Live data from Hacker News

NPR quits Twitter after being labeled as 'state-affiliated media'

wbur.org

291–300 of 1001 posts

Re: NPR quits Twitter after being labeled as 'state-affiliated media'

#291

How on earth can anyone say "falsely labeled"? NPR does get money from the federal government, that is an undisputable fact. How are they not "state-affilated"? I don't care how small a % of the budget is money from the government. The fact they take any money at all from the gov makes them sate-affilated.

> The fact they take any money at all from the gov makes them sate-affilated.

All this demonstrates is that you don't know what "state affiliated" actually means.

Re: NPR quits Twitter after being labeled as 'state-affiliated media'

#292
post #266
post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's funny that all the Americans/Russians commenting here seem to believe there are only two public broadcasters in the world: RT, and NPR. And that Twitter was merely being unfair by not labeling NPR as "state affiliated." ;) In fact, as I noted elsewhere in this thread, there are many (dozens?) of other public broadcasters around the world, most of which are not labeled as "state affiliated"--apparently in…

It's sad to see that so far much of the conversation here is going exactly how Twitter would prefer it goes... focused on whether 1% of funding qualifies as "state affiliated". When the real story is that Musk decided to arbitrarily target an organization based on his presumptions about its political beliefs.

> When the real story is that Musk decided to arbitrarily target an organization based on his presumptions about its political beliefs.

I'm assuming that people aren't dwelling on that because everyone already agrees that's the case.

Re: NPR quits Twitter after being labeled as 'state-affiliated media'

#293
Shameless plug here, but we're building a news feed for news at https://www.forth.news.

It's not a social network. It's a way to follow reporters/news organizations/topics, and see what they post. No misinfo, no spam, no hate speech. Just news.

Re: NPR quits Twitter after being labeled as 'state-affiliated media'

#294
post #52
post #22

Is NPR state funded? (real question - I actually don't know). What is the definition of state funded? Here in Canada all the media take government subsidies especially the big ones - a lot of that I think is the economics, they simply don't generate enough revenue on their own to sustain themselves so in the process of being subsidized by the federal govt they take on the viewpoint that can be considered statist. You…

34% of their budget comes from CPB, which is federal funding for local radio stations, and which NPR gets the money through local stations. They downplay this funding source and only mention the 1-4% that they get directly from local/state/federal government sources but clearly NPR would be dead without federal funding. [1] https://gigafact.org/fact-briefs/does-npr-receive-less-1-its...

You are quoting that source incorrectly:

>In its 2019 fiscal year, direct federal grants provided 0.6% of funding for National Public Radio... NPR does derive support indirectly, through payments from member stations that also get direct federal funding.

> NPR relies on the local stations' payments for 34% of its budget. CPB estimates its support provided 8.2% of the average station's budget in 2017, but it's more important to affiliates in smaller, rural markets

Re: NPR quits Twitter after being labeled as 'state-affiliated media'

#295
post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That excerpt isn't about their funding. The CPB funds (in part) public radio stations . Many of those public radio stations purchase NPR-produced content . (And from other similar providers like American Public Media (Marketplace), PRX (This American Life), etc.) NPR's customers can't afford NPR's offerings without said Federal funding, which is why NPR's particularly interested in it.

An agency that is federally funded through 1 layer of intermediaries is still, in the most practical sense, federally funded.

As the article indicates, those stations receive an average of 8% from CPB, and 5% from Federal/state/local government. The other 87% comes from elsewhere - 43% of it as individual donations.

If they're "government funded" as a result, slap the label on Walmart and McDonalds. They can't operate without Federal funding, either. https://www.cnbc.com/2020/11/19/walmart-and-mcdonalds-among-...

Re: NPR quits Twitter after being labeled as 'state-affiliated media'

#296
post #269

How on earth can anyone say "falsely labeled"? NPR does get money from the federal government, that is an undisputable fact. How are they not "state-affilated"? I don't care how small a % of the budget is money from the government. The fact they take any money at all from the gov makes them sate-affilated.

Twitter's own definition of "state-affiliated media" reads as follows: State-affiliated media is defined as outlets where the state exercises control over editorial content through financial resources, direct or indirect political pressures, and/or control over production and distribution. By this definition, NPR is not state-affiliated.

[dead]

Re: NPR quits Twitter after being labeled as 'state-affiliated media'

#297
post #269

How on earth can anyone say "falsely labeled"? NPR does get money from the federal government, that is an undisputable fact. How are they not "state-affilated"? I don't care how small a % of the budget is money from the government. The fact they take any money at all from the gov makes them sate-affilated.

Twitter's own definition of "state-affiliated media" reads as follows: State-affiliated media is defined as outlets where the state exercises control over editorial content through financial resources, direct or indirect political pressures, and/or control over production and distribution. By this definition, NPR is not state-affiliated.

COMPETES act stuffed 500M for state sponsored anti-PRC propaganda. By that definition all US media should be default suspect of being state affliated. Or charitably state influenced / infiltrated.

Re: NPR quits Twitter after being labeled as 'state-affiliated media'

#298
Musk (and Trump) are really, really good at vocally saying things everyone agrees with to cover the fact they're doing the exact opposite. They're populist champions to such a degree that their supporters (and even the media / independents) can't fathom they don't actually care at all.

Free speech, no wars, anti-corruption in DC, etc. These are all things most people agree with. If some of the stuff Trump/Elon did secretly leaked, people would be going crazy. But they've mastered the art of publicly being hypocrites, to the degree that the average person just genuinely can't wrap their heads around.

Like, how can Elon publish "The Twitter Files" and then literally just do way worst stuff with way less accountability, and have people still believe he's a champion for free speech?

Re: NPR quits Twitter after being labeled as 'state-affiliated media'

#299

I listen to NPR station in the car. Anecdotally, very little of the content is true journalism; much of it is effectively op-ed. That's not necessarily a bad thing, provived you understand what you're consuming. The state-funded tag is a bit much. But to claim NPR is a pure journalism play isn't accurate either.

The problem with NPR right now is that good content and content creators get snatched up immediately by bigger organizations once they gain any traction at NPR.

Joshua Johnson and his show 1A was the main case of this for me. The guy was running a top-notch show before NBC yoinked him up to the big leagues.

Re: NPR quits Twitter after being labeled as 'state-affiliated media'

#300
post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That excerpt isn't about their funding. The CPB funds (in part) public radio stations . Many of those public radio stations purchase NPR-produced content . (And from other similar providers like American Public Media (Marketplace), PRX (This American Life), etc.) NPR's customers can't afford NPR's offerings without said Federal funding, which is why NPR's particularly interested in it.

An agency that is federally funded through 1 layer of intermediaries is still, in the most practical sense, federally funded.

By this logic there would so many companies that are "federally funded" that the label itself would become irrelevant.
Post reply on HN