| | | | | Happy Halloween! Here's what scares me... | | Fake news sites and hyperpartisan Facebook pages are proliferating like weeds. And users can't keep up. Unreliable sources about this election have become too numerous to count. So it's time for a new rule on the web: Double, no, TRIPLE check before you share. Especially if it seems too good to be true.
On "Reliable Sources" and in this CNNMoney essay, I sought to connect the dots between BuzzFeed's recent study of misleading sites; some flagrant examples of fake news; and the efforts of news literacy organizations to help people figure out what's fact and what's fiction. These hoax sites actively hurt web users who think their views are being reinforced -- who hate the "opposition more and more -- but aren't hearing the truth. Watch/read here... | | | Trump's false claim about Google "burying" FBI news | | For an example, look no further than Donald Trump's Twitter account. Half an hour before we went on the air Sunday morning, Trump claimed that "Twitter, Google and Facebook are burying the FBI criminal investigation of Clinton." Not only was there no proof of this, but it was pretty easy to disprove. The FBI email inquiry was at the top of Google News; FBI director James Comey's name was at the top of Facebook's "trending" box; and Twitter's "moments" section had a prominent story about the controversy.
Nevertheless, Trump's wrong-headed "burying" claim was his most popular tweet of the day. About 25,000 accounts retweeted it and almost 50,000 "liked" it, helping the falsehood spread far and wide. Ironically, he was using Twitter to blast Twitter...
-- What was his source?! Well, Trump may have gotten the idea from an inaccurate Zero Hedge blog post alleging a "social media blackout." I asked the Trump campaign to provide a source for the wild claim, but no one responded... | | | "Journalists should call out these fake stories" | | | These sites aren't going away, so it's up to Internet users to spot fake news and avoid spreading it. Fact-checking sites like Snopes can help. Josh Stearns, a longtime media activist who now works at Democracy Fund, believes that traditional newsrooms also have a role to play. "Fact checking has taken center stage in this election, but newsrooms need to go beyond fact checking politicians statements and help debunk viral misinformation too," he told me. "At a time when trust in media is at an all time low, journalists should call out these fake news stories and help citizens tell fact from fiction." | | | Speaking of fact-checking... | | | On Sunday's show I interviewed Daniel Dale, a DC correspondent for The Toronto Star, who tries to make a list of every Trump falsehood every day. He says the count itself is part of the story. Here's why: "The story is that we have a candidate who lies strategically and pointlessly, who lies about things big and small, but who, most of all, lies frequently. The way fact-checking has traditionally been done is, you know, that the fact-checker will take one or two or maybe three false statements in a day and meticulously fact-check them and post an article. But that doesn't work when we have a candidate who is frequently saying more than 20 false things in a day, up to 37 on some days. So, what I have been trying to do is fill that sort of frequency void and make clear to people that this is not a normal political liar who can be shoehorned into normal patterns of political coverage." Watch our conversation here... | | "Law enforcement sources." "Federal officials." "People familiar with the matter."
The FBI is reviewing newly discovered emails that might be related to Hillary Clinton's private email server... And all the details beyond James Comey's vague Friday letter are being filled in by anonymous sources... Pro-Clinton CNN commentator Hilary Rosen says the sources are trying to "walk back the hysteria that Comey created with his vagueness."
In this blockbuster WSJ story about tensions within the FBI, "people familiar with the matter" are cited a dozen times...
-- While liberals howl about hyperbolic coverage of the controversy, CNN commentator Matt Lewis offered this counterpoint on Sunday's "Reliable:" "I think the coverage has been nuanced… Comey was in a very difficult position, a danged if you do/danged if you don't situation. I think there's been good coverage of that..." | | | "Little consensus on what, in fact, the news actually is" | | | Variety's Sonia Saraiya sums it up really well: "Emails are once again the subject of commentator frenzy. And yet there is little consensus on what, in fact, the news actually is..." | | | Media week ahead calendar | | -- Monday: Peter Thiel speaking at the National Press Club...
-- Wednesday morning: Time Warner earnings...
-- Wednesday afternoon: Facebook and Fox earnings...
-- Thursday night: FT celebrating the tenth anniversary of "Alphaville" in NYC...
-- Sunday morning: "Reliable Sources" live from DC... | | | 3 ways to catch up on "Reliable Sources" | | -- MRC's Rich Noyes: Clinton has been "out of the line of fire of the news media up until I guess this past weekend." Trump was the central focus of nightly news coverage in Aug/Sept/Oct, "and it was very, very negative…"
-- WashPost's Jennifer Rubin: "Trump has refused to reveal a lot of info that most candidates" share. "So there's more to find out on his side…"
-- Clinton supporter Peter Daou: "All we're asking for is proportionality and fairness in the coverage…" | | | Margaret Sullivan checks in with Nate Silver | | In Monday's WashPost, Margaret Sullivan writes about how Nate Silver "blew it when he missed Trump," and says "Silver is pushing hard to keep expectations reasonable" this fall.
"We've learned that we have to be careful about how we convey uncertainty," Silver tells Sullivan... | | | Media-themed Halloween costumes! | | | Did you spot a great media/tech-themed costume this weekend? Are you working on one for Monday night? Email the description and/or photo to reliablesources@cnn.com | | -- MLB stat via Bob Nightengale: "There are 2,100 credentialed media alone at Wrigley Field, and more than 3,000 for the World Series, highest total since 2004 World Series..." (Twitter)
-- Variety's James Rainey just posted this: "Top Sony Executives Disillusioned With Film Chairman Tom Rothman" (Variety)
-- Alamo Drafthouse opened in Brooklyn over the weekend (!!!) so "CBS This Morning" took this look at the growing brand... (CBS)
-- "SOTU" EP Katie Hinman says what I was thinking: "I have no idea how Anderson Cooper finds time to shoot his '60 Minutes' pieces but this season's have been really excellent." Cooper's piece this Sunday was about "the music of Zomba prison..." (CBS)
-- Distressing: "The Bronx is home to 1.5 million people and a single general-interest bookstore, which will close this year..." (The New Yorker) | | -- In Monday's NYT, Jim Rutenberg talks with Jeff Bewkes and Al Franken. Column title: "Seeking Ownership of Both the Information and the Superhighway"
-- Richard Plepler to John Koblin at The Lambs Club: Randall Stephenson "made very clear to everybody that what they are buying they look at with enormous respect and admiration, and the last thing they have any interest in doing is messing with a winning game..."
-- Michael Wolff's skepticism: "Part of the business theory" that the deal rests on "is that bigness and vastness are in themselves a business solution..." | | | Some publishers are turning away from Taboola and Outbrain's "around the web" ads, Sapna Maheshwari and John Herrman write in Monday's NYT... | | | This magazine cover will NOT be on Trump's wall... | | | NYMag's election issue, out Monday, features this cover by Barbara Kruger. EIC Adam Moss says the editors "were drawn to it, in part, for the three ways in which it could be interpreted: as Trump speaking (single word epithets being his specialty); as a description of Trump; and as a call on the election result. On this latter point, who knows – and we confess to being a little rattled when the Comey letter news broke just as we were shipping it. But in the end we felt that the power of Kruger's image transcended any one meaning you could read into it." There's also a fourth meaning, Moss says -- that all of us as Americans "are losers too" thanks to this election... | | David Fahrenthold's Sunday A1 story: "Trump boasts about his philanthropy. But his giving falls short of his words."
Fahrenthold sent Trump 70+ questions. He says Trump and co. did not respond. But Kellyanne Conway told NBC's Willie Geist on Sunday that Fahrenthold and the WashPost "are way against Mr. Trump, we know that." She also claimed that Trump has been "incredibly generous with his time and his money over the years." To that, Fahrenthold responded via Twitter: "I'd still love to hear answers to these questions..."
-- Paul Farhi tweets: "Advisory: Start engraving the trophies now for all the awards Fahrenthold will deserve. This story: Eye-popping..." | | | Four scenes from Trump rallies | | -- CNN's Ashley Killough Sunday afternoon: "Woman near press pen yells 'CNN sucks,' then looks right at me, makes eye contact. 'You suck,' she said."
-- Politico's Ben Schreckinger at the same event: "Man yells as Trump calls for cameras to pan the crowd in Vegas: 'Put the camera on us faggot! Put the camera on us queer!'"
-- WSJ's Byron Tau Sunday evening: "I can't speak for everyone, but there's something oddly enjoyable about a hanger full of several thousands people angrily jeering at you..."
-- CNN's Jim Acosta afterward: "Leaving Trump rally in NM, still trying to figure out why a man just yelled at me to "put some clothes on." I am fully dressed..." | | | Weak U.S. opening for "Inferno" | | | Brian Lowry emails: The sequel slump didn't end with the summer, apparently. "Inferno," the third film featuring Tom Hanks as his "The Da Vinci Code" character, flamed out in its opening weekend, and will rely on international box office -- where it's doing significantly better -- to eke out a profit... | | | "Crossover" season of "American Horror Story" | | | Sandra Gonzalez writes: If you think "American Horror Story" has done it all, think again. Creator Ryan Murphy has announced he plans to combine two of the FX anthology series' previous themes for an upcoming "crossover" season. "It's not going to be next season, but we're going to do a season that's a crossover between 'Murder House' and 'Coven,' which is very bizarre," Murphy told the crowd at Entertainment Weekly's PopFest Sunday. The season will feature characters from both installments, he said. Murphy said he's started approaching actors to see if they're available... | | | ICYMI: How Fox's audience is different | | I published this late on Friday: A new Suffolk U poll shows that Fox loyalists, when compared to the public at large, are far more pessimistic about America's future; are far more critical of President Obama's performance; are far more fearful of Clinton; and are more forgiving of Trump. The sharp differences in opinion extend to beliefs about political corruption, voter fraud and media coordination with campaigns.
Fox fans, when compared to fans of other networks, are far more likely to express concern about November's election results being manipulated. They are also more likely to agree with the sentiment that divisions in the United States are deeper than in the past.
Why this matters: I think it demonstrates why 21st Century Fox patriarch Rupert Murdoch recently told the WSJ that it would be "business suicide" to change Fox's editorial direction. Fox was a "voice of opposition" during the Obama administration, and that's what it will be if Clinton is elected too. Just look at where its audience stands: 84% of Fox devotees view Clinton unfavorably, versus just 13% favorably. Zoom out to the country at large, and there's a 46% vs 47% favorable/unfavorable split. Read all about it here... | | | "After years of leading the conversation about comedy on television, Comedy Central is experiencing what looks like a sustained slump, while many other television outlets have had hit streaks," Bill Carter writes in his latest for CNNMoney. The most obvious area is late night: the channel's offerings "have fallen markedly in both ratings and, perhaps more troublingly, influence." Check out Bill's full story about the slump. No word on a permanent Larry Wilmore replacement yet... | | | What do you like about this newsletter? What do you dislike? Send your feedback to reliablesources@cnn.com. We appreciate every email... And we'll be back tomorrow night... | | | Get Reliable Sources, a comprehensive summary of the most important media news, delivered to your inbox every afternoon. | | | | | |
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