Permanent link to MTA daily media news

Donors Launch Liberal “Mutual Funds”
Wealthy liberal activists are bringing a part of the financial world, the mutual fund, to politics as they attempt to increase the number of people giving to a select group of 37 Democratic-leaning organizations.
Still nothing for a coordinated media effort, however.  Still shortsighted.

Gotcha and Mini-Scandals Fuel the Year’s Biggest Campaign Week : November 11 - 16, 2007
Planted questions, the B-word, and an embarrassing indictment were all fodder for journalists covering the revved up race for the White House last week. In Pakistan, a national crisis turns personal in the media. And cable news’ favorite celebrity defendant.

Employees at CBS News Vote to Authorize a Strike
The vote enables the guild to call a strike at any time, although a walkout is not imminent. A strike could affect CBS television and radio newscasts, both nationally and in four local markets.

CMU algorithm produces new blog ratings (by Stephen Baker at Blogspotting, Business Week)
Just got a release from Carnegie Mellon about a new algorithm that rates the blogs we should read “to be most up to date.” Interestingly, if we have only time to read 100 blogs, Instapundit ranks first. (Since it’s an academic exercise, it uses 2006 data, and focuses on variables such as inlinks, outlinks, and posting frequency.) But if we have time to read 5,000, the list changes dramatically.
A HUNDRED blogs, much less FIVE THOUSAND??!!  Who has time?  And Instapundit??!!  Sounds like a kinky algorithm to me.  To be best informed, read MakeThemAccountable every day.

Scott McClellan’s Book Coming in April — Admits Wrongdoing in Clearing Rove and Libby in CIA Leak Case
NEW YORK To no one’s surprise in a world where top White House aides with any president eventually write a book about it, former Press Sectetary Scott McClellan will be coming out with his volume in April.  [From an excerpt:] “I had unknowingly passed along false information. And five of the highest ranking officials in the administration were involved in my doing so: Rove, Libby, the vice President, the President’s chief of staff, and the president himself.”

Fox host ‘for Tasing anyone in Code Pink’ after Hillary heckled (by David Edwards and Nick Juliano at The Raw Story)
A Fox News morning host has a novel idea to handle those pesky Code Pink protesters who disrupt political events and Congressional hearings: 50,000 volts of electricity. Brian Kilmead shared his ever-so-evolved views on crowd control Monday morning in a Fox & Friends discussion of a Code Pink-disrupted Hillary Clinton speech. His answer to annoying anti-war types? Tasers or Billy clubs. “They should Tase this guy,” Kilmead says. “At one point with security so high and tensions on edge, don’t you think they’re going to get at the very least Tased or beaten to a pulp by somebody? These people look threatening.”

Mythbuster: Basic Instincts: The Science of Evil
In ABC News’ version of the Milgram experiment, we tested 18 men, and found that 65 percent of them agreed to administer increasingly painful electric shocks when ordered by an authority figure. 22 women signed up for our experiment. Even though most people said that women would be less likely to inflict pain on the learner, a surprising 73 percent yielded to the orders of the experimenter… Our subjects had an unusually high level of education… The group was also ethnically diverse.
We haven’t learned a damned thing since the original experiments in 1961 through 1963.  What we should have learned is to teach people to be skeptical of those who appear to be authority figures, and to strongly criticize those, like Kilmead in the excerpt above, who legitimize and even glorify our worst impulses.

O’Hanlon Teams Up With AEI’s Kagan To Advocate Pre-Emptive Strike On Pakistan
In the wake of the recent crisis in Pakistan, Iraq escalation architect Frederick Kagan of AEI and Brookings analyst Michael O’Hanlon penned a column yesterday urging the U.S. to weigh a military option in Pakistan to secure its nuclear stockpiles.
Are these people completely crazy?

Fine-Tuning the Sell Job for the Next War (PR Watch)
“The basis of the whole thing was, ‘we’re going to go into Iran and what do we have to do to get you guys to go along with it,’” said Laura Sonnenmark, a participant in a recent focus group apparently funded by the Republican-associated lobbying group Freedom’s Watch. Sonnenmark, a “focus group regular,” said the moderator “used lots of catch phrases, like ‘victory’ and ‘failure is not an option.’” She added, “I’ve never seen a moderator who was so persistent in manipulating and leading the participants.”

The Clinton News Network Holds a Vladimir Putin Debate (by Brent Budowsky at The Hill’s Pundits Blog)
Joe Biden, Chris Dodd, Bill Richardson and Dennis Kucinich have close to a hundred years of significant government experience and very significant things to say about the campaign, but have been treated in these debates like the opposition to Vladimir Putin are treated in the state-controlled Russian media. It is a disgrace and a sham and a disrespect not only to those candidates but to the very idea of an informed citizenry choosing our next leader in a democratic election.

CNN’s Self-Importance is Beyond Debate (by Rogers Cadenhead at Watching the Watchers)
At last [week’s] Democratic presidential debate in Las Vegas, CNN moderator Wolf Blitzer spoke for more time than five of the seven candidates, repeatedly getting in the way of substantive discussion by reducing issues to yes/no options. But it wasn’t until the audience got its chance to ask questions that the CNN team demonstrated how inflated in self-importance our leading broadcast journalists have become during presidential campaigns.

Obama Camp Uses Disputed Gerth Account Of Clintons’ 20-Year-Plan To Fault Hillary (by Greg Sargent at TPM Election Central)
Barack Obama has unveiled a new line of criticism against Hillary: In speeches he’s started to point to the allegation made in Jeff Gerth and Don Van Natta’s Hillary book that the Clintons secretly formulated a 20-year-plan to deliver the presidency first to Bill, and then to Hillary… But the source that Gerth and Van Natta cited with supposed first-hand knowledge of this plan — historian Taylor Branch — has since vehemently denied that any such pact existed. “The story is preposterous,” Branch told The Washington Post, adding: “I never heard either Clinton talk about a ‘plan’ for them both to become president.”
Shame on you, Sen. Obama.

Prediction: Rove, Moulitsas won’t surprise us in Newsweek
Newsweek pieces by Karl Rove and Markos Moulitsas will no doubt be linked on plenty of political blogs, allowing the magazine to claim success, says Paul McLeary. “But I would be shocked if either one writes anything that isn’t utterly predictable or that falls outside the narrow realm of the worlds inhabited by their ideological fellow-travelers. And in that, the hirings will have failed the magazine’s readership.”
But Rove has already dropped a bombshell, Paul.  See below.  So what is it that makes you such an expert on the media?

Rove refuses to even use Bush’s name in Newsweek piece (by John Aravosis at AMERICAblog)
In discussing how the GOP candidate can beat Hillary in the general election (assuming she wins the primary), Rove … [painfully] avoids using Bush’s name, and it even implies that Rove is distancing himself (and therefore the candidate) from the Republicans as well - by saying “the Republican candidate” it’s almost as if Rove is implying that the Republicans are another party that he and the current GOP candidate aren’t connected to. Rove’s most important lesson on “How to Beat Hillary (Next) November” is in what he doesn’t say: Stay far away from George Bush and the Republican brand.

Novak Attacks Buffett As ‘Hypocrite’ With A ‘Phony Message’ Who ‘Should Be Ashamed Of Himself’
Last week, billionaire investor Warren Buffett urged Congress “to maintain the estate tax, saying that plans to repeal the tax would benefit a handful of the richest American families and widen income disparity in the United States.”… This weekend on Bloomberg Television, right-wing pundit Bob Novak fumed over Buffett’s altruistic testimony, attacking him as a hypocrite who “should be ashamed of himself for putting out that phony message.” Bloomberg’s Al Hunt responded, “Bob, there’s only two differences between you and Warren Buffett: $40 billion and a conscience.”
Click through to watch the Novak-Hunt video.

O’Reilly Runs Ad For ‘Vile’ Movie That He Claims Hurts ‘Our Troops’ And Helps ‘The Terrorists’
For two months now, Fox News host Bill O’Reilly has been using his various media perches to criticize and attack Brian De Palma’s controversial new film, Redacted… Last week, in order to test “O’Reilly’s motivation” for his campaign, [the film’s financer Mark] Cuban bought ad time for the film during The O’Reilly Factor. The ad ran during the Nov. 15 edition of the show… O’Reilly has yet to comment on the fact that his show is now profiting off the promotion of a film he claims is “hurting our troops and helping the terrorists.”
We already know what O’Reilly is, we’re just dickering over the price.

GOPers think Bush has his swagger back. Good grief. (by Joe Sudbay at AMERICAblog)
[An] “analysis” in [Sunday’s] Washington Post looks like it was spoon fed to Peter Baker by the White House press operation. You know the Bush team has been pushing this story for awhile — finally, someone bit. Somehow, because White House staffers and GOP talking heads think things aren’t so bad on some fronts (not that things are good, just not so bad), Bush now has his swagger back.
He’s a great hugger and a great swaggerer.  I guess that makes him a great president!

Media Matters for America headlines

Fox News’ Hill claimed Obama’s reaction to Novak’s thinly sourced column means he “could have something to hide”

Stephanopoulos, Politico allowed Thompson’s claims about his abortion record to go unchallenged

NY Times, AP again reported McCain’s pledge of civility and respectfulness, ignoring his prior shots at Clinton and Obama

CNN’s Cafferty, Wash. Post’s Murray left out GOP filibuster in reports on Democrats’ failed Iraq legislation

Chris Matthews teased segment by asking whether Clinton is a “She Devil”

Reliable Sources guest dismissed criticism of Russert debate questions, but Kurtz still hasn’t noted questions based on false information

CNN ignored McCain’s missed vote while highlighting Obama’s missed vote

The most dangerous war in the history of journalism
There were a number of “landmarks” in Iraq in the past few months: the Petraeus report into the US army’s “surge”; the withdrawal of British forces from their last base inside Basra city; the decision to bring security companies under the law following the incident involving guards from Blackwater. But one landmark which passed virtually unnoticed was that the Iraq conflict has become the deadliest by far for the media trying to cover it, with more than 200 journalists killed to date.

US plans case against AP photographer
NEW YORK - The U.S. military plans to seek a criminal case in an Iraqi court against an award-winning Associated Press photographer but is refusing to disclose what evidence or accusations would be presented.

Five W’s + H That Should Come AFTER Any Story (by Paul Bradshaw at Poynter Online)
For the past couple of months I’ve been putting together a Model for the 21st century newsroom in five parts. Part three seeks to go one step beyond the “news as conversation” model to look at what should happen after a news story has been reported, using a familiar framework: the 5 Ws and a H… Who can I connect with? What did the journalist read to write this? Where did this happen? When are events coming up that I need to be aware of? Why should I care? How can I make a difference?

A Troubling Case of Readers’ Block
Americans are reading less and their reading proficiency is declining at troubling rates, according to a report that the National Endowment for the Arts [to be issued Monday]. The trend is particularly strong among older teens and young adults, and if it is not reversed, the NEA report suggests, it will have a profound negative effect on the nation’s economic and civic future.

The Future of Reading
Amazon’s Jeff Bezos already built a better bookstore. Now he believes he can improve upon one of humankind’s most divine creations: the book itself.

TurnHere Expands Publisher’s Book Network (by Kristen Nicole at Mashable)
TurnHere, the online video service, is expanding its multi-publisher book network, Bookvideos.tv. It’s purpose is to promote videos from publishing houses for which it’s created videos. As with other services that TurnHere produces videos for, it will expand a video’s reach beyond its own network to include YouTube and other media-sharing sites across the web… [I]t’s becoming clear that the book publishing industry is making a larger push to become integrated into online marketing and social networking

Newspaper Stocks Trade Lower As Gannett October Revenue Declines
NEW YORK Shares of newspaper publishers traded lower on Monday as Gannett Co. said its October revenue fell 6.8 percent, mostly on declines in local and classified advertising sales.

SAGE Advice: Holiday Spending Watch 2007 — Silent Cash Registers
Retailers pulled out all the stops to promote spending by advertising price discounts in newspapers starting before Halloween, but a poll finds consumers planning to spend less this holiday season.

“I see Craigslist as a negative-editorial product,” says editor
“Why? Because it claims the profits normally shifted to the newsroom,” writes Seattle Times editorial page editor James Vesely. “Without the obligations of journalism, e-commerce becomes the anti-newspaper. Media companies, especially newspapers, are by default nearly the lone agents of the democratic form of government.”

WSJ would lose $63M in revenue by making website free
Recovering that in advertising sales would require boosting traffic by 130%, based on calculations by Reuters and a media industry consultant.

Business editor’s global warming letter called “problematic”
In a letter written for the Heartland Institute, Chicago Sun-Times business editor Dan Miller urges journalists to “keep an open mind” on global warming. Sun-Times editor-in-chief Michael Cooke says he didn’t know about the letter and wants to discuss it with Miller. (Phil Rosenthal couldn’t reach him for comment.) Poynter’s Bob Steele says: “He is actively urging a particular examination, and I would suggest a point of view, on a substantive public policy issue. He’s also pitching it in a problematic way to other journalists, using his journalistic connections in doing so.”

Pub sues Philadelphia mag owner over “dive bar” description
“This is a case of a place that can’t take a compliment,” says Larry Platt, editor of Philadelphia magazine and editorial director of A.C. Now, which published the review that prompted Irish Pub & Inn’s lawsuit.

Sports Talk 3 Lib Talk 0 in San Diego
It has been a week since Clear Channel pulled the plug on liberal talk radio in San Diego and lib talk supporters are now finding out that they were being used while the radio station group finalized it’s efforts to launch the third sports station in the market. While 19 lib talk stations (six owned by CC) have ceased to exist during the past year, the flip of KLSD/1360 represents the most serious blow yet to the format. (Ironically ratings for the station were up 33% in the last Arbitron Survey.)
So, as we knew all along, it’s not just about ratings.

The Weekly Radio Spin: Procter & Gamble’s New “Movement” (PR Watch)
Listen to this week’s edition of the “Weekly Radio Spin,” the Center for Media and Democracy’s audio report on the stories behind the news. This week, we cover U.S. military interrogators, the importance of asking where questions come from, and the “My Black is Beautiful” marketing campaign. In “Six Degrees of Spin and Fakin’,” we tell you how many steps it takes to get from supporting the troops to sending them overseas.

And the Number One Site for Women is … CafeMom (by Adam Ostrow at Mashable)
Glam Media claimed to be the number one destination for women back in June. Much was made of those numbers, which consist not only of Glam.com traffic, but sites that the company represents for advertising sales. As for actual destination sites, October numbers from comScore show CafeMom as the number one site for women in terms of total page views, racking up a total of 90 million of them. BabyCenter is number two at 77 million, with iVillage in third at 67 million. As for Glam.com, it places a distant 9th with just 4 million page views on its site.

Amway Adds Entertainment to Product Line
Amway, the door-to-door peddler of vitamins and soap, is pouring millions of dollars into a new online store called Fanista, which will initially sell DVDs and CDs.

KickApps WordPress Plug-in: Creating New Standards?
KickApps has created a Wordpress plugin for enabling a few community features for bloggers and their readers. It’s a single sign-on plugin that lets your readers simultaneously login to your blog and your KickApps-powered community. That basically means that you can more easily create a social network around your WordPress blog.

AOL Prepares New Video Annoyance: Video Ticker Ads (by Stan Schroeder at Mashable)
Boy, those big companies are really trying hard to mess up the online video viewing experience for us. We’ve got pre-roll ads, post-roll ads, overlay ads and dozens of ads all around the video. Now, AOL (with the help of PointRoll and its TickerBoy technology) has prepared a new way to embed ads into videos: video ticker ads.