Republican women, please behave at the RNC.
F Newsmagazine’s Sophie Lucido Johnson explains: “Wear long shorts — and 6 other rules for women at #RNCinCLE” This was in Crain’s Chicago Business, so you should also read the comments section to see who has a sense of humor and who doesn’t, while guessing what party they vote for.
Story of a redesign
A narrative on how a great newspaper changes its look, its organization, its process, based on a rethink led by celebrated designer Mario Garcia: Norway’s 154-year old Aftenposten, in pictures.
Some insights for student journalists: a template of three components for major stories (story, data, commentary) instead of “a long text that moves over two pages”; a look at their font choices; different thinking about a newspaper’s “destination page” (pp 2-3) (and maybe F Newsmagazine should rethink its contents page); and what they talk about in the morning meeting with which the editors begin the day.
Garcia features older posts on the home page, including one showing and commenting on the winners in a Society for News Design annual contest: SND 35 Awards: What makes a winner.
Some election comments
from the twitter feed of Clay Shirky, an NYU journalism prof. who is one of the more interesting thinkers about media in the Internet era, even if he does give Ted Talks:
“The liberal cause has been saved by African-Americans, who are populous and disciplined and consistent enough voters to overcome white rage.”
(My comment: African Americans have been the essential minority, playing a key role in progressive and revolutionary politics since the slave rebellions and abolition. Michael C. Dawson, in Blacks In and Out of the Left, taught me a lot about the indispensable alliance between the left and black freedom movements.)
“We’ve brought fact-checkers to a culture war. Time to get serious.” (My comment: This is a frequent criticism of liberal messaging. Communication theory now looks at how decision-making is inseparable from our emotions, rationality from values. Ad agencies have known this since their beginnings, and so do successful political consultants. We are no longer surprised that the right can ignore (or invent their own) facts, but has that taught the left how to campaign?)
“Trump can win, if he concentrates on white fear. That’s how you get white evangelicals to pick a libertine agnostic over a liberal Christian.” (See my note below: “Why are evangelicals ‘flocking to Trump’?”)
Roger Ailes Fired from Fox: It wasn’t just the sex abuse
Two thoughts about the firing of Fox News CEO Roger Ailes.
Ailes was fired by the Murdochs after Gretchen Carlson went public with a lawsuit accusing him of sexual harassment and the scandal quickly widened. Twenty-six other women have come forward so far, including Fox star anchor Megyn Kelly, hammering the lesson of the Cosby scandal: Once someone dares to expose a powerful abuser, more victims take courage. The law firm hired by the Murdochs to investigate is finding that at Fox News, it was not just the crimes of one person — it was the misogynist culture permeating the organization, with charges of harassment leveled at other supervisors and a general “hostile” workplace environment.
First thought: Even Fox News, a nerve center for right-wing misogyny, is not immune and cannot prevent charges of sexual harassment from blowing up into major scandals and bringing down a man once too powerful to defy.
Activists may not be able to overthrow the ruling elites, but while the elites can usually marginalize or defeat movements, they don’t have the weapons to block the profound cultural changes the movements can set in motion. The patriarchs still rule, but movements and generational shifts have weakened their hold on the culture and on our minds.
Second thought: The upending of the Fox News leadership parallels the upending of the Republican establishment — the bases of each are aging white people unsettled by a shifting culture and demographics, and the threat to each is a future in which their base becomes smaller and smaller. The median age of the audience of Fox News is 68. Rupert Murdoch and his sons fired Ailes because of a scandal quickly growing out of control — but also because he was not the CEO to bring Fox into the new media cultures of the internet age. The internet culture is not just about technology; it is shaped by the behavior of millions, especially the young; Ailes — and the GOP — belong to an earlier era.
Frightening thought: The Murdochs are looking for replacements for Ailes — not just at extreme right-wingers, but also David Rhodes, president of CBS News. “That would be clearly an indication that the company would be repositioned more to the center.” This should terrify comedians everywhere, and sadden us all; what a loss this would be to late-night comedy.
For a survey of the vulnerabilities (competition from web-based broadcasting and skinny cable bundles, see Ken Doctor’s piece in Nieman Lab.
How to wear a condom
“ISELIN, N.J., July 20, 2016 /PRNewswire/ — Ansell, a global leader in protection solutions and the makers of SKYN® Condoms, an innovative brand of premium condoms and lubricants, is excited to present SKYNFEEL™ APPAREL. This one-of-a-kind conceptual long jump suit for elite athletes is made of SKYNFEEL™, the same revolutionary condom material that lets you feel everything. With cutting edge design, drawing inspiration from biomimicry, SKYNFEEL APPAREL seeks to minimize body limitation and give extra airtime to the long jump athlete.”
NPR’s “culture of timidity” has for years been dissected by Jay Rosen, another NYU journalism prof., whose blog is essential reading for anyone interested in the meaning of “objectivity” in news reporting. “You can see the NPR policy at work in the many reports it prepared about the Melania Trump speech. They all avoided the word “plagiarized.” The language NPR used to describe the plagiarism without calling it by its name is sadly funny. Here you can read the lengths to which NPR goes to avoid controversy (here meaning, getting flack from a political campaign).
How many students have told me they get their news from NPR, thinking it somehow above corporate media, more explanatory and “objective.” I wish they would read Jay Rosen on NPR’s phony “objectivity,” in particular, always presenting “two sides,” even if one of them is nutty or patently false: “This is he said, she said reporting, one of the lowest forms of journalism in existence, in which the NPR reporter washes her hands of determining what is true.” And it is all about fear.
Explainer: Why are evangelicals “flocking to Trump”?
This Pew survey shows the data. Now Trump, a libertine and serial adulterer chooses for his running mate an evangelical who wanted to criminalize adultery. Jeff Sharlet, associate professor of literary journalism at Dartmouth and author of the book “C Street: The Fundamentalist Threat to American Democracy,” tells Democracy Now how evangelicals can support an agnostic libertine: “There’s always this idea: ‘How can they tolerate this guy? He’s a hypocrite.’ To which there’s a ready response —”And I’m a sinner.” That’s in the vernacular. But there’s also, especially in those elite evangelical circles, where you see guys like Christian right leader David Barton saying, “Trump wasn’t my first choice or my second choice, but I now realize that it seems that God has chosen him for this”—they don’t see him as a godly man; they see him, as David Barton, Christian right leader, says, as God’s man, as the tool that God is using.” More background on Trump’s courting and being courted by evangelical operatives: Donald Trump had white evangelicals at ‘hello’.
Teaching your first course?
Stacy Foster (UW-M) tells how she used discussion boards — get the conversations going without overloading yourself with work.
Strategy for a political mag: Seduce your readers
Your readers need to love you, not just to value the information you provide.
TPM publisher Josh Marshall talks about how a political blog/magazine can build readership and influence. He tells Nieman Lab, “The idea of publications totally based on advertising is, I think, an illusion. Some can do it, but I don’t think it’s ever going to be a sustainable model for most publications.” TPM tries for broad reach with its free product, but is supported by 11 000 subscribers who get TPM’s prime product, a special layout and access to a discussion forum. But, he says, the subscribers are motivated not just by that exclusive product, but also by loving TPM and wanting to support independent journalism.
