Tag: Media

Now Is Not the Time to Tune Out

Buck Banks

“We are a country that stands on the precipice, just six weeks away from swearing in, for the second time, a wannabe ‘dictator’ with ambitions to wildly reshape our democracy. There is a desire to tune out. … I get it. And while, as a member of the media, I feel a little sheepish making the case to keep reading columns (like this one!), watching the news, and listening to podcasts, it’s a perilous moment for America, and it only serves Donald Trump and his allies to look the other way.”

— Molly Jong-Fast

White Supremacy Euphemism Generator for Journalists

Buck Banks

StockUnlimited
StockUnlimited
Just when journalists are looking at at least four years of trying to come up with synonyms for “white supremacist,” BoingBoing creates a much needed mechanism.

Reading recent coverage of Donald Trump’s friends on the far right, it struck me that even when people pander to the idea Western culture’s wellbeing is inseparable from European ethnicity, they somehow avoid being called white nationalists or supremacists by journalists.

Generate some creative headlines here.

Hillary Stuck in a Bubble

Buck Banks

For all the public grind of this campaign, for all her public presence on the world stage over the past two decades, Clinton herself has increasingly spent her days in a kind of purdah, suppressing spontaneous utterances and surrounded by loyalists whose chief role is her care and feeding. She communicates only through a veil of unyielding self-protection, surrounded by a curtain of defensiveness. … So nowadays, almost no one outside Clinton’s innermost circle ever sees the tender side that loyal aides and friends insist is such a palpable part of her personality, but I can attest that it is there.

— Todd Purdum

HuffPo to Treat Trump as Entertainment, Not Politics

Buck Banks

After watching and listening to Donald Trump since he announced his candidacy for president, we have decided we won’t report on Trump’s campaign as part of The Huffington Post‘s political coverage. Instead, we will cover his campaign as part of our Entertainment section… Our reason is simple: Trump’s campaign is a sideshow. We won’t take the bait. If you are interested in what The Donald has to say, you’ll find it next to our stories on the Kardashians and The Bachelorette.

— The Huffington Post, announcing it would no longer cover the candidate as a political story.

Who Needs Political Reporters?

Buck Banks

The 2016 election may be the first one in which the political press is totally sidelined. Politicians now have a professional grasp of social media — Barack Obama just got his third Twitter account — and they don’t need media middlemen to communicate with voters. … What’s more, no journalist has the kind of celebrity and cultural credibility (as Tim Russert used to have) that once made interviews mandatory for aspiring presidents.

— Ryan Cooper, in the Week.

‘Mad Men’ Finale Affected the Stock Market

Buck Banks

0.15%

Amount the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell the day after the series finale of “Mad Men.” A study of 165 TV series finales shows that the wave of negative mood caused by the end of a popular and beloved show reduces the net demand for risky assets and decreases aggregate stock returns, says Gabriele M. Lepori of Copenhagen Business School. Specifically, if the number of viewers of a finale is 1 standard deviation above Lepori’s sample average, stock returns fall approximately 25 basis points the next day, all else constant. The finale of the drama “Mad Men” drew 3.3 million live and same-day viewers.