“The analysis of content aired and published by Radio and Television Martí, a sister agency to the better-known Voice of America, was launched by the broadcasters’ parent organization.” It found that Martís content routinely fails to meet standards of fairness, sometimes descends into outlandish propaganda — and that none of this is due to the direction of any Trump administration official. – The Washington Post
Category: media
Trying To Combat Trolls, Rotten Tomatoes Changes Its Audience Rating Scoring
The site’s standard user rating will now reflect only moviegoers who can prove they’ve bought a ticket to see it in a theater. – Variety
Hollywood Has Spent Lots Of Money Setting Up Production Facilities In Georgia. With Controversy Over Abortion Laws, Will The Studios Back Away?
“Georgia’s recent passage of a highly restrictive abortion law has turned its once cozy relationship with Tinsel Town into a fraught one, and put Hollywood’s liberal politics on a collision course with its own economic interests in the state. … But the industry’s response to the law has been far from unified. There have been pledges to boycott Georgia and promises to stay. Most strikingly, there has been near total silence from top studio brass.” – The New York Times
PBS NewsHour Gets $1.7 Million Grant To Beef Up Arts Coverage
Yes, Antonio Banderas Is Totally Playing Pedro Almodóvar In Their New Movie — And Yes, Says Banderas, It Was Weird
“It’s weird to play a character who lived, more weird if he’s still alive — because he’s producing more information every day — and extraordinarily rare that he is behind the camera saying, ‘Action!’ to you. To deal with all of these things was not easy.” – The New York Times
Alabama Public Television Just Blocked Broadcast Of The Cartoon Wedding Of A Rat And An Aardvark
“When the children’s television show Arthur made headlines last week for an episode in which the beloved teacher Mr. Ratburn marries his male aardvark partner, Alabama viewers saw only a rerun of an old episode.” In explanation, APT’s programming director said in a statement, “parents trust that their children can watch APT without their supervision.” – Slate
A Brief History Of The Laugh Track — The Shame Of Sitcoms? Or The Sine Qua Non?
“TV and film star David Niven griped in 1955 that ‘the laugh track is the greatest single affront to public intelligence I know of.’ … But consider for a moment the unheralded achievements of the laugh track. It allowed directors to leave their live studio audiences behind and shoot scenes on location. It gave at-home viewers someone to laugh along with. And, if you believe the sparse scientific research and the anecdotal evidence from Hollywood, it made jokes funnier.” – Quartz
The ‘Gomorrah’ Housing Project In Naples Will Be Torn Down
“Just a few years ago, Le Vele – a sprawling housing estate in Scampia, on the outskirts of Naples – was both the fictional location for the hit crime film and Italian TV series Gomorrah and the real-life location for the biggest international drugs and arms supermarket in western Europe.” But no more. “Unusually, the effort to demolish the buildings has been led by the residents themselves.” – The Guardian
Why NBC Backed Out Of Airing ‘Hair Live!’
Turns out it wasn’t because of the ratings for Rent [kinda] Live! (the worst ever for a live TV musical) or even the naked hippies at the end of Act I (well, maybe a little). No, what killed Hair Live! was, one might say, a fire-breathing dragon. – Adweek
Could New “Indie” Social Media Sites Solve What’s Bad About Social Media?
Could the IndieWeb movement—or a streamlined, user-friendly version of it to come—succeed in redeeming the promise of social media? If we itemize the woes currently afflicting the major platforms, there’s a strong case to be made that the IndieWeb avoids them. – The New Yorker