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 programming, thereby weakening the institution."
"Elimination of federal funding would result in fewer programs, less journalism—especially local journalism—and eventually the loss of public radio stations, particularly in rural and economically distressed communities."
Good. It's clear now that Twitter is just an information control mechanism for Musk, and journalists should quit their addiction to it. I think every major news outlet should have their own ActivityPub compatible service, essentially as a modern replacement for RSS.
> Twitter is just an information control mechanism for Musk, and journalists should quit
agreed. That was the case long before Musk.
Would you have felt comfortable articulating that opinion, two years ago? When anything but Twitter was "an extremist echo chamber"? When the only censorship they were indulging in was the censorship we still can't talk about?
Email remains undefeated as the original, indestructible, federated social network. It's a shame about the flub with Google Buzz, that could've been the basis for something great.
Strange that labelling medias with their true funding diminishes their credibility so much that they’d flee to any place where this information is not disclosed.
I wonder if this will have any domino effect, right now the only thing holding Twitter together is its network effects. According to the article on NPR's site[0], they have 8.7 million followers and run 52 different accounts so Twitter is losing a pretty important partner.
Also, no mention of Mastodon in this announcement. It sounds like they're just going to use Facebook for the time being.
NPR's funding does not come solely from direct appropriation. NPR receives a higher amount of federal funding than what is commonly believed. It is difficult to determine the exact amount of federal funding because it is hidden within the fees paid by local affiliates. These local affiliates receive a significant portion of their funding from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which is itself funded by federal tax dollars.
Congressional appropriation > Corporation for Public Broadcasting > grants for local affiliates > fee paid to NPR
I'm sure NPR does some good work, and while I believe it is biased, I've found it to be less biased than CNN or MSNBC. I don't understand why NPR objects to being labeled as either state funded or state affiliated. It was established by an act of Congress, for one thing, and according to its own website, and its own disclosures, it does depend on federal funding. And that figure is substantially more than the claimed 1%. The 1% funding figure is misleading because it implies that the only kind of state funding is that coming directly from the federal government. The figure is much higher when you consider indirect state funding, the fact of NPR taking in dues from affiliates that are substantially dependent on federal grants or state and local grants or money that comes from public schools and public universities, all of which are funded by or subsidized by government.
In addition to the 1% figure being a lie, the writer of this piece failed to disclose that he is literally an employee of NPR. I guess it wasn't difficult to find out, but still...
The "state affiliated" label on Twitter was originally applied to sources that are not editorially independent from their states. Twitter put this label on NPR, then removed an explicit mention of NPR as non-state-affiliated from their public policy related to the label, then removed the mention of editorial independence from the policy entirely, then changed the label to "state funded."
I think it's easy to see why NPR objected to the initial "affiliated" labeling, and that they see the new one as just a quick wording change to try to bat back some criticism, but that it carries the same stigma.
The poster here on HN just happened to post the version from WBUR's website. Also, I don't know if it was edited later or not, but the piece both on NPR's site and WBUR's site has a disclosure at the end explicitly stating that it's NPR reporting on itself.
It does disclose it... this is at the end of the article:
Disclosure: This story was reported and written by NPR Media Correspondent David Folkenflik and edited by Acting Chief Business Editor Emily Kopp and Managing Editor Vickie Walton-James. NPR's Bobby Allyn and Mary Yang contributed to this story. Under NPR's protocol for reporting on itself, no corporate official or news executive reviewed this story before it was posted publicly.
WBUR is an NPR station, not only is it not difficult to find out the writer is an employee of NPR, it's out in the open and advertised as such. Do writers need to disclose on every article that they're employees of the organization they're writing for?
Seems like a funny reaction to a label added as a subtitle to an organization with the name National Public Radio
People get attached to words or phrases without thinking about what they actually mean, seems like definitions get modified to emotionally herd the [un]imaginative/initiated
Wild that style of thinking goes that high up the chain at NPR the CEO sounds child-like with their response
This seems perfectly fair to me and I don't understand the controversy. Maybe in the US people see "State Affiliated" as some kind of an insult? Public broadcasters like the BBC and Al Jazeera have done extraordinary work at times.
That being said it would only be fair to also include a badge for private media corporations that says who their parent corporation is.
My general take on this is that people can make whatever arguments they want about whether NPR is According-To-Hoyle state media (I don't think it is, by the spirit of the term, but it's a gnarly enough question that I wouldn't want to burn a whole thread trying to hash it out).
The real issue here is: if Twitter is going to continue to be ad-sponsored for commercial viability, running a social media platform that chases National Public Radio off is very bad for business. You already have major national brands hesitant to re-engage there (whether you like their reasons or not). Playing chicken with NPR and losing is an awfully powerful arrow to put in the anti-Twitter quiver at those companies.
I wouldn't want to look at this through the lens of politics, so much as just plain mismanagement. It's part of a broader theme of Twitter, which depends utterly on user-generated content, doing things to deliberately antagonize the minority of their user base that actually produces content people want to see.
State affiliated media indicates state run media... i.e. propaganda for the State. NPR is in no way propaganda for the State. It's probably the furthest a media outlet could be from such a thing. This as an example of people putting their own political ideologies above all else and labeling the things that don't necessarily support them as propaganda. It's wrong and short sighted.
The Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) receives about half a billion dollars annually from Federal grants, and then channels that funding into subsidiaries like PBS and NPR.
Funding from a benefactor is known to create bias.
I'm concerned about NPR's statements which almost resembles some kind of pathology, because the statements look like a mix of denial and/or rationalisation. We are seeing outright denial, that they only get a little bit of federal funding... or rationalisation like that funding is just a small portion of our tiny budget...
The fact is that in 2021 Public Radio received about ~$100 Million, and about the same in 2022. If these estimation are wrong, they are leaning towards the conservative side, and would likely go higher. I'm pulling the data from the CPB financial statements, and mostly glossing over the details, yanking data from the executive summary.
Please, by all means dispute this data. I'd love to be persuaded that this is all somehow wrong. But right now it looks like NPR & PBS are both affiliated with the Federal government because they get significant funding from there, alongside donations.
How on earth can anyone say "falsely labeled"? NPR does get money from the federal government, that is an undisputable fact. How are they not "state-affilated"? I don't care how small a % of the budget is money from the government. The fact they take any money at all from the gov makes them sate-affilated.
Twitter's own definition of "state-affiliated media" reads as follows:
State-affiliated media is defined as outlets where the state exercises control over editorial content through financial resources, direct or indirect political pressures, and/or control over production and distribution.
In their rebuttal [0] to this, they cited a statement from the White House Press Secretary:
> When asked about Twitter's decision during the White House's daily briefing, press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre declined to address Twitter's content rules specifically. But she also defended NPR's journalism.
> "There is no doubt of the independence of NPR journalists," Jean-Pierre said. "If you've ever been on the receiving end of their questions, you know this."
Great, so you agree that Tesla and SpaceX must also be labeled as state-affiliated, right? And of course every single company that took PPP money, and...
Okay, so when big media corps get cut deals by government, are they now state-affiliated? Is Disney state-affiliated, with no editorial independence, because Florida had granted them their own little kingdom? Your post might as well say: "I don't care what the facts are, my minds made up that NPR is a mouthpiece for the state." It's just not at all true. Stations pay for NPR content, and stations are member driven, despite subsidy. The federal government has no more say in NPRs content than anyone else's.
By this logic, Tesla is also "state-affiliated". A huge amount of companies in this country receive government subsidies, are they all "state-affiliated" media? The NPR journalists act independently from any government oversight, they are not part of the government's media apparatus
I think folks who don’t follow the media industry would be surprised how much federal money makes its way around. The U.S. military alone has an annual marketing budget over $400 million, most of which goes to media companies.
There is also the 2nd order effect of major government contractors who spend heavily on brand advertising, which is in turned funded by revenue from government contracts. NPR actually gets most of its “government funding” this way, as private membership dues from local radio stations (who themselves receive some federal grants).
Personally what matters to me is editorial independence from the government, not where single digits of revenue come from. And NPR is undeniably as editorially self-directed as any other media company.
> The fact they take any money at all from the gov makes them sate-affilated.
Let's leave out the Elno companies that take gov money hand over fist, why is this label not applied to every company that gets tax benefits, took out govt loans?
"At this point I have lost my faith in the decision-making at Twitter," he says. I would need some time to understand whether Twitter can be trusted again."
Is NPR state funded? (real question - I actually don't know). What is the definition of state funded? Here in Canada all the media take government subsidies especially the big ones - a lot of that I think is the economics, they simply don't generate enough revenue on their own to sustain themselves so in the process of being subsidized by the federal govt they take on the viewpoint that can be considered statist. You just can't bite the hand that feeds you. The step that comes before independence of thoughts has to be independence of economics.
Well, there is an interesting history here. E.g. in 2000 NPR (and CNN) allowed the US Army's Psychological Operations division to place military members in the newsroom as interns as part of a media training program:
> "PSYOPS is a division of the U.S. Army mandated to “develop and disseminate propaganda designed to lower the morale” of “enemy forces,” and to “build support among the civil population” in other countries for U.S. objectives (U.S. Army Field Manual No. 100-15)."
I'm fairly certain that if a Russian media company had a history of hosting Russian military psyops people in its newsroom, or if hired ex-military and ex-intelligence officers as commentators, it'd get the 'state-affiliated' label on platforms like Youtube, Facebook, Twitter etc. without any controversy.
[+] [-] starbase|2 years ago|reply
"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 programming, thereby weakening the institution."
"Elimination of federal funding would result in fewer programs, less journalism—especially local journalism—and eventually the loss of public radio stations, particularly in rural and economically distressed communities."
https://www.npr.org/about-npr/178660742/public-radio-finance...
[+] [-] tapoxi|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] h2odragon|2 years ago|reply
agreed. That was the case long before Musk.
Would you have felt comfortable articulating that opinion, two years ago? When anything but Twitter was "an extremist echo chamber"? When the only censorship they were indulging in was the censorship we still can't talk about?
[+] [-] corndoge|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] riffic|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] xnx|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|2 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] eastbound|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bagels|2 years ago|reply
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.
[+] [-] segasaturn|2 years ago|reply
Also, no mention of Mastodon in this announcement. It sounds like they're just going to use Facebook for the time being.
0: https://www.npr.org/2023/04/12/1169269161/npr-leaves-twitter...
[+] [-] misssocrates|2 years ago|reply
Why do they keep saying they receive almost nothing, yet at the same time say government funding is essential to their operation?
[+] [-] bilekas|2 years ago|reply
It's state affiliated. Like Tesla. Like any company who received covid relief. Tax breaks etc.
Less than 1 percentage is simply not influential. It's disingenuous to say it's owned by the government.
[+] [-] crisdux|2 years ago|reply
Congressional appropriation > Corporation for Public Broadcasting > grants for local affiliates > fee paid to NPR
[+] [-] jtr1|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fdschoeneman|2 years ago|reply
In addition to the 1% figure being a lie, the writer of this piece failed to disclose that he is literally an employee of NPR. I guess it wasn't difficult to find out, but still...
[+] [-] zerocrates|2 years ago|reply
I think it's easy to see why NPR objected to the initial "affiliated" labeling, and that they see the new one as just a quick wording change to try to bat back some criticism, but that it carries the same stigma.
In terms of the affiliation of the author, this is a story written by NPR itself: https://www.npr.org/2023/04/12/1169269161/npr-leaves-twitter...
The poster here on HN just happened to post the version from WBUR's website. Also, I don't know if it was edited later or not, but the piece both on NPR's site and WBUR's site has a disclosure at the end explicitly stating that it's NPR reporting on itself.
[+] [-] kenjackson|2 years ago|reply
Disclosure: This story was reported and written by NPR Media Correspondent David Folkenflik and edited by Acting Chief Business Editor Emily Kopp and Managing Editor Vickie Walton-James. NPR's Bobby Allyn and Mary Yang contributed to this story. Under NPR's protocol for reporting on itself, no corporate official or news executive reviewed this story before it was posted publicly.
What more do you want?
[+] [-] lgdskhglsa|2 years ago|reply
https://www.wbur.org/about
[+] [-] gloghmalogh|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kaeresten_dit|2 years ago|reply
People get attached to words or phrases without thinking about what they actually mean, seems like definitions get modified to emotionally herd the [un]imaginative/initiated
Wild that style of thinking goes that high up the chain at NPR the CEO sounds child-like with their response
[+] [-] pphysch|2 years ago|reply
If you think that is a coincidence, and NPR is totally not de facto state-media, I have a bridge to sell you.
Props to Twitter's new leadership for doing what is ostensibly right, though who knows what their motivation is.
[+] [-] hidden80|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] reso|2 years ago|reply
That being said it would only be fair to also include a badge for private media corporations that says who their parent corporation is.
[+] [-] bryanlarsen|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jpmattia|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Arborealist|2 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] tptacek|2 years ago|reply
The real issue here is: if Twitter is going to continue to be ad-sponsored for commercial viability, running a social media platform that chases National Public Radio off is very bad for business. You already have major national brands hesitant to re-engage there (whether you like their reasons or not). Playing chicken with NPR and losing is an awfully powerful arrow to put in the anti-Twitter quiver at those companies.
I wouldn't want to look at this through the lens of politics, so much as just plain mismanagement. It's part of a broader theme of Twitter, which depends utterly on user-generated content, doing things to deliberately antagonize the minority of their user base that actually produces content people want to see.
[+] [-] gaoshan|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] parasense|2 years ago|reply
https://cpb.org/appropriation/history
Funding from a benefactor is known to create bias.
I'm concerned about NPR's statements which almost resembles some kind of pathology, because the statements look like a mix of denial and/or rationalisation. We are seeing outright denial, that they only get a little bit of federal funding... or rationalisation like that funding is just a small portion of our tiny budget...
The fact is that in 2021 Public Radio received about ~$100 Million, and about the same in 2022. If these estimation are wrong, they are leaning towards the conservative side, and would likely go higher. I'm pulling the data from the CPB financial statements, and mostly glossing over the details, yanking data from the executive summary.
https://cpb.org/sites/default/files/aboutcpb/financials/audi...
Please, by all means dispute this data. I'd love to be persuaded that this is all somehow wrong. But right now it looks like NPR & PBS are both affiliated with the Federal government because they get significant funding from there, alongside donations.
[+] [-] hitpointdrew|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] NickM|2 years ago|reply
State-affiliated media is defined as outlets where the state exercises control over editorial content through financial resources, direct or indirect political pressures, and/or control over production and distribution.
By this definition, NPR is not state-affiliated.
[+] [-] JohnFen|2 years ago|reply
In that case, very nearly every business (including mom and pop shops) is "state affiliated" and one has to ask why NPR is being singled out for this.
[+] [-] chatmasta|2 years ago|reply
> When asked about Twitter's decision during the White House's daily briefing, press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre declined to address Twitter's content rules specifically. But she also defended NPR's journalism.
> "There is no doubt of the independence of NPR journalists," Jean-Pierre said. "If you've ever been on the receiving end of their questions, you know this."
[0] https://www.npr.org/2023/04/05/1168158549/twitter-npr-state-...
[+] [-] clipsy|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] smolder|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kaesar14|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gamblor956|2 years ago|reply
SpaceX actually gets significantly more money, in absolute and relative terms, of its budget from the federal government than NPR.
[+] [-] snowwrestler|2 years ago|reply
There is also the 2nd order effect of major government contractors who spend heavily on brand advertising, which is in turned funded by revenue from government contracts. NPR actually gets most of its “government funding” this way, as private membership dues from local radio stations (who themselves receive some federal grants).
Personally what matters to me is editorial independence from the government, not where single digits of revenue come from. And NPR is undeniably as editorially self-directed as any other media company.
[+] [-] mochomocha|2 years ago|reply
Less than 1% of their funding is from the government.
Tesla received billions in government subsidies... Is it state-affiliated?
[+] [-] asveikau|2 years ago|reply
The difference between these is obvious.
[+] [-] unknown|2 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] newfonewhodis|2 years ago|reply
Let's leave out the Elno companies that take gov money hand over fist, why is this label not applied to every company that gets tax benefits, took out govt loans?
[+] [-] greenie_beans|2 years ago|reply
just slap that label on every single food product.
[+] [-] cortesoft|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fknorangesite|2 years ago|reply
All this demonstrates is that you don't know what "state affiliated" actually means.
[+] [-] jonstewart|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] wayeq|2 years ago|reply
Welcome to the club.
[+] [-] euix|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mleafer|2 years ago|reply
[+] [-] photochemsyn|2 years ago|reply
https://fair.org/home/psyops-in-the-newsroom/
> "PSYOPS is a division of the U.S. Army mandated to “develop and disseminate propaganda designed to lower the morale” of “enemy forces,” and to “build support among the civil population” in other countries for U.S. objectives (U.S. Army Field Manual No. 100-15)."
I'm fairly certain that if a Russian media company had a history of hosting Russian military psyops people in its newsroom, or if hired ex-military and ex-intelligence officers as commentators, it'd get the 'state-affiliated' label on platforms like Youtube, Facebook, Twitter etc. without any controversy.