Trump's War On "Fake News"- Another Epic Fail....

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Lord Jim
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Trump's War On "Fake News"- Another Epic Fail....

Post by Lord Jim »

There's certainly plenty to be depressed about as The Mad King continues to melt down, but there's at least one bright spot...

Il Boobce's insidious war on the concept of truth and his non-stop efforts to discredit journalists and news organizations who report truthfully about him is failing badly...(Except of course among the hardcore Trumpanzees, but then they were already strangers to reason)

In fact Trump's efforts to discredit anyone who reports honestly about him have backfired; he has greatly improved the opinion most Americans have of mainstream press:
voters trust the media more than Trump 57 - 31 percent to tell the truth about important issues.
https://poll.qu.edu/national/release-de ... aseID=2456
Trump's attacks on CNN aren't hurting it one bit

President Trump keeps calling CNN fake news, but his administration’s positive effect on the cable news network’s business is real.

CNN President Jeff Zucker said Thursday that the recent ratings lift fueled by viewer fascination with the early days of the Trump presidency is putting the Turner Broadcasting unit on track for another record year of profitability.

“There is a tremendous amount of interest,” Zucker said during a press lunch held Thursday.

In the first seven weeks of 2017, CNN’s ratings are up 36% over the same period last year and 51% in the 25- to 54-year-old age group that advertisers seek most when they buy news programming.
http://www.latimes.com/business/hollywo ... story.html

And at "The Failing New York Times":
Thanks to Trump, the New York Times added more subscribers in three months than in all of 2015

Donald Trump’s war against the media has been good for business at the “failing” New York Times.

The publication, which the US president has mocked on Twitter, as “dishonest” and “fake news,” just posted record subscriber growth on its digital-news platform.

During the last three months of 2016, the Times added 276,000 net digital-only subscribers for its news product, which includes access to NYTimes.com and all NYTimes apps, the company announced (pdf) today. That’s more than the 184,000 net subscribers who signed up for the news organization’s digital editions in the whole of 2015

https://qz.com/901684/thanks-to-trump-t ... l-of-2015/

Trump says NYT 'failing' -- but stock up 30% since election

On Wednesday, Trump attacked one of his favorite targets, the New York Times, tweeting from his @realdonaldtrump account.

"Remember when the failing @nytimes apologized to its subscribers, right after the election, because their coverage was so wrong. Now worse!"

Trump loves to claim that the publisher is "failing," but that idea needs to be fact checked, because shares of New York Times Co (NYT). are up 30% since he was elected president. If that's a failure, what's his definition of success?

http://money.cnn.com/2017/03/29/media/d ... mes-stock/
And The Washington Post:
Big Newspapers Are Booming: 'Washington Post' To Add 60 Newsroom Jobs

The Washington Post expects to hire more than 60 journalists in the coming months — a sign of remarkable growth for a newspaper in the digital age.

After a year of record traffic and digital advertising revenue, the Post newsroom will grow by more than 8 percent, to more than 750 people. The extent of the newsroom expansion was first reported by Politico. The Post will add a "rapid-response" investigative team, expand its video journalism and breaking news staff, and make additional investments in podcasts and photography.

Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos bought the Post in October 2013 and reportedly invested $50 million in the company last year. That investment is paying off, according to a memo from publisher Fred Ryan that said the Post is now "a profitable and growing company." Ryan said the Post's online traffic had increased by nearly 50 percent in the past year, and new subscriptions have grown by 75 percent, more than doubling digital subscription revenue.

Meanwhile, subscriptions at The New York Times have also surged. Times CEO Mark Thompson said on CNBC that the paper added 132,000 new subscribers in the 18 days after the election, a tenfold increase over the same period a year ago. The Los Angeles Times and The Wall Street Journal also reported record growth in subscriptions.

In June, Donald Trump revoked the Post's press credentials at his campaign events, before lifting the ban on the Post and other news organizations two months later.
http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/ ... sroom-jobs

With this many new news junkies, Donald Trump can be as rude to the media as he likes
Donald J. Trump

@realDonaldTrump

The FAKE NEWS media (failing @nytimes, @NBCNews, @ABC, @CBS, @CNN) is not my enemy, it is the enemy of the American People!
1:48 PM - 17 Feb 2017
On Feb. 16, a day before posting that, the US president held his first solo press conference—dubbed the “stress conference” by late-night host Stephen Colbert—in which Donald Trump railed against critical coverage of his administration by news outlets like CNN and the New York Times.

Trump has been a vocal critic of the mainstream media for years. And, as president, he’s used his pulpit, among other things, to slam liberal-leaning publications and discredit news reports he claims are false with cries of “fake news.” But there’s one byproduct of Trump’s war with the media that he likely didn’t count on.

The attention he’s paid the press has drawn droves of readers and viewers to the very media outlets he’s bashed.

Cable-TV news networks CNN and MSNBC posted 77% and 87% year-over-year growth, respectively, in total viewers for 2016—marking CNN’s most-watched year ever. January was also strong for those networks. And CNN CEO Jeff Zucker said that Trump’s remarks had not damaged the network’s brand, citing research commissioned by the company (paywall).

Online readership is up at news sites including The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post, according to data from industry tracker ComScore. (All those sites have a paywall.)

During the last quarter of 2016, the New York Times added 276,000 net digital-only subscribers—more than all the subscribers who signed up for the service the entire previous year. Conde Nast’s Vanity Fair set a single-day company-wide record after Trump tweeted that the publication’s circulation was “way down, big trouble, dead!” in December.

By pointing out that these outlets businesses are “failing,” which they are not, Trump also seems to have awakened in mainstream audiences a realization that they need to pay to support a free and independent press.
https://qz.com/912021/the-more-trump-ba ... -finances/

It's unfortunate that it took a catastrophe of the dimensions of a Donald Trump becoming President to finally get millions of Americans to stir from their complacency about our democracy and start paying attention to what the hell is going on, but at least it's happening...
Last edited by Lord Jim on Fri May 12, 2017 3:47 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Guinevere
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Re: Trump's War On "Fake News"- Another Epic Fail....

Post by Guinevere »

Agreed. I've added paid subscriptions to the NYTimes, the Washington Post, and Vanity Fair (where the EIC does an amazing skewering of the Trumpanzee every month), in the last 6 months (I used to just read the free versions of the NYT and Post). And I read news from a variety of other sources, including CNN, NPR, BBC, WSJ, Economist (I use my Swede's log-ins for Economist and WSJ).
“I ask no favor for my sex. All I ask of our brethren is that they take their feet off our necks.” ~ Ruth Bader Ginsburg, paraphrasing Sarah Moore Grimké

Burning Petard
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Re: Trump's War On "Fake News"- Another Epic Fail....

Post by Burning Petard »

Are we gonna get a Trump version of the Nixon Tapes?

The president tweeted something that the ex-FBI director better hope the recording of their dinner conversation is not released to contradict what he is 'leaking' to the press.

Me, IMNSHO, it ain't leaking when you intentionally turn on the spigot and let it run where everyone can see it and have access to it.

snailgate.

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BoSoxGal
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Re: Trump's War On "Fake News"- Another Epic Fail....

Post by BoSoxGal »

I just signed up for the $10.50/mo. digital only access to the New York Times; I was using up my 10 free monthly articles in just the first few days and decided it was worth the belt tightening. As an aside, I just watched a fascinating documentary on the NYT from a few years back, called Page One. Well worth a look.

Trump's core idiot supporters won't be much affected by this rise in interest in responsible journalism - see our resident rabid Trump fan's assertions just today regarding news coverage. We are seeing something very alarming revealed about the mental health, intelligence or common sense of these folks who persist in defending this President in the face of such obvious crookedness.

Were there so many diehard Nixonites who refused to believe him to be a crook even in the face of all the evidence?
For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.
~ Carl Sagan

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Lord Jim
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Re: Trump's War On "Fake News"- Another Epic Fail....

Post by Lord Jim »

Were there so many diehard Nixonites who refused to believe him to be a crook even in the face of all the evidence?


On August 5th, 1974, (Four days before he resigned) a poll came out showing him with a 24% approval rating...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_St ... val_rating

That date (8/5/74) is particularly significant, because it was the day the so-called "smoking gun" tape was released...

A tape of a conversation between Nixon and his chief of staff HR Haldeman on June 23rd, 1972 (six days after the Watergate Break-in) where Nixon orders the FBI to end its investigation into the Break-in...(Gee, sound familiar?)

Since the poll came out on the same day the tape was released, it didn't reflect public reaction to the revelation that led to the complete collapse of Nixon's political support in Congress and his resignation...

Presumably a poll taken a few days later would have shown a lower level of support...

There was a good portion of Nixon's die hard supporters who fully understood that he had committed crimes in covering up Watergate, but considered it minor and just didn't care, because they thought that despite that he was a good President, and shouldn't be forced out...

But bear in mind, Richard Nixon had spent 20 years in public life even before he was elected in '68 building up a hardcore base of supporters...

A little less than 2 years ago, there was no such thing as a Trump supporter, so what his "bottom" is in terms of popular support is anybody's guess...
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Re: Trump's War On "Fake News"- Another Epic Fail....

Post by Bicycle Bill »

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-"BB"-
Yes, I suppose I could agree with you ... but then we'd both be wrong, wouldn't we?

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