Our weekly roundup of news found at the intersection of media, politics, policy and technology, from the Shorenstein Center and from around the web.
This Week at the Shorenstein Center
Combating Fake News: An Agenda for Research and Action. Where does fake news come from, why do people believe it, and how can its negative effects be mitigated? Which tactics are effective in stopping its spread, and what research is still needed in order to better foster information systems that encourage a culture of truth? A new report, written by Matthew Baum (Shorenstein Center), David Lazer (Northeastern), and others, addresses these questions and offers ideas for researchers, news outlets, and social media platforms hoping to take the next step in combating fake news.
Reporting on lobbying: An introduction, tips and examples, from Journalist’s Resource.
News from Faculty, Fellows, and Students
What the Press Still Doesn’t Get About Trump. Leah Wright Rigueur, Assistant Professor of Public Policy at HKS, writes that “three months into his presidency, the media still don’t seem to know how to handle Trump’s continued social media outbursts.”
The 100 Days That Turned America Upside Down. Neal Gabler, fall 2011 fellow, writes that President Trump “has not disrupted the system, if by ‘system’ you mean the prevailing social order…His disruption has been of the epistemological and moral sort.”
Trump’s Mexico border wall is so high, you can’t get over it. Melinda Henneberger, spring 2013 fellow, writes that people should not have been so “literal-minded as to think that when Donald Trump spoke of building a big, beautiful wall along our southern border, he meant an actual brick-and-mortar structure.”
NPR Adds Terence Samuel as Deputy Managing Editor. Terence Samuel, spring 2003 fellow, joins from The Washington Post.
From the Kennedy School Review. Students write about what it means to be Muslim in the U.S., and how the Trump administration could affect social innovation.
President Trump—and the Media’s—First 100 Days
- After 100 days, the media are still embarrassing themselves covering Trump. Just not as much. From The Washington Post.
- How journalists should handle the next 100 days of Trump’s presidency, from Poynter.
- How has political fact-checking changed after Trump’s first 100 days? Not much. From Poynter.
- Under Trump’s first 100 Days, FOIA a little slower while open data takes a hit, from MuckRock.
- What It’s Really Like to Cover Trump, from
Social Media and Democracy
- Can technology rescue democracy? A collection of essays from technologists and scholars about how machines are reshaping civil society, from The Atlantic.
- In 3 charts, here’s how President Trump’s tweets differ from candidate Trump’s tweets, from The Washington Post.
- Analysis shows declining engagement with Trump’s tweets, from Associated Press.
- Free software to reveal how Facebook election posts are targeted, from The Guardian.
- Facebook admits governments used it to spread propaganda, from Vice News.
More on Fake News
- In Europe’s Election Season, Tech Vies to Fight Fake News, from The New York Times.
- Newsonomics: Can a master blacklist choke off fake news’ money supply? From Nieman Lab.
- It turns out people are very bad at estimating the magnitude of the fake news problem, from Nieman Lab.
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