tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-98237462024-03-16T03:07:57.798-04:00MediaCitizenTimothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.comBlogger704125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9823746.post-1263341185513101182024-02-23T17:26:00.008-05:002024-02-23T17:34:42.425-05:00To ‘Save Local News,’ Policymakers Need to Understand What Needs Saving Originally published at Tech Policy Press.Northwestern Medill Local News Initiative State of Local News 2023As lawmakers around the world struggle with ways to “save local news,” it’s worth asking who this sort of journalism benefits and whether new policies prioritize their needs. That’s why new research from Northwestern University’s State of Local News Project is so Timothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9823746.post-8648012141789770412024-02-23T17:21:00.007-05:002024-02-23T17:33:15.453-05:00CNN OpEd: Here’s What’s at Risk if Big Tech Doesn’t Address Deceptive AI ContentLast Friday, 20 technology platforms agreed to better label and curtail AI-generated disinformation that’s being spread online to deceive voters during a busy election year. They pledged to provide “swift and proportionate responses” to deceptive AI content about the election, including sharing more information about “ways citizens can protect themselves from being manipulated or deceived.”This Timothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9823746.post-39429968902613632482023-11-17T06:17:00.004-05:002023-11-17T07:46:48.807-05:00How the Media Can Atone for Enabling the Rise of TrumpismFor far too long, media execs have played along with Donald Trump’s strongman charade, aware that his tele-presence is a boon for ratings and revenues. Now, U.S. democracy is reaping what they have sown.At a speech delivered on Veterans Day, Trump used rhetoric nearly identical to that used by Adolf Hitler 80 years earlier. Rather than honoring veterans as one might expect of a Timothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9823746.post-80919822024610679522023-11-04T08:51:00.002-04:002023-11-04T08:51:31.330-04:00Sink, Sank, Sunk: One Year in and Musk's Twitter Is Circling the DrainIt’s been one year since Elon Musk took ownership of Twitter and proceeded to strip it of all its social value.Let that sink in. When he took charge of the platform, Musk called Twitter the internet’s “de facto town square.” Under his leadership, Musk insisted, the online forum would become “important to the future of civilization.” Very few people believed him at the time. Far fewer do Timothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9823746.post-61055107417320103432023-11-04T08:38:00.002-04:002023-11-04T08:38:48.791-04:00Why ISPs Can't Stop Lying About Net NeutralityNo single issue seems to scare large phone and cable companies more than Net Neutrality.That’s because Net Neutrality is built on the sound legal notion that broadband access must be classified under Title II of the Communications Act, which gives the Federal Communications Commission the comprehensive authority it needs to hold powerful companies like AT&T, Comcast and Verizon Timothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9823746.post-80907377578567663042023-08-01T07:06:00.003-04:002023-08-02T08:34:25.441-04:00Elon Musk Is Absolutely an Enemy of Free SpeechIn Elon Musk’s mind he’s absolutely a free-speech absolutist. He’ll absolutely defend your right to speak out, as long as you don’t criticize him. If you do … well … then you’re out of luck.To no one is this more evident right now than the good people at the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH). The nonprofit organization investigates the spread of hate speech across social media, and has Timothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9823746.post-82770612401902511402023-07-12T17:33:00.000-04:002023-07-12T17:33:02.279-04:00The Way to Saving Twitter Is Down a Road Elon Musk Will Never TravelConsistent and enforceable content-moderation is the key to social-media success. It's also good for, you know... democracy.Numbers don’t lie. And in this case they tell a tale of Twitter’s continued demise under the misguided reign of Elon Musk. They also suggest a clear path out of this mess, one Musk is highly unlikely to take.According to data that researcher Travis Brown provided Timothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9823746.post-72713292480837069772023-06-22T21:25:00.003-04:002023-06-22T21:26:34.050-04:00Exchanging Links for Cash Is No Way to Save JournalismPhoto by DALL-EOriginally published by Tech Policy PressLast Thursday, the Senate Judiciary Committee voted to advance the controversial Journalism Competition and Preservation Act (JCPA). Identical legislation, which moved through this same committee last year, failed to advance to the Senate floor or receive any consideration in the House due in part to widespread opposition from Timothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9823746.post-80659788791509987822023-06-22T20:38:00.006-04:002023-06-22T20:56:25.042-04:00Trump’s Lies Spark Right-Wing Cries to Defund PBSPBS must have really crossed the line this time.During its broadcast of Trump’s post-indictment rally on June 13, PBS NewsHour added factual context to the disgraced former president’s claims that he had won the 2020 election, that federal prosecutor Jack Smith was a “deranged lunatic” and a “thug,” and that the so-called deep state was “destroying our country” and “coming after you Timothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9823746.post-29190272286275413452023-06-22T20:23:00.003-04:002023-06-22T20:23:26.112-04:00How Musk’s Love of Hate and Disinformation Has Tanked Twitter’s BusinessTwitter’s latest round of bad news recalls a meeting Free Press and other racial-justice and digital-rights groups held in early November, at the beginning of Elon Musk’s disastrous run as the platform’s CEO.We sat down with the new-media boss to gauge his commitment to community standards, election integrity and content moderation. We urged Musk to retain and actually enforceTimothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9823746.post-50622145680458767692023-05-16T11:38:00.004-04:002023-05-16T11:39:42.229-04:00CNN, Trump and the Media Mainstreaming of DemagoguesThe pageantry of lies that passed for a town hall last week was yet another low point in CNN’s coverage of Donald Trump.
To absolutely no one’s surprise, the former president used the media attention to paint an alternative view of recent U.S. history — one in which he features not as the twice-impeached, criminally indicted sexual abuser who lost the last presidential election, but Timothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9823746.post-29283239874327442802023-05-03T16:39:00.003-04:002023-05-04T07:25:52.660-04:00How Lawmakers and Regulators Are Helping Sinclair Destroy Local NewsSometimes lawmakers write legislation that would do the opposite of its stated goal. Nowhere is this more evident than in two recent bills — one introduced at the state level and another in the U.S. Congress — that are supposedly designed to “save local news.”
Both the California Journalism Preservation Act (CJPA) and the federal Journalism Competition and Preservation Act (JCPA) would Timothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9823746.post-87577610992907162332023-04-23T09:16:00.008-04:002023-04-23T09:23:06.709-04:00Is $787.5 Million Enough to Make the Murdochs Accountable?It’s been a momentous week in media — one that executives and hosts at Fox News hope you’ll soon forget.But the aftertaste from its $787.5-million decision to settle the Dominion Voting Systems’ defamation case lingers. While the Murdochs want to wash away months of monumentally damaging headlines — exposing their efforts to deceive the American public and help overthrow a Timothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9823746.post-23818983721473609002023-04-14T09:30:00.001-04:002023-04-14T09:30:10.489-04:00Elon Musk: The World’s Worst BusinessmanEven billionaires get things wrong.
But none more so than Elon Musk, who, a year after announcing his bid to buy Twitter, has squandered every opportunity he’s had to make the social-media company a success.
Musk’s mistakes have been many. He’s spent most of the past year behaving like a preschooler on a finger-load of frosting, and his childishness has affected the platform’s bottom line andTimothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9823746.post-13301284727678461532023-02-27T09:36:00.008-05:002023-02-27T09:38:35.155-05:00Why Advertisers Aren’t to Blame for Mass Layoffs at NPRMore than 50 years on, it’s easy to wonder what went wrong with the Public Broadcasting Act of 1967, the legislation that created public media as we’ve come to know it in the United States. Despite the popular understanding that a healthy democracy requires a free press, the U.S. Congress remains reluctant to offer public subsidies for any journalism that doesn’t operate under the dictates Timothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9823746.post-81822135330510715842023-02-12T09:29:00.044-05:002023-04-14T09:31:56.197-04:00Musk, Twitter and the Lessons not LearnedResearch released Thursday by the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) offers the latest chapter in the rapid demise of Elon Musk’s Twitter: Major advertisers — including those featured during this weekend’s Super Bowl — are paying the social network millions of dollars to drag their brands through the platform’s toxic sludge.The research features screen grabs of instances where TwitterTimothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9823746.post-30717877710335066252022-11-30T08:25:00.017-05:002022-11-30T08:28:04.084-05:00Is Twitter Worth Saving?Twitter is unraveling at the speed of a SpaceX rocket. Things have gotten so bad under the erratic reign of Elon Musk that the future of the social-media company is in question. What, if anything, should be done to pull Twitter from the brink?From the moment Musk walked through the door, he’s sought to impose his unique brand of creative destruction on Twitter. But the results have been less thanTimothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9823746.post-24595957793411084842022-10-24T16:21:00.005-04:002022-10-24T16:23:07.375-04:00 Journalism’s Bad BargainU.S. legislation that lets media cartels collude is the wrong way to foster public-interest journalism By Sanjay Jolly and Timothy KarrYes, journalism is in crisis in the United States. That’s obvious to anyone observing the job losses and newspaper closures that have wreaked havoc on local news production over the past 20 years. But few of the lawmakers and lobbyists who claim they’re Timothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9823746.post-48791588058106125842022-07-02T12:08:00.005-04:002022-07-02T12:14:31.926-04:00Who’s Going to Protect Reproductive Rights Online?Chicago protests, June 24. (photo: Timothy Karr)Co-authored with Nora Benavidez for Tech Policy PressFollowing the Supreme Court’s decision overturning Roe v. Wade, 13 states have or will soon have laws that criminalize abortion, and at least five more are ready to follow. Those trying to determine how and where they can obtain reproductive healthcare face added layers of Timothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9823746.post-42932712869739798292022-03-25T12:04:00.000-04:002022-03-25T12:04:03.895-04:00The Future of Local News Is Noncommercial(Originally published by Columbia Journalism Review)IN FEBRUARY, Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota reintroduced the Journalism Competition and Preservation Act, which is designed to make Silicon Valley’s billionaires pay for the harms they’ve inflicted on the news industry.“What does Big Tech’s dominance over the news mean for Americans?” Klobuchar asked during a recent hearing on the legislation. Timothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9823746.post-86813459100451235382021-11-30T08:35:00.006-05:002021-11-30T12:03:16.705-05:00The 'F' Word and the MediaJust before Thanksgiving break, former President Donald Trump told Fox News that he had met Kenosha shooter Kyle Rittenhouse at Mar-a-Lago, where the two smiled for a photo that was custom built for right-wing social media.
The message behind the encounter is brutally simple: The ostensible leader of the U.S. Republican Party endorses deadly violence against any and all enemies — in this case, Timothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9823746.post-16516037296636377232021-11-16T08:59:00.004-05:002021-11-16T09:07:21.081-05:00Getting Beyond ‘Blah, Blah, Blah’ and Upending Inaction on Climate ChangeRipples from environmental activist Greta Thunberg’s passionate speech in Milan this September were still being felt last week as politicians, diplomats, NGO leaders and youth advocates convened during the World Forum for Democracy at the Council of Europe in Strasbourg, France.In her speech, Thunberg denounced the planet’s “so-called leaders” for failing to do enough to reverse the Timothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9823746.post-87144737986327877602021-11-01T11:06:00.005-04:002021-11-30T08:36:49.725-05:00Media Outlets Flood the Zone With News of Facebook's FailureThe many exposés reveal a toxic but highly profitable revenue model that's driving Facebook’s reluctance to safeguard democracy and stop the spread of hate and disinformation.If you decided to take a breather this weekend from the relentless stream of Facebook news, you've got a lot of catching up to do.Since Friday afternoon, several prominent outlets rushed to press with stories drawn from the Timothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9823746.post-77807032392216540902021-11-01T11:01:00.002-04:002021-11-01T11:01:09.980-04:00Talking Facebook (I Mean Meta), Frances Haugen, the Media Exposé, and What This all Means to WashingtonThe following is an edited snippet of my conversation with Janine Jackson of CounterSpin and FAIR. You can listen to the entire conversation here.Timothy Karr: Facebook’s unofficial motto used to be “move fast and break things,” and we now know because of these documents is that the things that it has broken include the lives of people in places like the Philippines, Myanmar and Ethiopia. Timothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9823746.post-71030947621488159682021-05-07T07:23:00.001-04:002021-05-07T07:23:04.727-04:00World Press Freedom During the U.S. Tech BoomOn Monday many observed World Press Freedom Day, a chance for people everywhere to assess the global health of a free press and the future of journalism.As the world marked the occasion, the world’s largest tech companies, including Amazon, Facebook and Google, reported their quarterly earnings. The news for them is very, very good: Their streak of trillion-dollar earnings in 2020 is Timothy Karrhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18428218526755405762noreply@blogger.com0