the suppliers of disinformation—Fox, Newsmax, Rudy Giuliani. But you can't litigate away the demand for antidemocratic conspiracy theories.” — @brianstelter https://www.vanityfair.com/...
Jake Tapper / @jaketapper: Dominion lawyer Justin Nelson says Fox is paying up $787,500,000 to settle the defamation case against Fox for its airing of numerous lies about Dominion Voting Systems. Fox has admitted telling lies, the company CEO John Poulos says in press conference.
Oliver Darcy / @oliverdarcy: “Like the phone-hacking scandal, like the sexual harassment cases, like the Seth Rich case, like the coupon case, this settlement will allow the Fox media machine to return to cruising speed and even continue its sleazy ways.” Always read @jackshafer: https://www.politico.com/...
Brian Stelter / @brianstelter: “This settlement changes exactly one thing behind the scenes: Fox News as an institution will take greater steps to ensure that it doesn't leave itself vulnerable to further defamation claims” —@DylanByers https://puck.news/...
Eriq Gardner / @eriqgardner: One point I make here is that thanks to Trump indictment, NY lawmakers are now considering passing legislation that would allow TV cameras in the courtroom. Maybe Smartmatic v Fox News gets televised? https://puck.news/...
Charlie Sykes / @sykescharlie: This won't be a problem, will it? https://twitter.com/...
Alyssa Farah Griffin / @alyssafarah: Not the climactic trial many were anticipating but still an eye-popping sum. It's a shame that so many Fox News viewers will never hear the truth: that the lies spread about the election were false & people in power were lying to them. https://twitter.com/...
Barb McQuade / @barbmcquade: Not sure what to make of Dominion settlement. While Fox paid a huge penalty for airing dangerous lies, it seems like they bought their way out of trouble without admitting wrongdoing. Will $787.5M deter more lies or is it simply the cost of doing business? https://www.nytimes.com/...
Hamilton Nolan / @hamiltonnolan: Fox News didn't do a discrete bad thing, Fox News is, in total, a right wing propaganda operation that uses “journalism” as a flag of convenience, which is also why it's bad for “journalists” to constantly appear on the Tucker Carlson show
Chris Fralic / @chrisfralic: “Dominion planned to have Hannity, Carlson, Bartiromo, Ingraham and Baier on the witness stand. Getting out from all of that for $787.5 million is a kind of bargain for a company with a market cap of $17.3 billion. Fox has $4.1 billion in cash on hand” https://www.politico.com/...
Armando / @armandondk: If Dominion had gone to trial won and been awarded 2 billion dollars Fox still wouldn't have had to apologize. That's not what the legal system does. https://twitter.com/...
Ben Eltham / @beneltham: Best analysis on the Fox vs Dominion case I've seen so far: Rupert wins again https://twitter.com/...
Molly Jong-Fast / @mollyjongfast: This is why a lot of us feel like Fox won https://www.politico.com/... https://twitter.com/...
Jim Roberts / @nycjim: Well said. via @jackshafer https://www.politico.com/... https://twitter.com/...
Peter Sagal / @petersagal: Seems about right. https://twitter.com/...
Jim Manley / @jamespmanley: He and his family have tried to ruin democracy on at least 3 continents https://twitter.com/...
Ronald Brownstein / @ronbrownstein: “When Murdoch was shamed over the phone-hacking scandal...observers hoped that maybe he or one of his children would amend the company's manner. But here we are a decade-plus later, and the Murdoch enterprise is just as contaminated as it ever was.” https://www.politico.com/...
David Pierce / The Verge:
A look at ActivityPub, the open, decentralized social network protocol finalized in 2018 that is gaining prominence powering Twitter alternatives like Mastodon — The tech industry is abuzz about a new standard for social networking that is more open, more user-centric, and potentially more powerful than Twitter and Facebook.
Financial Times:
Internal slides: in the coming months, Google plans to let advertisers supply “creative” content for generative AI to “remix” for more sophisticated campaigns — Big tech groups are racing to incorporate the groundbreaking new technology into their products
Discussion:
Engadget, Mashable, Gizmodo, The Verge, @johnreedwrites, @ruslantrad, @bigmeaninternet, MarTech, @cristinacriddle and @lukolejnik, more at Techmeme »
Discussion:
Lauren Leffer / Gizmodo: Google Plans to Use Generative AI to Pump Out ‘Remixed’ Ads
James Vincent / The Verge: Google will offer customers AI tools to ‘remix’ content for ad campaigns: report
John Reed / @johnreedwrites: 'One person familiar with Google's presentation said they were worried the tool could spread misinformation, since text produced by AI chatbots can confidently state falsehoods: “It is optimised to convert new customers and has no idea what the truth is."' https://www.ft.com/...
Ruslan Trad / @ruslantrad: Waiting to see how authoritarian players who don't have regulators over their heads will use this feature in the near future. Ads and ad platforms are one way to push ideas and disinformation. Sometimes even Google can't detect in time bad behaviour. https://www.ft.com/...
Malcolm Harris / @bigmeaninternet: Yessss “so random lol” ads are transforming into “inhuman language slop” ads https://www.ft.com/...
Constantine von Hoffman / MarTech: This week's AI product releases: Google adds generative to ads and more
Cristina Criddle / @cristinacriddle: SCOOP: Google will add its new generative AI to its advertising in the coming months, telling advertisers it “unlocks a world of creativity”. The tech will be able to create sophisticated ad campaigns https://www.ft.com/...
Lukasz Olejnik / @lukolejnik: It's here. Google to use generative AI to make on-the-fly ads. This thing could generate tailored ads on the bidding/auction phase. Making transparency very complex, not mentioning data protection, cybersecurity, disinformation. #GDPR #DigitalServicesAct https://www.ft.com/... https://twitter.com/...
Winston Cho / The Hollywood Reporter:
Alec Baldwin's lawyers reveal that involuntary manslaughter charges against him will be dropped in the fatal shooting of Rust cinematographer Halyna Hutchins — Baldwin faced two counts of involuntary manslaughter.
Discussion:
Variety, SlashFilm, Deadline, The Wrap, Comic Book, The Guardian, ET Canada, Fox News, Los Angeles Times, Insider, New York Post, Rolling Stone, New York Daily News, Semafor, abc7NY, CBS News, IndieWire, Page Six and The A.V. Club
Discussion:
Valerie Ettenhofer / SlashFilm: Alec Baldwin's Charges In The Rust Tragedy To Be Dropped, But It's Not Over Yet
Scott Mendelson / The Wrap: ‘Rust’ Restarts Production, 18 Months After Fatal Shooting
Spencer Perry / Comic Book: Alec Baldwin Manslaughter Charges To Be Dropped (Report)
ET Canada: Charge To Be Dropped In Alec Baldwin ‘Rust’ Set Shooting: ‘We Are Pleased With The Decision’
Meg James / Los Angeles Times: ‘Rust’ prosecutors drop charges against Alec Baldwin after questions over gun misfire
Jon Blistein / Rolling Stone: Alec Baldwin's ‘Rust’ Manslaughter Charge Will Be Dropped, Lawyers Say
New York Daily News: Involuntary manslaughter charges against Alec Baldwin dropped, ‘Rust’ filming to resume
Alex Sundby / CBS News: Alec Baldwin charges in “Rust” shooting expected to be dropped, actor's attorneys say
Mary Kate Carr / The A.V. Club: Well, Rust is officially filming again