So much is being written about the topic of journalism and public trust that it’s hard to keep up. The following clips and publications were required or recommended reading, listening or viewing for students in the spring 2018 Pollner seminar at the University of Montana. We’ve grouped them by topic. Please help us keep this resource current by recommending additional links in the comments.
WHY TRUST MATTERS
READ
Ed Williams, Edelman: Why trust matters
Lisa Muller, London School of Economics: The impact of mass media on the quality of democracy within a state
Chris Wallace, Fox News (Washington Post column): The media is giving up its place in our democracy
Ian Gibbs, Media Shift, ‘Trust in News’ Study Shows More Trust for Print Publications Than Digital
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American Press Institute: What makes people trust and rely on news
Reliable Sources, CNN: Trump’s war on the media, one year in
John Sutton, Current: A digital revolution for public radio fundraising (insights into NPR listeners vs. NPR donors)
EROSION OF TRUST
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Robert G. Kaiser, Brookings: The bad news about the news
James Hohmann, Washington Post: The Daily 202: The corrosion of support for First Amendment principles started before Trump. He’s supercharged it.
Gallup survey: Democrats’ Confidence in Mass Media Rises Sharply
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Laura Hazard Owen, Nieman Lab: The era of “truth decay”: 12 things we still don’t know about our weird time
Jennifer Kavanagh and Michael D. Rich, Rand Corporation: Truth Decay: An Initial Exploration of the Diminishing Role of Facts and Analysis in American Public Life
Joy Mayer, Reynolds Journalism Institute: Who trusts and pays for the news?
HOW DID WE GET HERE?
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Derek Thompson, The Atlantic: Why do Americans distrust the media?
Knight Foundation: Ten reasons why American trust in the media is at an all-time low
Melissa Bell, Vox Media: Viewpoint: We Broke the News Media, How Can We Fix Them?
WATCH
LinkedIn editor Isabelle Roughol interviews Geneva Overholser of the Democracy Fund. How the media lost the public’s trust (4:19)
LEARN MORE
John Oliver, Last Week Tonight: Journalism (19:23)
FAKE NEWS
READ
Rasmus Kleis Nielsen and Lucas Graves, Columbia Journalism Review: What do ordinary people think fake news is?
Sol Orwell, Observer: Media Manipulation: How One Tweet Created a Fake News Story Read Over 1M Times
WATCH
CNN: Fake news machine gears up for 2020 (13:17)
NBC News: How to outsmart fake news (1:11)
LEARN MORE
First Draft News: A Field Guide to “Fake News” and Other Information Disorders
The Daily: Fake news, real consequences. Michael Barbaro, host of the New York Times podcast “The Daily,” talks to reporter Caitlin Dickerson about her story of how fake news turned a small town upside down.
PARTISANSHIP
READ
Laura Hazard Owen, Nieman Reports: People just don’t launch non-partisan news sites anymore
Craig Silverman, Buzzfeed: This Is How Your Hyperpartisan Political News Gets Made
LISTEN
Brian Stelter, CNN Reliable Sources podcast: Tracing the roots of conservative skepticism in the media with S.E. Cupp (22:18)
WATCH
Idea Channel, PBS Digital Studios: How NOT To Spot Fake News (11:53)
FACT CHECKING
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Ben McMullin, Poynter: What causes fake news, and what are its solutions?
Niraj Chokshi, New York Times: How to Fight ‘Fake News’ (Warning: It Isn’t Easy)
Bill Adair, MediaShift: An Experiment in Live Fact-Checking the State of the Union Speech by Trump
LEARN MORE
CNN: Tapper fact-checks tax plan claims (3:24)
DOES FACT CHECKING WORK?
READ
Margaret Sullivan, Washington Post: Will the truth win out?
WATCH
Carlos Maza, Vox: Why fact-checking won’t stop Trump’s lies
LEARN MORE
Carole Fader, Florida Times Union: So who’s checking the fact-finders? We are
TECHNOLOGY
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Heather Timmons, Quartz: Google executives are floating a plan to fight fake news on Facebook and Twitter
Alexis C. Madrigal, The Atlantic: Google and Facebook Have Failed Us
Danah Boyd, Wired: Google and Facebook can’t just make fake news disappear
Charlie Warzel, Buzzfeed: He Predicted the 2016 Fake News Crisis. Now He’s Worried About an Information Apocalypse
WATCH
Is facial manipulation the next frontier? Researchers at Stanford, the University of Erlangen-Nurenberg and the Max Planck Institute for Informatics worked on this project. Face2Face (6:36).
LEARN MORE
New York Times: How do Russian Bots Work? (VIDEO)
Brian Stelter, CNN: How to clean up the conspiracy theory pollution that’s making us all sick
REGAINING TRUST PROPOSALS
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Elizabeth Jensen, NPR: Looking To The Future: Restoring Public Trust In The Media
John Daly, Paste Magazine: Three Ways the News Media Can Earn Back Some Credibility
Jeff Jarvis, Medium: A Proposal to Start a Responsible, Reliable, Reasonable Conservative News Organization
Mollie Hemingway, The Federalist: 5 Ways The Media Can Regain The Public Trust
TRUST PROJECTS
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Laura Hazard Owen, NiemanLab: The Trust Project brings news orgs and tech giants together to tag and surface high-quality news
Sean Stroh, Editor and Publisher: Why the Trusting News Project is Aiming to Better Understand Public Trust in Journalism
Anya Schiffrin, Beatrice Santa-Wood, Susanna De Martino, Ellen Hume and Nicole Pope, Global Investigative Journalism Network: Bridging the Gap: Rebuilding Citizen Trust in the Media
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Mark Stencel & Riley Griffin, Reporters Lab: Fact-checking triples over four years
LISTENING
Mollie Hemingway, The Federalist, Trump’s Aide Is Right: Media Do Need To Shut Up And Listen
Teresa Gorman, NPR: How Community Listening Sessions Can Help Stations Reach New Audiences
TRANSPARENCY
READ
Carrie Brown-Smith, NiemanLab: Transparency finally takes off
Tom Rosenstiel, Poynter: Why ‘be transparent’ has replaced ‘act independently’ as a guiding journalism principle
LISTEN
The New York Times podcast, The Daily, often takes its audience behind the scenes. In this episode, you’ll hear a Times reporter describe how he got an exclusive story. The inquiry that’s rattling Washington. Begins at 10:45 in from the start. (Runs 10:42)
DISCLOSURE
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Denise-Marie Ordway, Journalists Resource: What audiences think of journalists’ social media use
Jay Rosen, PressThink: Tell people where you’re coming from (point #9)
Marc Ambinder, The Atlantic: The Ideology of Journalists, a Response to Jay Rosen
CORRECTIONS
READ
Alexios Mantzarlos, Poynter: Journalism can’t afford for corrections to be next victim of ‘fake news’ frenzy
Jack Shafer, Politico: Should Journalists Have the Right to Be Wrong?
WATCH
Could failure be a good way to build trust? Craig Silverman, the author of Regret the Error: How Media Mistakes Pollute the Press and Imperil Free Speech, explains why he thinks the answer is yes in this Tedx talk. (8:56)
ACCOUNTABILITY
READ
Jackie Spinner, CJR: Public editors disappear as media distrust grows
David Ignatius, Washington Post: Bring back the ombudsman
Megan Garber, Nieman Lab: Why the NYT Mag’s editor credits are a great idea
ENGAGEMENT
READ
Taylor Blatchford, MediaShift: What “Engagement Reporting” Is and Why It Matters
Andrew Haeg, Medium: The Engagement Manifesto, Part III
Free Press: Creating an Engaged Newsroom (pages 4-7 and 10-15)
INTERACTION
READ
Adam Felder, The Atlantic: How Comments Shape Perceptions of Sites’ Quality—and Affect Traffic
Mathew Ingram, Gigaom: Guardian digital editor is right — ending comments is a mistake
Shan Wang, Nieman Lab: The Washington Post on Reddit surprises users with its non-promotional, ultra helpful presence
Christine Schmidt, NiemanLab: Can 5,000 strangers have a productive Facebook dialogue? Spaceship Media is about to try
LEARN MORE
New York Times: Comment moderation quiz
DIVERSITY
READ
Bob Papper, RTDNA: Women and minorities in newsrooms
ASNE: 2017 Newsroom Diversity Survey (and explore interactive trends)
Karen K. Ho, Columbia Journalism Review: Diversity in newsrooms has been bad for decades and it probably won’t get better: study
LaToya Dennis, WUWM: Young black men ask Milwaukee media: Why do you cover us the way you do?
Susan Goldberg, National Geographic: For Decades, Our Coverage Was Racist. To Rise Above Our Past, We Must Acknowledge It
REBUILDING THE WALL
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Ira Basen, Globe and Mail: Is that an ad or a news story–and does it matter which?
Rebecca Iannucci, Poynter: News or opinion? Online, it’s hard to tell
WATCH
What is native advertising? Why is it problematic? Last Week Tonight’s John Oliver has an opinion about that. News & advertising. (11:22)
SOLUTIONS JOURNALISM
READ
David Bornstein, Forbes: Why we need solutions journalism
Erika Fredrickson, Missoula Independent: With Missoula’s remaining agricultural land threatened by development, can local farmers learn from Vermont’s example?
WATCH
Solutions Journalism Network: What is solutions journalism? 1:34
TELLING THE STORY
READ
Michael Calderone, Nieman Reports: Journalists Need to Better Explain What Journalists Do
Scott Nover, Poynter: At Poynter Ethics Summit, journalists emphasize importance of trust and transparency in the age of Trump
Logan Jaffe, ProPublica Illinois: How Does Journalism Work? Ask Us Questions. We Can Explain.
WATCH
CNN ad: This is an apple (:30)
ACCURACY AND CONTEXT
READ
Craig Silverman, CJR: Eight Simple Rules for Doing Accurate Journalism
Chip Scanlan, Poynter: Getting it Right: A Passion for Accuracy
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