Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

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

wbur.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

561–570 of 1001 posts

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

#561

Post by hot_gril »

jacquesm wrote: post #460
hot_gril wrote: post #408

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why else do they get this source of funding that other networks don't have? (Though this is still just a theory and not reason to slap "govt-affiliated" on them. "Govt-funded" is fair.)

You should look into their origin story if you want an answer. And no, Govt-Funded is also not fair absent an indication of editorial control. The BBC in the UK, the NOS in NL, NPR in the United States, and so on are all official channels but they also have their own editorial staff and only in very rare cases does the government directly intervene in the production (and usually simultaneously on other channels as we…

NPR was created after the signing of the Public Broadcasting Act of 1967 aiming to increase public education through media, which doesn't really answer my question.

> Govt-Funded is also not fair absent an indication of editorial control

But they're govt-funded. BBC is too.

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

#562

Post by donio »

anigbrowl wrote: post #397
hklgny wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone likes to blame the server interface, but honestly that's not so bad and I think most people get over it. Mastodon's real problem in my opinion is that its primary audience today doesn't actually want anyone new to join - it's VERY toxic for newcomers who don't fit a specific mold. It's a shame, cause we really do need something new. I'm hoping some of the new decentralized ones take off. Edit: I think the co…

This is survivor bias. If you're a non-tech person signing up for a new service, the federation aspect is just wizard talk and it's not obvious what difference it makes. Most people do not want to go on side quests to find other people they know or figure out which digital village they live in, especially not as the first stage in the onboarding process.

People manage to deal with this when they sign up for their email account. It's just that we don't (yet) have the equivalent of gmail (or hotmail, aol before that) as a default option.

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

#563

Post by woooooo »

jacquesm wrote: post #492
woooooo wrote: post #377

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's still federally funded. Twitter probably shouldn't have gotten into labeling who is and isn't state funded, but if they are, US/UK/NATO orgs should be fair game alongside the Russians and Chinese. NPR labeling the "state-funded media" claim as "false" when its trivially, factually true is a bad look for them as a fact-based organization.

It's irrelevant, the label implies control like with the Russians and the Chinese, and that control simply isn't there.

1. "True but we think it's irrelevant" does not equate to "false".

2. "But america are the good guys" is the exact kind of thing you see uniformly from all American media including NPR.

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

#564

Post by ta321099 »

akira2501 wrote: post #472
bagels wrote: post #317

Should Twitter itself get a state sponsored label for getting concessions from San Francisco on their headquarters? https://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/S-F-controller-hails-... Should Elon's account (or SpaceX or Telsa) have the same label because of their significant government funding? It's hard to see this as anything but silly politics games.

> Should Elon's account (or SpaceX or Telsa) have the same label because of their significant government funding? Are they a "media" company primarily dedicated to the practice of journalism?

[dead]

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

#565

Post by 908B64B197 »

hklgny wrote: post #280
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> no mention of Mastodon in this announcement Mastodon blew its moment. It could have eaten Twitter’s lunch. But onboarding—specifically, choosing a server—was too tedious for non-niche adoption.

Everyone likes to blame the server interface, but honestly that's not so bad and I think most people get over it. Mastodon's real problem in my opinion is that its primary audience today doesn't actually want anyone new to join - it's VERY toxic for newcomers who don't fit a specific mold. It's a shame, cause we really do need something new. I'm hoping some of the new decentralized ones take off. Edit: I think the co…

I looked at joining Mastodon.

The first "recommended" server on the Mastodon's official website was something about anime, and the second seemed to be about some "Queer friendly furry community", whatever that means. Then there was one about tech and and the local Bay Area one.

At least, unlike GNU Ring (or whatever it's called nowadays) it didn't just crash on startup.

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

#566

Post by brandonagr2 »

jrussino wrote: post #412
jfengel wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He certainly figured it out, which is why he worked so hard to back out of the deal. Though he never really expected it to earn its price back. As a large-fraction-of-a-trillion-aire, he may well have found that having trolls, clowns, and morons to enjoy his adolescent antics is worth $44B in pure enjoyment. He was buying a chance to put a significant thumb on the finger of world culture. Musk has so much money that…

> he may well have found that having trolls, clowns, and morons to enjoy his adolescent antics is worth $44B in pure enjoyment This is the most disappointing part. I have a hard time imagining that any of these billionaires are "good people" in a way that I would recognize. But before this Twitter thing I felt like at least I can respect the things Musk chooses to spend his time and money on. How much would that $44B…

> How much would that $44B have moved the needle on on his Mars dream

It would make 0 difference, SpaceX is already moving as fast as possible, throwing money at them would not make things go faster. In the future when actual ships start flying to Mars Elon will still have plenty to fund that personally if he needed to.

In other news, the first flight test of the largest rocket ever built is scheduled for Monday the 17th

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

#567

Post by rahimnathwani »

ImPostingOnHN wrote: post #557
rahimnathwani wrote: post #398

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was so surprised by the first statement in your comment, that I stopped reading right there, and searched online to see if I could confirm/deny the statement. Then I wrote a reply without reading the rest of your comment. I didn't say anything about editorial control.

it sounds, then, that you'd agree with an accurate compromise: "receives a small amount of funding from the federal government but maintains editorial independence" all true, so better than the current label

yes

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

#568

Post by philistine »

effingwewt wrote: post #325
pixxel wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

8.7 million followers but take a look at their feed. Go back a week in time (for a snapshot) and the like/retweets/comments are generally in the 10s or low hundreds, with a few exceptions (low thousands). Same with NYT. Last time I looked they had 50+ million followers with similar low engagement. So how many of their followers are bots and what’s NPRs true value to Twitter? I don’t know. I’ve got a small 5k followin…

You hit the nail on the head. Most twitter account followers are nothing but bots. Millions of 'followers' but likes and retweets only in the dozens. It also makes for huge egos. Like, they know they bought all their followers, but they wake up one day and forget, and start to believe their own bullshit. To be fair it is everywhere, youtube accounts will millions of followers do the same. Never more than 200 comments…

Low engagement does not absolutely equate paid bots. Twitter is ooold. I bet the overwhelming majority of NPR followers are inactive accounts by people who signed up somewhere in the '10s and went to the website twice.

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

#570

Post by [deleted] »

jacquesm wrote: post #303
starbase wrote: post #213

Here's what NPR's own website says about their federal funding: "Federal funding is essential to public radio's service to the American public and its continuation is critical for both stations and program producers, including NPR." "Public radio stations receive annual grants directly from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB)" "The loss of federal funding would undermine the stations' ability to pay NPR for…

Besides the fact that they receive only a tiny percentage of their funding from the government the bigger issue is that of editorial control and NPR is pretty clean as far as I can see. Unlike most of the other entities labeled 'State Affiliated Media'. Naming NPR in one breath with those others is intentionally tarnishing them and playing to the crowd, which is something that Elon has been engaging in in a very spec…

[deleted]
Post reply on HN