- The Case of the Missing 60 Minutes Segment
- The Reverse Centaur’s Guide to Criticizing AI
- Monopolization and Movies
- Australia’s Social Media Ban
- Women Under Attack — Again
- Digital Sewer Socialism
- Palestine Movement Outsmarts Algorithms
- Cartoonists vs Mamdani
- Will Podcasts Replace Daytime Talk?
- Media, Marxism and McChesney
The Case of the Missing 60 Minutes Segment
By Edward Helmore, The Guardian
“60 Minutes” abruptly pulled a segment Sunday on the Trump administration deporting hundreds of Venezuelan migrants to a megaprison in El Salvador, around two hours before it was to set to air. For days, CBS had been promoting the segment, “Inside CECOT,” on “brutal and torturous conditions” inside El Salvador’s Terrorism Confinement Center.
The Reverse Centaur’s Guide to Criticizing AI
By Cory Doctorow, Medium
Creating a viable metaverse is the secondary goal. The primary goal is to keep the market convinced that your company will continue to grow, and to remain convinced until the next bubble comes along. So this is why they’re hyping AI: the material basis for the hundreds of billions in AI investment.
Monopolization and Movies
By Joseph M. Singer, Deadline
Any acquisition of Warner Brothers Discovery by Netflix or Paramount would harm competition, consumers, workers, regional economies, America’s trade balance, and U.S. cultural influence abroad. This is a threat to a competitive marketplace — and a democratic cultural ecosystem — so severe it would echo across the economy for decades.
Australia’s Social Media Ban
By Kevin Rennie, Global Voices
After months of anticipation and debate, Australia’s social media ban is now in force. Young Australians under 16 are unable to have an account on some social media platforms, including Instagram, TikTok and Facebook. Many countries are already considering following Australia’s lead.
Women Under Attack — Again
By John Knefel, Media Matters
The campaign to roll back decades of material gains for women is coming from both the gutter sexists and the would-be high-brow elements of the conservative media world, and it could serve as a rallying point for an increasingly fractured MAGA movement.
Digital Sewer Socialism
By Ben Tarnoff, Jacobin
With the rise of AI slop and overall “enshittification,” it is increasingly the case that the internet is failing to address the public’s needs. What we need is sewer socialism for the digital realm — and it can start at the municipal level.
Palestine Movement Outsmarts Algorithms
By Farah Awadalla, Waging Nonviolence
In response to systematic censorship by Meta and other platforms, Palestinians and their allies have built an innovative new playbook of tactics to beat the algorithm.
Cartoonists vs Mamdani
By Hank Kennedy, FAIR
Right-wing cartoonists waged a relentless campaign to tar Zohran Mamdani as a dangerous extremist and religious radical, but were unable to hoodwink the electorate. Nevertheless, their images served to normalize both Islamophobia and red-baiting–a negative achievement that will make actually governing a diverse city that much more difficult.
Will Podcasts Replace Daytime Talk?
By Amanda Silberling, Techcrunch
Netflix signed deals with iHeartMedia and Barstool Sports this week, in addition to a recent deal with Spotify, to gain exclusive video rights to select shows. Podcasters see this as an offensive move with YouTube as the primary target. This threatens to shift our culture away from watching programmatic daytime TV and talk shows and toward watching podcasts.
Media, Marxism and McChesney
By Matthew Rothschild, Monthly Review
It is not hard to see the throughlines of Robert McChesney’s scholarship and his activism. He understood that runaway capitalism was a disaster and totally incompatible with democracy. He grasped the crucial role that the corporate media play in maintaining the system. As a result, he and John Nichols helped organize a media reform movement.
