Detroit Free Press’ Post

Loved seeing this piece from Kelly McBride. News avoidance is a crucial problem for media organizations, and — as this report shows — getting information to people in a way that’s quick, easy, and accessible is important to bringing them back into the news ecosystem. A few things that stuck out to me: 💁The majority of news avoiders heard about the shooting from friends and family. I’ve found that more and more people are relying on these trusted relationships to help them understand complicated news. This says a lot about how people want to engage with people — not with organizations or products. 📱Push alerts and social media were the second and third most popular ways of discovery. Having the digital reach to meet where people they’re at is going to continue to re-engage news avoiders. We have to make sure the content going through these channels is easy to digest (particularly for breaking political news!). 💻 One-third of people immediately opened a browser to search for more information. This is why SEO is so incredibly important for discoverability! By not optimizing pages, we’re not only doing ourselves a disservice, but also audiences who are looking for reliable, authoritative sources to help them understand complex topics. Give the full article a read if you can!

NEWSOM WAITS IN THE WINGS In the aftermath of Democrat President Joe Biden's poor performance Thursday at the CNN Presidential Debate with ex-president Donald Trump, the leading Republican candidate, the news media is red-hot with speculation about what comes next in the 2024 race. Even though Biden did remarkably well in a campaign appearance Friday, media stories of the 81-year-old's problems with memory lapses and fragility have taken over the cycles of print and broadcast journalism. Among the examples: After the debate, the New York Times editorial board called on Biden to do the right thing and resign for the good of the nation. Time Magazine's new cover has Biden, depicted as a frail elderly man, wandering off the stage. Axios urged the president's family to urge him to resign. The Wall Street Journal has reported that Biden's memory lapses have been noticed and are of concern to European leaders; and the WSJ reported that White House staff has blacked-out criticism of Biden to avoid political reprisals. On Friday, Biden said he will not resign because he's the only one who can beat Trump, a convicted felon facing other serious legal issues, because he believes his opponent is a "threat to democracy," a serial liar and an immoral man who was recently convicted of sexually abusing a woman in public. Vice President Kamala Harris, some feel, couldn't beat Trump because her polling is below Biden's own. Pundits are scrambling to determine what happens next. The Democratic National Convention will be held later this summer. Among other potential Biden replacements, one name has repeatedly stood out: Gavin Newsom, the charismatic and youthful governor of California is a Biden surrogate. The state has a population of some 40 million -- and has the seventh largest economy in the world. In a recent CNN interview, Newsom said Trump has surrounded himself in an environment of "corruption" and the governor "refuses to kiss the ring." Check out Bloomberg's editorial below.

🇨🇦’s Online News Act (C18) has been a disaster of its own making. News disappearing from feeds, massive consolidation and layoffs, shutting down of local outlets, and near universal reliance on gov’t funding for once independent media outlets. It’s been bad for journalism and worse for Canadian news consumers. And you wouldn’t know it, because every major media outlet lobbied for this bill and barely let any opposition to it be printed or heard (believe me, we tried https://lnkd.in/ebCBYBPg) Props to David Clement + The News Forum for holding basically the only critical interview of a Liberal government official on this issue with pointed questions. Even if the answers were bizarrely wrong and way off-base. The federal government frankly has no role in dictating the terms of agreements between social platforms and media outlets that rely immensely on their ability to connect people. The media and content world is changing and politicians can’t dictate those terms based on satisfying their constituencies over the common interest of the public Rather than call the plan quits and allow journalism to flourish on its own again, the status quo portends a troubling future for independent media — something that’s vital for democracy #cdnpoli #c18 https://lnkd.in/ed8CFtzx

The current state of the Legacy Media and the White House is absolutely appalling. https://lnkd.in/gd5eqURH .

Double standards, false equivalencies …take a closer look at how the news media jumps through hoops to ‘balance’ coverage of the presidential candidates. “There is an almost desperation to pretend that this race is like any other. It is not. Something even more destructive is happening. It’s the numbing of a population…” https://lnkd.in/g5ZYqdti The political press’s efforts to rationalize Trump’s incoherent statements are eroding our shared reality and threatening informed democracy. As Trump’s statements grow increasingly unhinged in his old age, major news outlets continue to reframe his words, presenting a dangerously misleading picture to the public. https://lnkd.in/gTVkHMuU This “sanewashing” of Trump’s statements isn’t just poor journalism; it’s a form of misinformation that poses a threat to democracy. By continually reframing Trump’s incoherent and often dangerous rhetoric as conventional political discourse, major news outlets are failing in their duty to inform the public and are instead providing cover for increasingly erratic behavior from a former—and potentially future—president. https://lnkd.in/gHEaXhFV The consequences of this journalistic malpractice extend far beyond misleading headlines. By laundering Trump’s words in this fashion, the media is actively participating in the erosion of our shared reality. When major news outlets consistently present a polished version of Trump’s statements, they create an alternate narrative that exists alongside the unfiltered truth available on social media and in unedited footage. https://lnkd.in/gJiPGakm Voters who rely solely on traditional news sources are presented with a version of Trump that bears little resemblance to reality.

Today is World Press Freedom Day, which is observed annually on May 3rd. It’s a day to celebrate the fundamental principles of press freedom, evaluate press freedom around the world, defend the media from attacks on their independence, and pay tribute to journalists who have lost their lives in the exercise of their profession. #VisionUpdates #WorldPressFreedomDay

🌍🗞 It's World Press Freedom Day. At fraycollege, we know that attacks on journalists are attacks on freedom of expression. More than ever, the need for reliable sources of information and press freedom is dire. This #WorldPressFreedomDay, we have prepared a quiz on issues relating to press freedom. ✍ Take the quiz here: https://lnkd.in/dDSHY3WV. Share your knowledge to contribute to the fight for press freedom!

Government subsidy of news media means deciding who counts as news media. It means government control of news. https://lnkd.in/eKaDtjhB

#CBSNews, once the Crown Jewel of #NetworkTelevision, when I grew up with #WalterCronkite as "the Most Trusted Man in America!" anchoring the evening news, now down to just 4mil #Viewers Homes industry data reports. That's of 333.3mil #Americans in 133mil #Households, in other words, perhaps a dismal 3% #MarketShare of homes. #NorahODonnell, the #CBSEveningNews #Anchor, finds herself ingloriously demoted to #SeniorCorrespondent, she told insiders this week, as the heir to the prestigious #Cronkite and the less sterling #DanRather, who inflicted #ReputationalDamage on himself. Despite #ODonnell, who's leftish liberalism as a #Journalist is apparent even to me as a #LifelongDemocrat who parked my #Political views when working as a #PoliticalJournalist, my evening routine for decades has been built around tuning in to the 630pm NewsCast. She comes on after the great #WCAU #CBS3 #Philly #Delaware-native Anchor #UkeeWashington, a longtime #FOS (#FriendOfSam)! Kudos to #Ukee -- whose given name is #Ulysses and is a cousin of the even more famous #DenzelWashington -- for never ever having let whatever his personal political views appear to shape his #NewsCoverage. As an admitted lifelong #NewsJunkie, what's really disappointing -- #biased coverage issues aside -- is how few people go to the #legacy #NewsOrganizations for #NewsCoverage, worse less than 600,000 households in the targeted desirable 25-54 years old #Demographic, where the #ConsumerSpending is robust. Until recently, #CBS was reported to be paying Ms. O'Donnell $8mil/yr to service those 4mil or so #American #News-consuming households!

My latest for Poynter Institute on *this moment* for journalists covering the election. If you don't have time to read it, here are the broad recommendations: 1. Focus on what is in your control 2. Anticipate the public’s anxieties and engage with them 3. Decide with your colleagues when your business model or instincts should NOT win out 4. Plan for the future (as counter-intuitive as that sounds) https://lnkd.in/dkud44Qj Highly recommend this related piece from Kelly McBride & Gabriel Rodriguez: https://lnkd.in/dKNS3WJH Hearken, Inc, Spitfire