| | | | Obama and Trump bemoan "fake news" | | | Both President Obama and President-elect Trump used the phrase "fake news" on Wednesday... But in very different ways. Obama said that the "notion of election fraud -- voting fraud -- this is something that has constantly been disproved. This is fake news." | | | Trump criticized a "Today" show report that cast doubt on his job-creating record by labeling it "fake news." His tweet came a few minutes after Ari Melber's report, which marked the start of a new "Today" show franchise called "Today's Fact Check." Melber called Trump's impact "very small or non-existent." Numerous other news outlets have reached similar conclusions... | | Trump says the "Today" show is doing "badly;" it isn't | | Clearly ticked off by Melber's report, Trump tweeted, "No wonder the Today Show on biased @NBC is doing so badly compared to its glorious past. Little credibility!"
"Today" is actually America's highest-rated morning show among 25- to 54-year-olds, and it is just 100,000 viewers behind ABC's "GMA" among all viewers. The show is doing really well and raking in cash for NBCUniversal... Here's my full story... | | This Atlanta TV station has some questions to answer | | Media editor Alex Koppelman emails: Tuesday night, CBS46, the CBS affiliate in Atlanta, aired a "Reality Check" segment by one of its anchors, Ben Swann, that treated the untrue and pernicious "Pizzagate" conspiracy theory as if it had real substance. Swann used a pretense of TV professionalism, talking about things "too disturbing" to air, to add extra innuendo to his segment. And the CBS affiliate in the ninth-largest metropolitan area in the country aired it.
Why would they do that? And do they stand behind their decision? CBS46' GM and news director didn't respond to messages and emails, though the news director did tell the AJC that he'd discussed the story with Swann and said, "I know he was meticulous with his search for facts." The station is owned by Meredith; its chief comms officer, Art Slusark, told me by email, "We are looking into this and don't have a comment at this time..." | | | How Infowars was tricked by a 27-year-old in Scotland | | "I made it all up." According to BuzzFeed's Jamie Ross, a 27-year-old man based in Scotland "tricked the right-wing conspiracy site Infowars into publishing a completely fake report about president-elect Donald Trump."
This guy pretended to be an "NBC source." He "sent a direct message on Twitter to Infowars' editor-at-large Paul Joseph Watson claiming BuzzFeed News and CNN were due to release harmful footage of Trump." Watson ran with it. The B.S. story is still up on the Infowars home page. This is obviously humiliating for Watson... But when BuzzFeed asked him to comment, he just responded by saying "BuzzFeed is cancer. BuzzFeed is fake news..." | | NYT's Scott Shane has a must-read profile of an Annapolis man who built up a web site full of fake anti-Clinton stories. Cam Harris "said he would have been willing to promote Mrs. Clinton and smear Mr. Trump had those tactics been lucrative. But as other seekers of clicks discovered, Mr. Trump's supporters were far more fervent than Mrs. Clinton's."
In a follow-up post on Wednesday night, Harris apologized and claimed to have learned a lesson about how walled-off we all are... | | | -- Related: Smart NYT feature by Sapna Maheshwari: "Ten Times Trump Spread Fake News" (NYT) | | | Job listing! Help us cover the truth | | A note from Alex Koppelman: We're adding to the Media at CNNMoney, looking for a senior writer to join the beat. This person is going to be covering "fake news" and the people and stories behind it, but more importantly thinking bigger than that and looking at truth -- what happened to it, why so many of us no longer believe it, and where those people are going to get their information instead.
This writer should live on the Internet, and be intimately aware of its darkest corners. They should get angry every time they see any inaccuracy in any story, whether large or small, and whether published by a fake news site or a real one. They should be the kind of person who can't pass by a single rabbit hole without being desperate to jump in to see where it leads. Interested? Check out the full description and apply here... | | President's parting words to the press: "Good luck" | | NBC's Richard Engel tweets: "What a contrast: in final presser, Obama thanks press for defending democracy. in last presser trump attacked press as makers of fake news."
"Having you in this building has made this place work better," Obama told reporters at the outset of Wednesday's press conference. His final words were: "Thank you very much, press corps. Good luck." | | | Per TVNewser: "POTUS called on 8 reporters. 5 women, 3 men. 4 TV. 3 print. 1 Radio. 2 non-English lang. 1 LGBT pub." | | | Spicer's first briefing will be in the briefing room | | Dylan Byers emails: Obama's remarks came as Trump's transition team mulls the possibility of moving the briefing to a different building. On Wednesday, Trump told Fox News he would not move the briefing initially, but suggested that space issues would force his administration to pick which journalists are allowed in.
Tom Kludt asked Sean Spicer to elaborate on what Trump meant by that, and Spicer did not respond. But Spicer confirmed on a morning conference call that his Monday briefing will be in the usual place. "It's going to be tight," he said. But that's okay...
-- Tune in alert: W.H. Correspondents Association president Jeff Mason will join me in D.C. on Sunday's "Reliable Sources..." | | -- Ryan Murphy has optioned Jeffrey Toobin's book "A Vast Conspiracy," about the Monica Lewinsky saga, for a future season of FX's "American Crime Story..." (THR)
-- Erik Wemple's latest deep dive: "In retraction request to CNN, Trump team confirms CNN story." He says Manu Raju's work "profiles as a model of careful and measured journalism..." (WashPost)
-- One of Obama's final interviews as president is with his former staffers who now host the "Pod Save America" podcast... The chat was taped on Wednesday... (Twitter)
-- Two new staffers at the Priorities USA super PAC: Brian Fallon and (CNN contributor) Symone Sanders… (Politico) | | In a must-read Q&A with Gabriel Sherman, CNN prez Jeff Zucker says it's "unfortunate that the most powerful person in the world is trying to delegitimize journalism and an organization that plays such a vital role in our democracy. I think he's entitled to his opinion, but it's — to use one of his favorite words — sad..."
More from Zucker: "We think that CNN has a job to do, which is to hold their feet to the fire... One of the things I think this administration hasn't figured out yet is that there's only one television network that is seen in Beijing, Moscow, Seoul, Tokyo, Pyongyang, Baghdad, Tehran, and Damascus — and that's CNN. The perception of Donald Trump in capitals around the world is shaped, in many ways, by CNN. Continuing to have an adversarial relationship with that network is a mistake..." | | | ...and the Murdoch-Trump relationship | | | Zucker said Sherman was "trying to goad me" by asking about Trump's multiple interviews with Murdoch-owned news outlets like Fox and the WSJ. "But you've made the right observation," Zucker said, adding, "I don't think it's any coincidence those are the outlets that ended up with the interviews..." | | | Big new Pew study about news sources | | The media divide on stark display: "According to a new Pew Research Center survey, Americans who say they voted for Trump in the general election relied heavily on Fox News as their main source of election news leading up to the 2016 election, whereas Clinton voters named an array of different sources, with no one source named by more than one-in-five of her supporters."
Overall, Fox was named the "main source" by 19% of voters; CNN by 13%; Facebook by 8%; local TV by 7%; etc. But it's really remarkable how dominant Fox was among Trump voters, and how Clinton voters listed a larger # of outlets... Here's the fascinating study... | | "Not being slave to clickbait is a challenge to the whole industry." --AP exec editor Sally Buzbee at Wednesday's Civic Hall/Knight Foundation symposium. I spent much of the day there... Here's a recap via BI's Maxwell Tani... | | | CNN's Ryan Nobles emails: WDBJ anchor Chris Hurst, whose girlfriend Alison Parker was shot and killed during a morning live shot in August 2015, "announced Wednesday night he is leaving TV news... Didn't say where he is going, but said he was staying in the Roanoke area..." Details here in the Roanoke Times... | | -- What's Bob Bakish up to at Viacom? On Wednesday at NATPE he gave his first major public remarks since he was named permanent CEO in December..." He talked about wanting "more collaboration across the company's divisions..." (Variety)
-- Digiday's Sahil Patel talks with Scott Van Pelt and ESPN's top "SportsCenter" exec Rob King about the reimagining of the brand… (Digiday)
-- Julia Carpenter tweets: "The Lily was the first newspaper for and run by women, est in 1849! Now, a new Washington Post product for women." It's "an experimental, visually-driven product designed for millennial women," repackaging content from across The Post, that will appear on Medium, Facebook and Instagram... (WashPost) | | | Esquire Network shutting down | | Brian Lowry emails: The thinning-the-herd phenomenon in cable that execs like FX's John Landgraf have been warning about just claimed another victim. On Wednesday Variety broke the news that NBCUniversal's Esquire network is shutting down. It was always a flawed concept, but the decision should send more shivers through channels with equally shaky foundations.
Read Lowry's full analysis here... | | | Another surge for Netflix | | | CNNMoney's Seth Fiegerman reports: "Netflix is quickly closing in on the 100 million mark for total subscribers." The company "added 7 million members globally in the final quarter of 2016, handily beating its earlier forecast for 5.2 million new subscribers." The stock jumped 8% after hours, hitting a new high... | | | Invest in original programming, gain subscribers, invest, etc. "We're just going to lather, rinse, repeat again and again for the next couple years," Netflix CEO Reed Hastings said on Wednesday's earnings call. "We have a long way to go..." | | | WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM ANNUAL MEETING | | CNN's Richard Quest interviewed AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson at Davos on Wednesday. One key Q: Is AT&T prepared for the attention, good and bad, that would come from owning CNN, if the deal to acquire Time Warner goes through?
Yes, Stephenson said, "I understand there is going to be a lot of attention, there's going to be a spotlight..."
What about spinning of CNN to appease the Trump administration? "I don't see what that accomplishes," he said. "To what end, right?" Read more from CNNMoney's Charles Riley here... | | | No press permitted inside the Trump International Hotel | | Tom Kludt reports: "The Trump International Hotel in D.C. is refusing to provide additional information about a report saying that members of the media have been barred from the premises this week. Politico's Daniel Lippman wrote Wednesday morning that he was stopped at the hotel door when he arrived earlier that morning for a breakfast meeting. After identifying himself as a journalist, Lippman said he was informed that the press was not permitted inside..."
-- More: Trump visited the hotel Wednesday night, and the press pool was kept outside...
-- But: To be fair, it's a very busy inauguration week. When Kludt called the hotel P.R. rep, she said it's about protecting "the privacy of our guests," and then hung up on him...
-- Plan B: Lippman told me he met his friends for breakfast at the Willard InterContinental instead. "At least I got in a good walk from Trump to the Willard... but definitely an unusual morning..." | | | Who will Trump's official White House photographer be? | | | I'm glad Time highlighted this: "With just hours left until his Inauguration, Donald Trump has yet to name an official White House photographer," Time's Olivier Laurent notes. No replacement for Pete Souza yet... So it seems like there won't be a photog there on Day One... | | | DC assignments at NBC and CNN... | | | CNN published a full list of its Washington correspondent assignments on Wednesday morning... Check out the list here... In the afternoon, NBC sent out this memo with its new DC correspondents info... Notably, White House-bound Hallie Jackson will continue to anchor at 10am and Katy Tur will anchor through "the first 100 days" at 2pm... | | Kawasaki spokesman says the company is cutting ties with the "Apprentice..." | | ...Then Kawasaki cuts ties with the spokesman | | | On Wednesday a Kawasaki spokesman responded to an anti-Trump boycott campaign by saying the company would not sponsor another episode of NBC's "New Celebrity Apprentice" unless the reality show cuts ties with Trump. But later in the day, the company said that statement was a "misrepresentation" and "the employee is no longer with the company." Huh. So maybe Kawasaki ads will continue to air during the show? That part is still unclear. CNNMoney's Danielle Wiener-Bronner has a full story here... | | | For the record, part three | | | -- "You could argue that, with nothing more than a few impetuous thumb-taps on his Android, Trump probably made Vanity Fair at least a million dollars richer." Joe Pompeo explains how... (Politico)
-- Elle profiles Martha Raddatz... She says that fake story about "crying" on election night "drove me crazy..." (Elle)
-- Gretchen Carlson will guest co-host "The View" on Friday, January 27... Omarosa will be a guest on the show...
-- Rebecca Nelson, formerly of GQ, is joining Cosmopolitan.com… she will cover news and politics… Per Cosmo, "She started her journalism career in 7th grade, as a teen stringer for CosmoGirl magazine..." | | | Remember when C-SPAN's live stream was briefly interrupted by Russia Today last week? The incident sparked hacking fears, but on Wednesday C-SPAN said it had concluded its investigation, "and as we had anticipated was caused by an internal routing error. C-SPAN.org was not hacked..." | | | NBC ordering two more seasons of "This Is Us!" | | | IMHO this is the best news of the day.
Sandra Gonzalez emails: "This is Us" has scored a surprise TWO season renewal from NBC. The renewal itself is no surprise, but NBC's large commitment speaks to its confidence in the show. On the broadcast side, the bar for two-season renewals is insanely high and usually reserved for biggest hits -- think "NCIS," "Big Bang Theory," and "The Voice." Still a very young series, "This is Us" is quickly joining the ranks of some TV giants... | | | More from Sandra: In unrelated but equally exciting news: "Will & Grace" is coming back to NBC. The 10-episode limited series is set to premiere in the 2017-18 TV season. The series was a groundbreaking show and an envelope-pusher in its day, and it will be interesting to see what that line looks like more than a decade after it went off the air... | | | "Embeds" premieres on Go90 | | | Brian Lowry emails: Airing on a relatively obscure service, "Embeds" likely wouldn't get much attention except for its auspices, since its producers include Megyn Kelly, the Fox News star leaping to NBC. But it's actually a rather charming show built around young reporters tracking a presidential candidate. NYT reporter Sopan Deb — who did exactly that for CBS — has a piece in Wednesday's paper addressing the program's veracity, which he labels mixed. (His misgivings include the opening scene, in which a reporter wakes up in Iowa next to two women he barely recognizes.) But the show largely works as what amounts to a workplace comedy, focusing on the mostly 20-something reporters on the bus, thrown in with a few grizzled veterans who tend to be either grouchy and condescending or lascivious. The series is airing now on Go90, Verizon's mobile streaming service... | | | "Star Trek: Discovery" delayed? | | | "Star Trek: Discovery," in the works for the CBS All Access streaming service, "will likely miss its previously announced May premiere target," Variety's Oriana Schwindt reports. "The series has also cast James Frain as Spock's father." CBS says "This is an ambitious project; we will be flexible on a launch date if it's best for the show..." | | | For the record, part four | | | -- Chloe Melas emails: I'm heading to D.C. to cover the Make America Great! Concert and I'll be interviewing Jackie Evancho, The Piano Guys, Tim Rushlow and more...
-- More from Chloe: Chelsea Clinton gave her first post-election interview, and her choice of outlet was Refinery29. In it, she discusses the future of the Democratic Party and why people should not lose hope...
-- From Lisa France: "Dreamgirls" star Jennifer Holliday said she was shocked by the backlash over her potentially performing at the Trump inauguration -- including death threats...
-- Here is HBO's funny trailer for season four of "Last Week Tonight with John Oliver…" The show is back on February 12... | | "You know their work, now hear their stories." CNN's entertainment team has produced this 👌 series of "CREATORS" videos with artists like Ava DuVernay, Natalie Portman, Dev Patel, and Jon Favreau... Check it out! | | | What do you like about this newsletter? What do you dislike? Send your feedback to reliablesources@cnn.com. See you tomorrow! | |  | | We'd love to share our other newsletters with you. Check out Five Things for Your New Day, CNN's morning newsletter. Give us five minutes, and we'll brief you on all the news and buzz people will be talking about. | | | Get Reliable Sources, a comprehensive summary of the most important media news, delivered to your inbox every afternoon. | | | | | |
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