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Media News Round-Up – Jul 24th ’22

Photo by Hatice Yardım on Unsplash

 

Hi everyone, Eliz Mizon here with the Media Reform Coalition blog.

For even more media news and analysis, the latest media reform campaigns, and relevant content from around the web, follow me at Power and Pop Culture.

For now, here’s your media news digest:

Reinstate Des Freedman and Gholam Khiabany

Sign the open letter to demand reinstatement of Des Freedman and Gholam Khiabany, the head and deputy head of Goldsmiths media dept who have been suspended after writing an email to students about how the ongoing strike action could affect them.

Des Freedman is a founding member of the Media Reform Coalition.

This Week’s Media News

  • The Scottish chapter of Youth Strike for Climate has written an open letter to the UK media demanding three changes to coverage of heatwaves: 1) All coverage of heatwaves must feature and be led by climate scientists; 2) All coverage of heatwaves must name the climate crisis and communicate its severity; 3) Coverage of heatwaves must not use “fun in the sun” imagery. (Medium)
  • A majority of Big Tech companies (Meta, TikTok, Twitter, Apple, Microsoft, Google, Amazon, Netflix and Spotify) have signed up to Indonesia’s new draconian publishing licences. Digital laws in the country mean authorities can censor platforms; in order to retain access to the region, the fourth largest population in the world, the companies have agreed. (FT)
  • Fox News and MSNBC, two of the States’ leading conservative and liberal broadcasters respectively, have been downgraded by credibility auditor Newsguard, which says they each “fail to adhere to basic journalistic standards”. (Press Gazette)
  • Full Fact, the London-based fact-checking charity, is developing a tool to fact-check claims in real-time, meaning facts could “flash in chyrons [on-screen graphics] under the faces of politicians and pundits debating on TV”. (Poynter)
  • Erin Overbey, the New Yorker’s archive editor, has written a frank and meticulous Twitter thread about inequality in legacy media, in which she claims Editor-in-Chief David Remnick added mistakes into her copy when she was already on probationary watch for speaking up about inequality.
  • The head and deputy head of Goldsmith’s media department have been suspended after they wrote to students about the results of ongoing strike action by academics. (openDemocracy)
  • The House of Lords Communications and Digital Committee has rejected the idea a paywall could fund the BBC, but is reported to be considering a council tax levy in the event that the Tories’ are able to enact their plan to scrap the license fee in 2027. (The Guardian)
  • Netflix is being sued for breach of labour laws by a contestant of ‘Love Is Blind’. Jeremy Hartwell alleges that “producers encouraged the cast to drink alcohol, while limiting access to food and water and underpaying them.” (BBC)
  • After years of claiming it was committed to promoting and funding the new industry as a response to accusations that Big Tech has been siphoning news’ economic model, Facebook has announced it will be “reallocating resources” from Facebook News and its newsletter platform Bulletin, to focus on the creator economy. (WSJ)
  • Justice secretary Dominic Raab has announced courts will get new powers to dismiss Slapp cases (strategic lawsuits against public participation, a type of lawsuit that the wealthy can use to kill critical stories) against reporters. (The Guardian)
  • The latest Ofcom report on news consumption has shown for the first time that social media is the most popular news source among UK teenagers. Instagram is used by 29%; TikTok and YouTube by 28%, and the BBC—until now the most popular— has been bumped to fifth place at 24%. (Variety)
  • The Guardian has given its editor-in-chief Katherine Viner a £150k (42%) pay rise, even after it only recently raised freelancer pay 5% for the first time in over a decade, and published coverage about ‘profiteering bosses’. (The Telegraph)
  • Tech workers at The Atlantic will follow their editorial colleagues in forming a union. (HuffPost)
  • Both Tory leadership candidates are believed to back plans to privatise Channel 4, spelling bad news for the 96% of the public who reject the sale of the broadcaster. Rishi Sunak has publicly spoken of his support for the plans and, although she hasn’t spoken on the issue publicly, Liz Truss is reported to support them also. (The Guardian)
  • Channel 4 has published new guidelines, developed with disabled talent such as comedian Adam Hills, for the representation of disability and people with disabilities in broadcasting. (Channel 4)
  • The BBC has celebrated its centenary by releasing over 30k items from its archive online. The material is categorised by region and can be downloaded and used non-commercially. (BBC)

See you next week!

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