#cablenews

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CNN’s ratings are dwarfed by Fox’s. In January, Fox averaged 2.8 million viewers in primetime vs. 734,000 for MSNBC and 522,000 for CNN. But the really frightening metrics for people who treasure fact-based journalism are the trendlines: Fox’s number was up 40% from a year earlier, while MSNBC’s was down 33% and CNN’s was off 14%.

CNN is flailing between facts and fascism

[muffinrecord]

cablenews replied to your photoset “Shipping” this and “shipping” that, have we ever considered that...”

aro* not ace. aro means not feeling romantic attraction.

consultingundergroundrainbow replied to your photoset “Shipping” this and “shipping” that, have we ever considered that...”

Ace people can get crushes

Woops! Thank you guys for the correction-- I’ll go correct the post right now. 

[effing]

#sdcomicfest #cable #cablenews #deadpool #sketch #pun #notsorry (at Four Points by Sheraton San Diego)

[azspot]

Broken Cords

We’re moving toward replacing cable TV with a bundle of streaming networks. Will local and news programming get lost in the transition?

Two hundred counties in America lack a local newspaper. Television remains a large source for news consumers, particularly those over 50, and local news viewership has been relatively stable. What happens if those channels go away? “It further underscores why you have to look at market dynamics with the news industry,” said Radsch. “It’s already not very profitable to run a news outlet on cable or broadcast. That’s going to become a broader problem.”

Maybe you can replace the cable news talking head wasteland with opinion-heavy streaming and YouTube content. But the substitute for local news in particular is hard to find. Putting heavier blinders on what happens in our communities would be a nightmare. And democracy demands a variety of news and information available to people wherever they can be reached.

The way America solved this during the move to pay TV was through must-carry requirements put in place in the 1960s. Local channels can demand carriage on cable systems, and cable operators must pay them to transmit their broadcasts, while setting aside space for local programming. A must-carry mandate doesn’t exist in streaming, but that doesn’t mean Congress or the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) cannot create it. Local streaming channels could become required on smart TV sets or as part of streaming bundles, as well as retransmission fees.

It may require a new Telecommunications Act to reimagine local programming in the streaming age. Radsch thinks policymakers need to start exploring it. “I don’t think policymakers are either addressing the current challenges adequately nor are they looking to the history of governing our information communication technology,” she said. “We’ve got to get on top of this faster and not wait two decades in.”

[azspot]

I used to be invited to go on television and give a historian's perspective on current events. I spoke on CNN, Fox News and MSNBC, among others. But the experience grew less satisfying over time. As a commentator on CNN for Barack Obama's inauguration, I patiently waited my turn to speak, only to discover that there were no turns. If I wanted to be heard I had to shout over whoever was then talking. Fox News insisted on a pre-interview before the real thing. This is not uncommon. Producers get a sense of the areas of expertise of the guests. Fox News took it further. Their producer explained what I was expected to say. As a university professor, I was positioned as a liberal. What I told the producer I would actually say didn't fit the category envisioned for me. The invitations stopped coming from Fox News. MSNBC was more subtle. I have a cussed streak in me that causes me to question the dominant interpretation on just about any subject. The MSNBC talking heads would develop a head of progressive steam, and I would say something like, Hold on, it's more complicated than that. The hosts would simply not come back to me when it should have been my turn to speak.

(2) Politics and history

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Once again, we are witnessing a news media that refuses to treat the act of informing the public as a core part of its mission. Rather than spending time telling us what it would mean for policy if a race goes one way or another, news organizations are busy chasing the narrative being set by Fox News, playing the role of horse race announcer, and again, failing the public.

Another Successful 'Foxtober' Midterm Election is Under Way

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What happens when a group of Fox News viewers watch CNN for a month?

A study that paid viewers of the rightwing cable network to switch shed light on the media’s influence on people’s views

Watching Fox News can be like entering an alternative universe. It’s a world where Vladimir Putin isn’t actually that bad, but vaccines may be, and where some unhinged rightwing figures are celebrated as heroes, but Anthony Fauci, America’s top public health official, is an unrivaled villain.

Given the steady stream of misinformation an avid Fox News consumer is subjected to, the viewers – predominantly elderly, white and Donald Trump-supporting – are sometimes written off as lost causes by Democrats and progressives, but according to a new study, there is still hope.

In an unusual, and labor intensive, project, two political scientists paid a group of regular Fox News viewers to instead watch CNN for a month. At the end of the period, the researchers found surprising results; some of the Fox News watchers had changed their minds on a range of key issues, including the US response to coronavirus and Democrats’ attitude to police.

The findings suggest that political perspectives can be changed – but also reveals the influence partisan media has on viewers’ ideology.

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The biggest hypocritical media story of the 2020 election was the cable networks shaming the social media giants not to accept political ads leading up to the election while they ran Trump/Biden and Citizen United protected Ads up to midnight on election night.

@ReallyActivist