Peter Bale - curated media and journalism news - Something for the weekend
People with scant illusions about Trump are volunteering to help him execute one of his Big Lies.
This is spot on for me and worth the read. There are huge problems with the reporting and origin of the Steele Dossier but it is vital not to forget there was a conspiracy and connections worth exploring. The mistakes need to be owned up to (especially in my view the silly Guardian one about Manafort and Assange -- see below). Media need to own up quickly and transparently when there's an error and stand by the good stuff.
This is here sort of for balance and because there are stories that didn't stand up and need to be fixed, as the Washington Post has done. Others need to do more to transparently address the ones that were wrong or where they were misled into believing sources were legitimate.
Pretty good analysis on an interesting internationally-relevant media story from New Zealand. You know I have done work for Stuff (as well as for Facebook). In my view, the publishers should be permitted to collectivise for this negotiation as the power disparity is so huge. However, I don't believe they will get anything like the level of government backing as Australian publishers ruthlessly demanded and got. Getting permission to negotiate well with the platforms is a good idea and they deserve it. It is interesting that BusinessDesk (for which I write a little) has already done its own deal with Google on Showcase and that makes a lot of sense.
Very amusing piece from The New Scientist on a truism that tech nerds like MZ really don't always have the greatest sense of irony.
I strongly believe in this approach to local journalism but it requires a tax system that rewards philanthropy and where charity can be distributed to support journalism and that doesn't apply in many countries.
Natalia is a friend and has a perspicacious take on most things but especially her native Georgia. I love some of the witty lines in what is otherwise a seriously important story and yet another indication of how Putin's overwhelming cynicism and skill puts him in another class of rotter.
The FT was brave and good to support this and it seems to be working.
I am nowhere near as good as I should be on punctuation and grammar, though I think I have recently started using semicolons more effectively than I have in the past. I love this sort of nerdy piece.
The Bale take on the world, kind of.
A sort of bonus, or not. I do this weekly curated assemblage of stories for a New Zealand site called The Spinoff. You might find the odd item interesting.