Final Lecture Flashcards by Rylee Turner

The Corporation
News Chapter
(video)

2 reporters from Fox News want to report on Monsantos but Fox says no

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OutFoxed “Rupert Murdoph’s War on Journalism”

Left-leaning documentary on Fox News channel/Corporation
They reach billions of ppl (4.7)
There’s political talk, but not much real news
Very right leaning channel

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The case of Fox and Fox News

All news and commentary has a formula
o Breaking down “the Wall” – between corporate and news division
• The news agency is a marketing construct
o Not new – see pre-1950’s journalism in the US
o Fox (News Corp.) ≠ Fox News

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The case of Fox and Fox News:

2 views

• Fox News promoting a conservative agenda
 Political entity
• Fox (News Corp.) out to expand and profit from an integrative global media empire
 Economic entity

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Issues portrayed in Spotlight
1 Issue
2 Dangerous story

Issue: Alienating The Subscriber Base

Dangerous story: when he advises his reporters to “Start ignoring everybody”
- Pulitzer – A newspaper should have no friends
• Cause if you do, you’ll treat them differently than you would others

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Issues portrayed in Spotlight
3 Stand alone
4 Finding the big story
5 Media & Law working together

“A paper has to stand alone”
o Gives you a sense of the pressure going on which journalists operate
Finding the big story: The System
o The institutional corruption – that’s involved behind it

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Spotlight - teacher notes

Comment in the beginning – has the Globe changed since it’s been bought by NYT

Subtle way of asking if autonomy has been affected at all

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Spotlight - teacher notes

Trusting the source?

Trusting the source and gathering evidence to see who they believe

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Spotlight - teacher notes

Lots to figure out legally

legal aspects; lawyer taking on the catholic church and making settlements but it really undermines the process in making it all public

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Spotlight - teacher notes

Takes an outsider

if you’re an insider, it’s a much more difficult position to take on the church

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Spotlight - teacher notes

Next part of movie

we see that it’s the editor that really pushes the story instead of the journalists

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Spotlight - teacher notes

2nd chance

The Globe gets a second chance at breaking the story

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Spotlight - teacher notes

compartmentalize

There’s a way to compartmentalize to keep the story secret

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Spotlight - teacher notes

Holding a story to a particular date

9/11 forces them to hold off on reporting/gathering info
Then xmas pushes it further back
- Cultural content in which everything occurs in the background
o Alienating the subscriber base

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Lessons of Spotlight

Big stories

The biggest stories are systemic

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Lessons of Spotlight

Systemic stories

Systemic stories tend to be met with internal disbelief (within the newsroom)
o Reporters tend to think that they wouldn’t be there if there wasn’t legitimacy behind them. So when you look at systemic stories, it tends to be something bigger

Lessons of Spotlight

Lobbying

Editors are lobbied by the powerful/interested/involved

Lessons of Spotlight

Powerful players

Savvy & powerful players (ppl that are influential) will tap internal dissent
o Individuals associated with the Catholic church
o Creating a wedge in the newsroom
• Role of Marty Baron as an outsider
 He’s a non-Bostonian, Jewish
 Better positioned to represent the story

Lessons of Spotlight

Outsiders

The outsider has an advantage
o He’s not intimidated by all of this – there’s a natural inclination to realize your messing with something that’s really big

Lessons of Spotlight

Producing and constraining news

Journalists produce news (have flexibility in doing so), but current events constrain journalists (ex. 9/11)

Lessons of Spotlight

Challenging the community

Who but the city’s newspaper could challenge a community pillar like the Catholic church in Boston

Lessons of Spotlight

Source credibility

Source credibility is essential

o They finally had the resources to get behind all the accusations

Lessons of Spotlight

Exposure

Chas Kaiser (ex. WSJ/NYT): “The Globe investigation… indirectly led to national/international exposure”

An Inconvenient Truth 2006

Profile of Al Gore

o How global warming is bad and a serious thing

Cool It 2010

Profile: Bjorn Lomburg | How they “debunk” parts of Inconvenient Truth on their numbers and usage of photos etc.

A special case in media and in problem solving: Ecological issues • “Environment” • “Ecology”

“Environment” – surroundings “Ecology” – the branch of biology that deals with relations between living organisms and their environment o Interconnectedness • You can never do just one thing – you can build a dam, dig a pipe etc., but that effects many other things o Systems theory • Ecology leads us to think in terms of systems

A special case in media and in problem solving: Ecological issues

Ecological critiques (critiques of something from an ecological perspective) are attacks on political and economic arrangements - Ecological issues that become acted upon or discussed, become inherently political Ex. If I want all cars to be able to drive 40mph, I’m attacking your right to buy big cars

A special case in media and in problem solving: Ecological issues • Types of problems

Ecological problems often are individual or democratic problems rather than technical problems o EX. we know how to lower greenhouse gas emissions, but people don’t want to A lot of times its not a matter of scientists coming up with solutions, and more so that we struggle with what we wanna do

A special case in media and in problem solving: Ecological issues • Values • Democracy

Many of these issues are about values o They’re subjective rather than objective Democracy is slow to respond to these issues

A special case in media and in problem solving: Ecological issues • Causes and effects

Causes and effects of ecological issues may be far removed from one another o Something in China or Africa can effect us o The farther the more difficult – to solve problems or get people to pay attention to it

A special case in media and in problem solving: Ecological issues • Overall difficulty

This is why it’s so difficult reporting on climate – these problems have a lot of features that make them seem too big/ineffective • It’s hard to categorize some things

Crisis vs. Crunch

``` Crisis o Event – hurricane, fire etc. o EASY for media Crunch o Incremental o Gradual o DIFFICULT for media ```

Thresholds of perception

Perception requires crossing some sort of boundary o Ex. when is it safe to cross a street or putting pressure on paper until it rips Human perception has a sensory, often visual, bias associated with it o Ex. you can’t see CO2 emissions or feel the ocean warmer

Al Jazzera video (self notes)

• About Paris climate accord • Nothing in the media about climate change o Trump said he would pull out of the agreement • More about players involved and less about the actual planet • It’s all about doom and gloom – there’s fear • Barriers to climate change are not technological, they’re political • Standing Rock tribal community stood up to big oil companies when they tried to stop them from digging the pipeline and only got media when the police used force