| | | | | Ramos says "neutrality is not an option" | | "It doesn't matter who you are—a journalist, a politician or a voter—we'll all be judged by how we responded to Donald Trump."
Others have said it, but the message is particularly powerful coming from Jorge Ramos, America's best known Spanish-language anchorman.
It's been one year since Ramos questioned Trump at a press conference in Iowa. So Ramos wrote this op-ed for Time.com today. "Neutrality is not an option... Just providing both points of view is not enough in the current presidential campaign. If a candidate is making racist and sexist remarks, we cannot hide in the principle of neutrality. That's a false equivalence..." | | Staking its future on video, BuzzFeed announced today that it will split into two units: a new, video-focused BuzzFeed Entertainment Group and BuzzFeed News.
What does this mean? Trouble for the news division? Dylan Byers emails: It's like previous splits at News Corp and Tribune, designed to maximize BuzzFeed's entertainment platform, which is its main revenue generator, while continuing to sustain a less lucrative news platform that could one day be spun off or sold while BuzzFeed Entertainment goes public.
Read Dylan's full story here...
-- Jonah Peretti memo: "We have ambitious goals for both departments..."
-- Flashback: Dylan reported in May that BuzzFeed News was retrenching as the company staked more and more of its business on video... | | | Peretti responds to Zucker | | Vanity Fair's Emily Jane Fox, who broke the news of today's reorg, interviewed Peretti, who notably "compared the push into both entertainment and news to what Ted Turner did with both CNN and TBS."
Fox, formerly of CNNMoney (!!), brought up Zucker's recent remark that "I don't think Vice and BuzzFeed are legitimate news organizations." She says Peretti's "only reaction" was this: "It's very similar to what people used to say about CNN when it was an exciting upstart, developing new models." | | | Hackers working for Russia targeting NYT and other newsrooms? | | This afternoon CNN's Evan Perez and Shimon Prokupecz broke the news that "hackers thought to be working for Russian intelligence have carried out a series of cyber breaches targeting reporters at the NYT and other U.S. news organizations." The story cited "U.S. officials briefed on the matter" and said "the intrusions, detected in recent months, are under investigation by the FBI and other U.S. security agencies..."
-- Key graf: "News organizations are considered top targets because they can yield valuable intelligence on reporter contacts in the government, as well as communications and unpublished works with sensitive info..."
-- NYT spox Eileen Murphy responds: "We are constantly monitoring our systems with the latest available intelligence and tools. We have seen no evidence that any of our internal systems, including our systems in the Moscow bureau, have been breached or compromised..."
-- Here's how to read between the lines of that statement: "CNN's report didn't say that the Times internal systems were breached, but that reporters were targeted..." | | | Snarkiest tweet of the day | | | The title goes to Jack Shafer, who asks: "Remember Gawker?" | | | O'Reilly praises Hulk Hogan's "heroism" | | Tonight "Bill O'Reilly took a parting shot at the recently deceased Gawker.com, calling the site 'garbage,'" Mediaite's Sam Reisman reports.
"Garbage finds its way out into the legitimate media," O'Reilly said. "With the destruction of Gawker thanks to the heroism of Hulk Hogan, one's down, but 15 take their place..." | | -- I should have included this in last night's letter: Newsweek collected accounts from 53 women and 2 men of "sexual harassment and sexual assault related to their jobs in journalism." (Newsweek)
-- NBCU's purchase of DreamWorks Animation is official. Jeffrey Katzenberg is leaving with $391.6 million through his shares of DreamWorks stock... and Universal is announcing a new leadership team... (LATimes)
-- Via Keach Hagey: "Will Disney buy Vice? Both sides agree it would make sense. A look at media's most unlikely marriage..." (WSJ)
-- "Another controversial Facebook takedown, another muddy explanation for an erroneous removal." This time it involves two libertarian groups, Alex Kantrowitz reports... (BuzzFeed)
-- Confirmed: the "Today" show will not be naming a new news anchor... (TVNewser) | | | Andrea Tantaros sues Ailes and Fox | | Andrea Tantaros filed suit against Fox News last night. The ex-host says Ailes and other men at Fox harassed her, and when she tried to speak up about it, Ailes' senior lieutenants "engaged in a concerted effort to silence Tantaros by threats, humiliation, and retaliation."
The lawsuit names, along with Ailes, P.R. chief Irena Briganti; H.R. head Dianne Brandi; programming executives Bill Shine and Suzanne Scott; and the network as a whole. It also alleges that several male hosts and commentators at Fox News acted inappropriately around Tantaros, but does not name them as defendants.
There is, to be blunt, a tremendous amount of skepticism inside Fox News about these charges. Click here for Dylan's full story about the suit... And read it for yourself here... | | | Adding to the intrigue... | | | The lawyer who is representing Tantaros in this case, Judd Burstein, previously represented former Fox News P.R. boss Brian Lewis, who was fired in 2013. Lewis walked away with a handsome settlement... | | | Spotlight on the Fox News P.R. machine | | The lawsuit depicts Fox's P.R. department as a dirty tricks operation, one that will stop at almost nothing to attack enemies, including Fox employees. As I wrote in this story earlier today, the suit appears to support some long-held suspicions about the department's tactics.
The suit claims that Ailes had Briganti undermine Tantaros at every turn, by "repeatedly denying all requests by prominent and credible news outlets to interview Tantaros" and by "repeatedly crafting and placing insulting stories about Tantaros" onto blogs. I don't know if it happened to Tantaros, but I know that Fox's P.R. people, particularly in the Lewis era, used the press to "punish" Fox hosts and commentators for perceived slights and screw-ups... | | There are also some glaring inaccuracies in the suit. Page 12 says "it is common knowledge within the industry that TVNewser was created and controlled by Ailes." Ummm. TVNewser was actually created by me in 2004. I had never even met Ailes.
Other editors took over in 2007. The site has never been "controlled by Ailes." Tonight Burstein apologized to me for the "creation" reference. "My understanding, though, is that you left in 2007, and I stand by my allegations concerning TVNewser during the period since Andrea joined Fox. We intend to subpoena Chris Ariens's emails to prove the truth of our claim."
Ariens, now the top editor of the site, wrote in a blog post earlier today, "Fox News has never controlled this site..." | | | Fox P.R. denies use of "sock puppets" | | The Tantaros suit alleges that Briganti directed "sock puppet" social media accounts to post negative comments about Tantaros. The suit describes "sock puppets" as "accounts operated by Fox News's media relations department designed to make it appear that they were maintained by persons unrelated to Fox News." Tonight, through a Fox News spokesperson, Briganti denied all use of "sock puppet" accounts.
(A question I have: Gabriel Sherman has written about Ailes' "black op" consultants -- could they have been behind the fake social media accounts?) | | | The Ailes sexual harassment scandal is not over. Not by a long shot. The stories keep coming and coming... | | | There are "facts" and then there are "FACTS" | | | This morning Trump tweeted: "It is being reported by virtually everyone, and is a fact, that the media pile on against me is the worst in American political history!" | | | Clinton targeting Breitbart and Bannon with speech about "alt-right" | | Last night on Jimmy Kimmel's show, Hillary Clinton slammed "wacky" right-wing ideas about her health and alluded to an "alternative universe." Later this week, she will press the case further. On Thursday Clinton will "deliver a speech to address Donald Trump and his advisors' embrace of the disturbing 'alt-right' political philosophy," according to a press release from the campaign.
In other words, Clinton is aiming straight at Breitbart boss turned Trump campaign CEO Steve Bannon. WashPost's Philip Bump has a preview here... | | | I was on "New Day" with John Podhoretz this morning talking about how Trump is "mainstreaming" conspiratorial talk by politicians. I'll be back Wednesday A.M. around 8:40am ET... | | | Viacom P.R. chief leaving... | | No surprise here, but it's a sign of the Viacom shakeups still to come: The company's top spokesman, Carl Folta, is leaving. Tom Dooley confirmed the departure in a memo today. Emily Steel notes that Folta's job entailed being a "big Philippe Dauman defender..." | | | ...BuzzFeed adding P.R. chief | | Meanwhile, one of Folta's former deputies, Carole Robinson, has a new job: chief communications officer for BuzzFeed. She'll start on 9/6 and be based in NYC. "As the first person to serve as BuzzFeed's communications chief, Robinson will report directly to its CEO Jonah Peretti and oversee all global communications strategy, public relations, media relationships and internal communications," THR reports. "Her team includes Liz Wasden, who joined BuzzFeed from Facebook in early 2015 to oversee PR..." | | | Frank Pallotta reports: Much has been made of the disappointing ratings garnered by NBC's coverage of the Rio Olympics, and with good reason. But there's one very important group that, surprisingly, doesn't seem to be complaining: advertisers. "I know from my clients that they were very happy to be advertising within the games and to have a vehicle that brought in big numbers in a fragmented market place," said Andy Donchin, chief investment officer at Amplifi. Here's WHY... | | | Subtitled TV demands undivided attention | | Brian Lowry emails:
Watching "Gomorrah," an excellent new Italian-language crime drama premiering this week on Sundance TV, I noticed something interesting: Because the show is subtitled, I couldn't do many of the things I normally accomplish while previewing a new series (especially if there are multiple episodes to wade through), like checking Twitter and answering emails. The same situation applies to "Narcos," the Netflix drama that returns Sept. 2, which is also heavily subtitled. It got me thinking about the two-screen way we're now accustomed to watching TV -- and the fact that more than 90% of us, per a Deloitte study, multitask while we watch.
Hopefully, this column is worthy of your undivided attention... [[Editor's note: It is!]] | | -- Worst news of the day? "Facebook has been testing autoplay video ads that load with the sound turned on, instead of off as usual..." (AdAge)
-- Chloe Melas interviews Robert DeNiro, who says "I'm just happy" to still be in the game...
-- Lisa France emails: We dare you to not dance to this. Singer Montell Jordan surprised late night host James Corden with a performance of "This Is How We Do It" for his birthday...
-- More from Lisa: Britney Spears is literally giving the clothes off her back for Baton Rogue relief. The Louisiana native is auctioning off her MTV Video Music Awards outfit... | | Catch up on Sunday's show | | | What do you like about today's newsletter -- and what do you think we should improve? Email your feedback to reliablesources@cnn.com. We'll be back tomorrow... | | | Get Reliable Sources, a comprehensive summary of the most important media news, delivered to your inbox every afternoon. | | | | | |
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